An Easter Privilege...

April 02, 2021

An Easter Privilege...

...Well, not exactly an Easter song, but as Easter time is almost upon us...this is taken from the 1978 album by the Patti Smith Group called 'Easter'.

This is one of the tracks from it, 'Privilege (Set Me Free)', this track and the more obviously likely to be a hit 'Because The Night', originally penned by Bruce Springsteen were both released as singles. The latter being by far the more commercially successful reaching #5 in the UK Singles Chart.

The song 'Privilege (Free Me)' had been originally written for the 1967 film, oddly enough called Privilege, starring Paul Jones (Manfred Mann) and Jean Shrimpton (60's Model and Actress). The film was written by Johnny Speight a British television and film scriptwriter, (mostly comedy), writing for Morecambe & Wise, Peter Sellers and television comedies such as 'Til Death Do Us Part.

The film itself is set in the future and focuses on Paul Jones who is a pop star who attains almost god-like status, but is actually a 'puppet' for a manipulative government and ends up despising the adulation he receives. The film location was set in and around Birmingham and included Birmingham City's Stadium.

The original version of the song was called 'Free Me', it was sung by Paul Jones and written by Mel London and Mike Leander, the latter being a big name in music in the 60's and 70's.

The original version here:

And just because it would be rude not to put it here, the more popular and successful single from the Patti Smith Group, 'Because The Night'. Purely because it is awesome!😉