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The Village People -Y-M-C-A-

The Village People - Y.M.C.A. Lyrics and Youtube Music Videos

Album: Cruisin'
Released: 1978

Y-M-C-A- Lyrics

Y.M.C.A.

Y.M.C.A. stands for "Young Men's Christian Association," which is commonly associated with the gyms that often provide temporary housing to men. The Village People sing about the YMCA as a place where you can hang out with all the boys. It's implied that this is more of a concealed kind of place to gather in-the-closet gay young men so they can leave their worries and troubles behind and let loose. While the lyrics don't contain any specific gay references, the song became a gay anthem.

Producers Jacques Morali and Henri Belolo in 1977 assembled a group designed to attract gay audiences while parodying (some claimed exploiting) that same constituency's stereotypes. Songwriters Phil Hurtt and Peter Whitehead were tabbed to compose songs with gay underpinnings, and roles and costumes were carefully selected; among them were a cowboy, biker, soldier, policeman, and construction worker complete with hard hat.

The songwriting credit on "Y.M.C.A" goes to Morali, Belolo and Victor Willis, who was the policeman in the group.

A common misconception was that Village People were an all-gay troupe. Only cowboy Dave Forrest and indian Felipe Rose were gay; the rest were straight, but they all played gay stereotype roles because the group was marketed to the GLBT community associated with disco at the time. Looking back, it's kind of ridiculous to think that discos were "a gay thing" (nobody was having suspicions of, say, John Travolta), but people didn't think very hard about these things in 1978.

This song has a dance associated with it where people form the letters with their arms. It is commonly performed at weddings and other celebrations, and is extremely popular as it's very easy to do. The Village People introduced the dance moves when they performed the song, and over the years they have sometimes given instructions on how to do it correctly. They say the most common mistakes are in the M and the C: the M is correctly made by touching your fingers in front of you, not by putting your fingers on your shoulders like you're calling a 20-second timeout. The C goes wrong when dancers make the gesture to the right, which to the audience looks flopped. The correct way to make the C is to the left, so it looks like a C to people facing you.

The Village People made a video for this song, which was rare for American acts in 1978, since there was no MTV. In Europe, however, there were many more places to show videos, and that's where the Village People clip got the most views. When MTV launched in 1981, they played a lot of videos from British acts and a few they had from American acts like Devo, but the Village People apparently didn't fit their format.

In 2008, Spin magazine asked some of the Village People about this song. Here are some of the responses:
Randy Jones (cowboy): When I moved to New York in 1975, I joined the McBurney YMCA on 23rd Street. I took Jacques (Morali) there three or four times in 1977, and he loved it. He was fascinated by a place where a person could work out with weights, play basketball, swim, take classes, and get a room. Plus, with Jacques being gay, I had a lot of friends I worked out with who were in the adult-film industry, and he was impressed by meeting people he had seen in the videos and magazines. Those visits with me planted a seed in him, and that's how he got the idea for "Y.M.C.A." - by literally going to the YMCA.

David Hodo (construction worker): We had finished our third album Cruisin', and we needed one more song as a filler. Jacques wrote "Y.M.C.A." in about 20 minutes - the melody, the chorus, the outline. Then he gave it to Victor Willis and said, "Fill in the rest." I was a bit skeptical about some of our hits, but the minute I heard "Y.M.C.A.," I knew we had something special. Because it sounded like a commercial. And everyone likes commercials. "Y.M.C.A." certainly has a gay origin. That's what Jacques was thinking when he wrote it, because our first album [1977's Village People] was possibly the gayest album ever. I mean, look at us. We were a gay group. So was the song written to celebrate gay men at the YMCA? Yes. Absolutely. And gay people love it."

When Spin asked Y.M.C.A. media relations manager Leah Pouw about this song, she replied: "We at the Y.M.C.A. celebrate the song. It's a positive statement about the Y.M.C.A. and what we offer to people all around the world."

This is a very popular song at sporting events, especially baseball games where it is often played between innings. The song plays at Yankee Stadium when the grounds crew dredges the infield. The crew stops to perform that arm gestures at the appropriate times.

