Smorgasbord Blog Magazine – The Music Column – One Hit Wonders – Monster Mash by Bobby ‘Boris’ Pickett

I have records on my various playlists that were single hits for an individual artist or group but they were never followed up by another chart success. I also wonder what happened to the artist.  So I am going to track some of them down and find out more…..starting with the 1950s – I am taking them from the list kindly supplied by Wikipedia

Monster Mash – Bobby Pickett 1960s

Robert George Pickett born in 1938 was known as Bobby ‘Boris’ Pickett and was a singer, songwriter, actor and comedian… In 1962 he co-wrote ‘Monster Mash’ with Leonard Capizzi. It was a spoof on the dance crazes of the time including the Twist and the Mashed Potato. Horror stars Boris Karloff and Bela Lugosi were impersonated by Bobby Pickett. Unfortunately it was not considered to be a hit by the various record labels that were approached but it was heard by Gary S. Paxton, a record producer who agreed to produce it on his Garpax Records.

The single sold over 1 million and was #1 in the Billboard Hot 100 for two weeks in1962 as performed by Bobby ‘Boris’ Pickett and the Crypt-Kicker 5. It entered the charts again in 1970 and in 1973 at #10. It then went into the UK charts in 1973 at #3 and sold another million copies.

For a one hit wonder for Bobby Pickett, it certainly was a gift that kept giving.

As far as his career was concerned he continued to write and perform other monster themed songs and an album and in 1985, he even released ‘Monster Rap’.

Bobby Pickett also wrote musicals including ‘Frankenstein Unbound’. In 1995 the co-writers of Disney’s ‘Toy Story’, Joel Cohen and Alex Sokolow, produced a movie of the musical called ‘Frankenstein Sings’ but it was later released as ‘Monster Mash: The Movie’.

In 2005, Bobby Pickett published his autobiography ‘Monster Mash: Half Dead in Hollywood.

Bobby Pickett passed away in 2007.

Additional sources: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bobby_Pickett

Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Monster-Mash-Bobby-Boris-Pickett/dp/B000V3VT7Y

 

If you wonder what happened to the artist of your favourite one hit wonder, then let me know their name in the comments and I will see what I can find out…..

Thanks for tuning in… next week William Price King is back with another jazz instrumentalist…