Check the On Disc page for a discography of Lyn's solo releases as well as earlier recordings with The Nocturnes and the New Seekers which feature her singing the lead vocal.
Lyn's first solo single after the break-up of the New Seekers was taken from the soundtrack of the Gregory Peck film The Dove (ABC Records ABDP-852). As an actor Gregory Peck was nominated five times for an Academy Award and in 1962 he received the Oscar for Best Actor for his role in To Kill A Mocking Bird. In a radio interview in 2009 Lyn Paul recalled meeting him when she was recording the song: "I was so nervous... I was recording it and Gregory Peck was sitting, just listening to it. All I could think was 'Oh my God'... I was a huge fan of Gregory Peck, I can't even begin to tell you... and he was just sitting there and smiling at me... I was so nervous, so I sound a little bit like a chipmonk on it." (Ready Steady Sunday, Bay Radio, 7th June 2009)
The songwriting and production team behind Sail The Summer Winds couldn't have had a finer pedigree. John Barry had long established himself as a maestro of film scores and TV themes. Notable among his many successes were Hit and Miss (the theme tune to Juke Box Jury) and the soundtracks to films such as The Ipcress File (1965), The Lion In Winter (1968), Midnight Cowboy (1969) and Walkabout (1970). Barry was best known for his James Bond scores, including Thunderball (1965), On Her Majesty's Secret Service (1969) and Diamonds Are Forever (1971).
By the time he came to work with Lyn Paul in 1974, Barry had also written the score for the historical drama Mary Queen of Scots (1971) and the TV theme for The Persuaders (1972). His future successes would include soundtracks for The Deep (1976), Moonraker (1979), Jagged Edge (1985) and Out Of Africa (1985) as well as more Bond movies - Octopussy (1983), A View To A Kill (1985) and The Living Daylights (1987).
Lyricist Don Black, who co-wrote Sail The Summer Winds with John Barry, also had a string of hits to his credit. His first hit, Walk Away, was a chart success for Matt Monro in 1964. The following year he wrote his first film score with John Barry (the title song for the James Bond movie Thunderball) followed by Born Free in 1966 (for which he and Barry won an Academy Award and an Ivor Novello Award). Sail The Summer Winds was nominated for a Golden Globe Award in 1975.
Don Black has also collaborated on many stage musicals. By 1974 he had already written Billy (with John Barry) which was the hit musical in London that year. He would go on to write Bar Mitzvah Boy (with Julie Styne); Tell Me On A Sunday (with Andrew Lloyd Webber); Aspects Of Love (with Lloyd Webber and Charles Hart); Sunset Boulevard (with Lloyd Webber and Christopher Hampton) and Dear Anyone... (with Geoff Stephens). Dear Anyone... featured ex-New Seeker Peter Oliver on its soundtrack and provided Hot Chocolate with their 1978 hit I'll Put You Together Again (UK number 13).
Sail The Summer Winds didn't quite make it into the Top 50 singles chart but "bubbled under" for 18 weeks
(08/06/1974: 55-56-55-57-57-55-62-60-52-61-51-55-57-63-59-58-65-71).
The B-side of Sail The Summer Winds was written by another former-member of the New Seekers, Peter Doyle. It was originally featured on the New Seekers' 1971 album New Colours (Polydor 2383 066) and is typical of the soft ballads which Lyn sang while she was a member of the group. In 2008 Lyn re-recorded the song for the album A Tribute From The Heart, a limited-edition CD to raise funds for the Peter Doyle Fund.
Catalogue Number: Polydor 2058 472 Released: 24th May 1974
Written by: Phil Galdston / Jon Lind / Wendy Waldman Produced by: Rod Edwards / Nick Magnus
Save The Best For Last was a hit for Vanessa Williams in 1992. In the USA the single spent five weeks at the top of the chart; in the UK it peaked at number 3. The song was earmarked as a "possible" for inclusion on Lyn Paul's album Late Night, though Lyn later thought better of it and abandoned the recording.
Save The Best For Last has also been recorded by: Captain & Tennille, Richard Clayderman, Floyd Cramer and James Last.
The songwriting trio who wrote Save The Best For Last also wrote Vanessa Williams' hit The Sweetest Days (UK number 41 / US number 18), as well as I Owe You One for Aaron Neville. Songwriter Phil Galdston has also written songs for Brandy (One Voice), Cher (Kiss To Kiss), Celine Dion (I Don't Know, If That's What It Takes) and Jaci Velasquez (Love Will Find You).