The Village People saw this song as no more than an album filler, but Neil Bogart, the president of their record label, saw its potential and made the decision to push it.

The YMCA re-branded its name and logo to its popular nickname, "The Y" on July 11, 2010. The name switch came after research indicated many people didn't understand what the organization did. Village People fans breathed a sigh of relief when the lead singer of the original group, Victor Willis, released a statement to say the change won't affect the song. He added that the dance that goes along with it, in which participants use their arms to make the shape of each letter, is here to stay as well.

Structurally, this is very similar to the first Village People single, "San Francisco (You've Got Me)." Both songs build to a pronounced, 4-syllable chant: Y-M-C-A, San-Fran-Cisc-O.

Jacques Morali wrote the music and produced both tracks, so this makes sense. The lyricists were different, however, as lead singer Victor Willis had replaced Phil Hurtt and Peter Whitehead in this role - something that earned him a great deal in royalties. According to Hurtt , Willis threatened to quit if Phil was brought back to write lyrics. When Willis left the group, Hurtt was called back to write lyrics for the songs in the 1980 Village People movie Can't Stop the Music.

Various versions of the song have been used in a series of UK television adverts for British price comparison website Confused.com since 2010. The commercials use the music as a familiar tune to which several distinct new lyrics have been added.

On December 31, 2008, Guinness World Records certified the Village People performance at halftime of the Sun Bowl between Oregon State and Pittsburgh in El Paso as the largest YMCA dance ever, with 40,148 fans doing the moves, minus a few guys who didn't feel comfortable making letter gestures in the beer line.

The Village People - San Francisco (You've Got Me)

The Village People - San Francisco (You've Got Me) Lyrics and Youtube Music Videos

Album: Village People
Released: 1977

San Francisco (You've Got Me) Lyrics

(Folsom), Folsom Street, on the way to (Polk and Castro)
(You don't find them finer)
(Freedom), freedom is in the air, yeah
(Searching for what we all treasure: pleasure)
(Cycles), cycles in the night shining bright
(Brightly on nights tell a glory story)
(Leather), leather, leather, leather baby
(Levi's and T's are the best now all right)

Dress the way you please and put your mind at ease
It's a city known for its freedom, (freedom)
Cycles shining bright break the silence of the night
Inhibitions, no, you don't need them, (no),no,(no)

(San Francisco), San Francisco
(San Francisco), City by the Bay yeah
(San Francisco), he he he he hey
(You've got me)

(San Francisco), San Francisco
(San Francisco), take me to the water
(San Francisco), he he he he hey
(You've got me), 'got me got me, baby

(Folsom), Folsom Street on the way to (Polk and Castro)
(You don't find them finer)
(Freedom), Freedom, freedom, freedom
(Searching for what we all treasure: pleasure)
(Cycles), cycles shining bright
(Brightly on nights tell a glory story)
(Disco), Disco, disco party baby
(Music that sets you on fire, higher)

Say what's on your mind and spend a little time
Every gesture there has a meaning, (meaning)
Party 'till the night before the morning light
You may feel your whole body screaming

(San Francisco), San Francisco
(San Francisco), City by the Bay yeah
(San Francisco), he he he he hey
(You've got me) Oh you got me

(San Francisco), San Francisco
(San Francisco), take me to the water
(San Francisco), he he he he hey
(You've got me), got me, got me, got me baby

Got me, got me, got me baby
Say you got me, love ya love you so, well
Here's what I want you to do,
(Take me), take me, take me baby,
(Show me the way) show me the way
(Take me), take me, take me baby,
Hey, Lead me to the water...
(Take me), well well it's you and me yeah
(Show me the way), why don't you show me the way, show me the way, hey
Come on baby, let's get it down, down

Ain't nobody between you and me
Baby baby feel fast and free

Baby baby let's do hot night
Come on baby let's you and me swing

Love the way I please, don't put no chains on me
If you got the time, you can do it,
What I need is love, that's all I'm thinking of
Take me to the Bay, lead me to it, (now) now (now)

(San Francisco), San Francisco
(San Francisco), oh I love ya yeah...
(San Francisco), he he he he hey
(You've got me) Aau Aau

