It Was 50 Years Ago Today: “Sugar Town” by Nancy Sinatra

January 24, 1967
“Sugar Town” by Nancy Sinatra
#1 on the Billboard Easy Listening Singles chart, January 21 – February 3, 1967

With “These Boots Are Made for Walkin’,” Nancy Sinatra announced herself as an icon of the Swinging Sixties. She wasn’t some throwback dame out of one of her father Frank’s songs; she was an independent woman unafraid to stick up for herself — and was all the more alluring for it.

But Sinatra also seemed to be hedging her bets. The singles may have been punchy songs like “Boots” and “How Does That Grab You, Darlin’,” but the albums were often padded out with less interesting covers.

Sometimes, they were rock songs, such as her fondly remembered versions of the Beatles’ “Day Tripper” and Cher’s “Bang Bang.” More often, however, she covered middle-of-the-road fare not too far removed from something that might appear on one of her dad’s less-inspired outings.

This conflict between Sinatra’s sexy tough-kitten image and the family house style of “listenable music” resulted in a somewhat erratic discography, veering between sassy rock ‘n’ roll and more traditional, adult-friendly recordings. 

Sinatra and her steady collaborator Lee Hazlewood threaded the needle, however, with her third Top 10 single, 1967’s “Sugar Town.” The recording is infused with sunshiney vibes, with Sinatra crooning in her most tooth-rottingly sweet voice appropriately sugary lyrics (“I got some troubles, but they won’t last / I’m gonna lay right down here in the grass”), while the melody skips sweetly over a shuffling rhythm borrowed from the era’s fad for vaudeville. This near-unbearable cuteness sent “Sugar Town” floating up to the Top 5 of the Billboard Hot 100 and #1 on the Easy Listening charts.

But “Sugar Town” also had tricks up its sleeve. Hazlewood had been inspired to write the song after watching young people at a club get high by dripping liquid LSD on sugar cubes. According to an unsourced quote floating around the internet, Hazlewood “wanted the dumbest lyric ever written to a song, to a doper song.”

Thus mindlessly blithe lyrics like, “I just lay back and laugh at the sun” and the repetitive but catchy “shuh-shuh-sugar town” hook were Sinatra and Hazlewood’s way of sneaking subversive material into an apparently innocuous pop song.

The simple-minded “doper song,” however, proved indistinguishable from the fluffiest fluff that regularly featured on the pop and easy listening charts.The majority of listeners didn’t pick up on its druggy subtext. For anyone who had found “Boots” too shocking, here was proof that Frank’s little girl could produce something charming and non-threatening.  

“Sugar Town,” therefore, appealed to multiple audiences: those who took the catchy melody and cheerful lyrics at face value; those who caught the LSD reference in a seemingly innocent pop song and appreciated the joke; and those who were just really into Nancy Sinatra’s image and would buy anything she’d sing, no matter how dumb.

“Sugar Town” proved an apt pop hit to start 1967, the year of Sgt Pepper and the Summer of Love. Unlike the burgeoning psychedelic rock scene, however, the sound of “Sugar Town” doesn’t really attempt to replicate the mind-bending qualities of the drug; after all, Hazlewood and Sinatra weren’t really acid heads. Instead, “Sugar Town” seems inspired by the tranquil, blissed-out appearance that those dopers presented to the outside world.

But while the rest of the pop world got more infatuated with LSD and the sexual revolution, Sinatra seemed to retreat into her father’s more conservative musical style. In fact, the biggest hit she’d have in 1967 wasn’t “Sugar Town,” but “Somethin’ Stupid,” a duet with her father.

“Somethin’ Stupid” may have represented a merging of generations, but it was weighed entirely in the elder’s favor.  Nancy may have been free to play with the hip new sound of rock ‘n’ roll, but ultimately, the song suggests, she’d grow up and listen to Daddy.

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.