Greatest Hits Of
Whitney Houston
(album cover)
Saving All My Love For You
Written by: Michael Masser / Gerry Goffin
Featured on the 'Various Artists' download compilation:Greatest Hits Of Whitney Houston.
On Saturday, 15th November 1986 Lyn Paul made a guest appearance on Yorkshire Television's popular variety and game show 3-2-1. Each show featured three variety acts who, after their performances, would present the game show contestants with an object and a cryptic clue. Before reading her cryptic clue and presenting the contestants with - wait for it - a potato masher, Lyn sang her version of Whitney Houston's number 1 hit Saving All My Love For You.
Written by Michael Masser and Gerry Goffin, the song was originally recorded by Marilyn McCoo & Billy Davis Jr., who included it on their 1978 album Marilyn And Billy. Whitney Houston recorded the song for her self-titled début album. It became her second solo hit single and her first number 1, topping the Billboard chart in the USA on 17th August 1985 and repeating that success in the UK on 16th November.
Lyn's version of Saving All My Love For You from 3-2-1 was first made available as a download in 2012, mistakenly attributed to Patricia Bird. The 'Various Artists' compilation on which it appeared A Tribute: Greatest Hits Of Whitney Houston has since been withdrawn.
Released: 7th June 2013
Song Without End
Written by: Laurence / Weston Produced by:David Mackay
Written by: John Franklin Produced by: John Franklin
A song written and produced by Lyn's long-time friend John Franklin, first released as a YouTube video on 29th June 2020, with a second version of the video by Kevin Dicks released on 23rd July.
Released: 29th June 2020
Tammy Wynette
Queen
Of The
Country Music
Hall Of Fame
(DVD cover)
Tammy Wynette wrote Stand By Your Man with her producer Billy Sherrill. Released as a single in late 1968, the song provided "the First Lady of Country Music" with her fifth number 1 hit on the US country chart and her first Top 20 entry on the pop chart. The album Stand By Your Man also achieved mainstream success.
Stand By Your Man soon became a country standard. Within a year it had been covered by many of the other leading ladies on the country scene - Lynn Anderson, Loretta Lynn, Billie Jo Spears and Dottie West. Since then it has been recorded by artists across the musical divides, including versions by the Dixie Chicks, Elton John, Springfield Revival, Candi Staton and Tina Turner, two unlikely covers by Erasure and Motörhead, and an ironic version by Lyle Lovett.
In the UK Stand By Your Man did not become a hit for Tammy Wynette until 1975. It spent twelve weeks on the singles chart, including three weeks at number 1. By 1975 Wynette's marriage to country singer George Jones was coming to an end. Appropriately enough, the song D-I-V-O-R-C-E was chosen as her next UK release. This had originally been a hit in the USA before Stand By Your Man. In the UK it peaked at number 12 but also inspired a comic cover version by Billy Connolly, which reached number 1.
Glenys Kinnock MEP, wife of the former Labour party leader Neil Kinnock, named the song as one of her favourites. "I think if you are not subservient to men then it's much easier for you sit back and enjoy a song like this and not feel threatened by it. It's really slushy and sentimental. You don't have to be politically correct about it... It's not a feminist song, of course, but I do think that it is a song that feminists can and should accommodate... It gets to you, you can't escape it." (BBC2 Country Night)
Lyn Paul included Stand By Your Man in her stage act, introducing the song as Stand On Your Man following her own D-I-V-O-R-C-E from club-owner Vince McCaffrey [1980]. The performance featured on the Legends In Concert DVDs and on the download album The Greatest Hits Of Lyn Paul was recorded live at the Church Street Station in Orlando, Florida. On this occasion Lyn introduced the song by saying: "I am gonna sing you a song now that you will recognise instantly and I desperately hope that you forgive me for singing it seeing as it's one of Tammy Wynette's most popular hits but I just happen to love the song to death so I hope you enjoy it."
A song from Boy George's musical Taboo, which George wrote for his mother. In George's words: "a very hard song to sing" and, as he also said, Lyn sings it "superbly".
A CD single featuring the full length version and a radio edit of the song was distributed to radio stations in the UK in July 2002. The single also includes A Case Of You (incorrectly labelled on the CD as A Case For You).
