It Was 50 Years Ago Today: “Lightnin’ Strikes” by Lou Christie

February 23, 1966
“Lightnin’ Strikes” by Lou Christie
#1 on the Billboard Hot 100, February 19-25, 1966

Listening to “Lightnin’ Strikes” in 2016 is an uncomfortable reminder of how different social mores were 50 years ago. The lyrics epitomize the double standard of the age, where Christie can plead for “a girl he can trust to the very end” while at in the same breath justifying his own infidelity (“when I see lips beggin’ to be kissed / I can’t stop! / I can’t stop myself!”). Even given the era’s gender norms and rock’s pervasive misogyny, the condescending “you’re old enough to know the makings of a man” and dominating “for the time being, baby, live by my rules” stick out as especially shameless.

But what if the sliminess of “Lightnin’ Strikes” has another, more intentional, meaning behind it? The verses are a burlesque of innocence, thick with tinkling piano, church bells, and the image of an idyllic “chapel in the pines.” (Note that Christie’s narrator is careful to imply a wedding without ever quite committing to it.) The girlish backing vocals are so exaggerated in their sweetness that they verge on grotesque. Christie smarmily croons to his girl that, even while he’s cheating, “you’re in my heart all the time,” a line so brazen that it must be ironic (right?). In addition, Christie’s transparent phoniness implies something in his true nature that needs concealing. The crashing piano chords opening each verse suggest distant cracks of thunder, warning of a coming storm. The prechorus, where Christie’s strained voice shouts “I can’t stop myself!” while female backing singers cry “stop! stop!” seem to imply an association between sexism and violence. Is our narrator an unrepentant Casanova or something far more sinister?

Christie’s peculiar persona, established on his earlier hits, lends credence to the possibility that “Lightnin’ Strikes” isn’t entirely what it seems. The former Lugee Sacco had sung on a few singles popular in his native Pittsburgh, but the success of the Four Seasons in 1962 inspired the sound that gave the newly minted Lou Christie his breakthrough. Christie borrowed elements of the Four Seasons style: a similar pop sensibility, a falsetto to make Frankie Valli jealous, and, on “Lightnin’ Strikes,” a producer/arranger in former member Charles Calello. What Christie’s records have that the Four Seasons don’t, however, is a pervading element of weirdness, which makes them easier to dismiss as camp, yet also more fascinating. Records like “The Gypsy Cried” and “Two Faces Have I” almost conform to the sound of early ’60s pop radio, but something intangible makes them stick out, if only in the sense of “what is this?” Christie’s eccentricity was fueled by his longterm writing partner Twyla Herbert, a self-described mystic and bohemian more than two decades his senior — in short, not a woman who would seem to comply with social and gender norms laid out in “Lightnin’ Strikes.” 

More than Valli and most other vocalists of the era, Christie understood how otherworldly falsetto sounds, and how best to deploy it for dramatic effect. When Christie’s voice shifts into its upper range, it’s not just representing a surge of emotion; it’s the sound of a man being possessed by an evil spirit or splitting into an alternate personality. In “Lightnin’ Strikes,” when Christie spots “lips begging to be kissed,” his voice mutates into a shrill keen, completely unrecognizable from the charmer he posed as just seconds earlier. The switch from his teen idol croon to the manic, eerie falsetto signifies that he has transformed into some unknown thing incapable of being controlled. His choice of words — “lightning striking me again!” — links him with the violence of a sudden, unpredictable burst of energy that burns hot and leaves destruction in its wake. It also evokes the electrical flash that brought Frankenstein’s monster to life.

“Lightnin’ Strikes” was Christie’s big comeback after a two-year stint in the US Army, and thus seems to be make up for lost time by packing in a dozen records’ worth of sheer drama: multi-part verses, kitchen-sink production, and octave-scaling vocals. It’s hard to ascertain whether “Lightnin’ Strikes” is a parody of all the overcooked, melodramatic singles of the era, or the genuine article. As with the song’s questionable lyrics, this uncertainty as to the song’s true intent complements the song’s constantly shifting structure, keeping the listener from ever getting too comfortable. This ambiguity — is it ironic, sincere, or something in between? — is what makes “Lightnin’ Strikes” such a compelling listen, if also an uneasy one.

It Was 50 Years Ago Today examines a song, album, movie, or book that was #1 on the charts exactly half a century ago.

Sally O'Rourke

Sally O’Rourke works in an office and sometimes writes about music. She blogs about every song to ever top the Billboard Hot 100 (in order) at No Hard Chords. She has also contributed to The Singles Jukebox, One Week // One Band, and PopMatters. Special interests include girl groups, soul pop, and over-analyzing chord changes and lyrics as if deciphering a secret code. She was born in Baton Rouge and lives in Manhattan. Her favorite Nugget is “Liar, Liar” by The Castaways.