(San Francisco), San Francisco
(San Francisco), City by the Bay y'all
(San Francisco), he he he he hey
(You've got me), got me, got me, got me baby

You've got me, got me, got me, baby
Got me, baby
Here's what I want you to do
Show me, show me the way

Writer/s: JENKINS, BARRIE ERNEST / MCCULLOCH, DANNY / BURDON, ERIC VICTOR / WEIDER, JOHNNY / BRIGGS, VIC
Publisher: Warner/Chappell Music, Inc., Universal Music Publishing Group
Lyrics licensed and provided by LyricFind

San Francisco (You've Got Me)

This was the first single for the Village People; with its big group chorus, it formed a template for their later hits "Macho Man" and "Y.M.C.A."

The group was created by the French producers Jacques Morali and Henri Belolo, who developed the concept after coming to America and producing the Philadelphia act The Ritchie Family, who had a hit in 1976 with "The Best Disco In Town." The Village People were conceived as a gay Disco group that would dress in outlandish costumes and sing tunes with gay interest by mainstream appeal. Looking for such a song, Morali and Belolo ordered up a song called "San Francisco," which is a very popular city in the gay community. Their associate Peter Whitehead wrote the lyrics, but they were too gay, so they asked Phil Hurtt, who worked with them on The Ritchie Family project, to clean them up. "They were full of sexual innuendo and a gay concept," Hurtt says about the original lyric. After coming up with something less offensive and more ambiguous, Hurtt turned the new lyric over to Morali and Belolo, who put the track together.

The group did not exist when this song was recorded. This was not uncommon: producers would put songs together using studio musicians, then figure it out later if they needed a group to perform the songs. Casting for the lead singer was basically done at this session, and the job was offered to Phil Hurtt, who co-wrote the song and sang backup. In our interview with Hurtt , he told us the story:

"When I got there, there was myself and three other background singers. I had put down my own vocal as a lead to put the background parts on, so my own reference vocal was on. I got on the microphone with the background guys and I taught them the background parts, taught them the song, gave them the harmony parts - the whole thing, the arrangement.

When the tracks were all done, Jacques (Morali) says to me, 'Okay, darling, you're the singer for the Village People.' I said, 'No, I'm not.' There was no group, by the way. There was no group at all.

I had some other engagements and was on my way out of town, but he says, 'Well, I need you to do that.' I said, 'I can't do that, but there's a guy in the background who has a heavier voice, like a husky voice.' I said, 'He probably could do it for you.' I'm trying to get out of there.

He says, 'Okay, I'm going to lunch. You try him and let me hear what he sounds like.' So I took this kid in the other studio in New York, and taught him the song 'San Francisco,' and wrote 'Hollywood' while I was in the studio. Taught it to him. Brought him back out, put him on the microphone. And when they came back and heard him, they said, 'Oh, he sounds fine.' That was Victor Willis."

The musicians on this track were a group called Gypsy Lane, who also backed The Ritchie Family when The Village People's producers had worked with them.

The Village People - Fire Island

The Village People - Fire Island Lyrics and Youtube Music Videos

Album: Village People
Released: 1977

Fire Island Lyrics

Fire Island

Fire Island is located just south of Long Island in New York State. The Fire Island Pines section is what longtime resident Andrew Kirtzman called the "spiritual homeland" for gay men. It's famous gay inhabitants have included Calvin Klein and David Geffen.

Those unfamiliar with the Fire Island might not catch the gay references ("pumpin' at the Botel," "Don't go in the bushes), and that was the point - The Village people were designed for gay appeal without alienating heterosexuals.

This was one of four songs on the first Village People album, which found its intended audience and set the stage for their stardom two years later. The songs on this set were all written by the French producers who created the group - Jacques Morali and Henri Belolo - along with the lyricists Peter Whitehead and Phil Hurtt . Morali and Belolo got the idea for the group when they were working with Hurtt on another Disco act:The Ritchie Family. When they recorded this first Village People album, they had Hurtt do the vocal arrangements and sing background, then offered him the job as lead singer. Hurtt, who was a popular songwriter/producer in Philadelphia, declined the offer but suggested one of the other background singers: Victor Willis. He got the job - that he wasn't gay was beside the point.