The Duprees: “You Belong to Me” / “Why Don’t You Believe Me” (1962)
Doo-wop groups didn’t come any more “whitebread” than Jersey City’s own The Duprees, who formed out of high school in 1960, and soon drew the attention of former big band leader and Coed Records impresario George Paxton.
The group’s very first single, ‘62’s “You Belong to Me” (originally cut a decade earlier by Jo Stafford) was a big-ass hit, reaching No. 7 on the Billboard charts, and enjoying countless future revisions by easy listening stars like Patsy Cline, Bing Crosby, and others.
Much of The Duprees’ success can be attributed to the song’s Glenn Miller-style big band backing, commissioned by Paxton and A&R man Fred Weismantel, who, ironically, also wrote the bawdy “Big Ten Inch Record,” made famous by Bullmoose Jackson and, later, Aerosmith.
But this conservative, straight-laced approach sounds positively flat to my ears, lacking any of the earthy, soulful grit and raw, untutored innocence found that gave so much classic doo-wop its irresistible vitality.
And this single’s B-Side, “Why Don’t You Believe Me,” was just as sappy, and less infectious, to boot (it too had been a hit a decade earlier, for Joni James), though it also managed to crack the Top 40 in 1963.
All of which signaled a somewhat limited commercial shelf-life for The Duprees, who rarely troubled the charts again with their invariably schmaltzy remakes of female vocal singles from the 1950s.
Before long, they had joined the oldies circuit with an eternally revolving cast of musicians, each more faceless than the last, backing up lead singer Joey Canzone, until The Duprees were inducted into the Vocal Group Hall of Fame, in 2006.
More Doo-Wop: The Channels, The Crests, The Del-Vikings, The Drifters, The Edsels, The Flamingos, The Hollywood Flames, The Jive Five, Little Anthony & The Imperials, Ruben & The Jets, The Skyliners, The Penguins, The Teen Queens, The Turbans, The Willows, Maurice Williams and The Zodiacs.