A Case Of You
Written by:Joni Mitchell Produced and arranged by: Kevan Frost
This Joni Mitchell song first appeared on Mitchell's 1971 album Blue. Biographer Karen O'Brien described it as "one of Mitchell's most sensual and visceral songs." (Shadows and Light, page 130) A Case Of You depicts the end of a love affair, pouring scorn on protestations of fidelity whilst acknowledging the strength of the passion that had previously existed.
The song takes a few listens to really hit home. As Mitchell said: “My music is not designed to grab instantly. It’s designed to wear for a lifetime, to hold up like a fine cloth.” (Quoted in 'She Bop' by Lucy O’Brien, page 178)
Boy George's influence is apparent in the choice of the song. In an interview with Charles Spencer, which appeared in the Daily Telegraph, George said: "I'm actually a huge fan of Joni Mitchell and met her once, and she said to me 'Never let anyone interior decorate your art.' So I decided to stop being ambiguous and to put myself into the songs." (Daily Telegraph, Thursday, 15th August 2002, page 21)
A Case Of You has also been recorded by Prince (1983), Graham Nash (1992), Tori Amos (1995), Nancy Wilson (1999), Diana Krall (2000) and k.d. lang (2004). In 2000 Joni Mitchell recorded a new version of the song for her album Both Sides Now.
Talking In Your Sleep was an international hit for Crystal Gayle in 1978 (UK number 11 / USA number 18). Eastenders' star Martine McCutcheon took it back into the UK singles chart in 1999.
The song was co-written by Roger Cook, better-known for the hits he had written in partnership with Roger Greenaway, not least I'd Like To Teach The World To Sing by the New Seekers. Cook and Greenaway ended their association in 1975, the year that Lyn Paul had a Top 40 hit with their song It Oughta Sell A Million. Greenaway stayed in the UK; Cook became a tax exile in Nashville. Both continued to have success as songwriters. Crystal Gayle gave Cook his first country chart-topper in 1978 with her recording of Talking In Your Sleep. Two years later, in 1980, she also gave Greenaway a number 1 with her recording of It's Like We Never Said Goodbye.
Talking In Your Sleep has also been covered by Reba McEntire on her 1995 album Starting Over and by Lynn Anderson, whose version is included on the Various Artists compilation Country Greats (Legacy 80112).
Originally recorded by Isham Jones in 1923, Who's Sorry Now was a number 1 hit in the UK for Connie Francis in April 1958. The song rescued her career. Up until that point she had recorded a string of flops and her record company, MGM, had been on the point of dropping her.
The song features lyrics by Bert Kalmar and Harry Ruby set to a tune by Ted Snyder. Ruby died on 23rd February 1974, just a few months before Lyn recorded the song. Lyn's version features one of those special growly vocals on the line "And I know" which only Lyn can do!
Who's Sorry Now came close to being a hit for Lyn, bubbling under the UK Top 50 for six weeks (05/10/1974: 67-61-58-54-65-72). It also bubbled under 'down under', entering the Australian Top 100 on 20th January 1975 and hovering around for 16 weeks until the week of 5th May (20/01/1975: 95-77-?-72-68-65-60-60-64-62-60-60-67-66-68-75).
A love song with a country feel to the arrangement, Sweet Lovin' Ways is not unlike some of Olivia Newton-John's early recordings (songs such as If Not for You and Let Me Be There spring to mind).
Lyn goes disco! A surprise release on MP3 in 2017, available from Amazon.com and Amazon.co.uk.
Released: 15th November 2017
Who said that?
Disco
Disco is just jitterbug. Fred Astaire
Disco dancing is really dancing for people who hate dancing, since the beat is so monotonous that only the champions can find interesting ways of reacting to it. There is no syncopation, just the steady thump of a giant moron knocking in an endless nail. Clive James, 'The flying feet of Frankie Foo' (published in 'The Crystal Bucket')
Disco is music for dancing, and people will always want to dance. Giorgio Moroder
I like mindless disco... they say the lyrics are stupid and repetitious. So what's wrong with that? So is lying in the sun. Not everything has to be serious. Lou Reed
Joni Mitchell
Harry: I can't believe you still listen to Joni Mitchell. Karen: I love her and true love lasts a lifetime.
Richard Curtis, 'Love Actually' featuring
Alan Rickman (as Harry) and Emma Thompson (as Karen).
