Chip Taylor recalls the moment he wrote ‘Wild Thing’
In a new interview, Chip Taylor, the singer and songwriter best remembered for writing ‘Angel of the Morning’ and ‘Wild Thing’, recalled the moment he conjured up the lyrics to the latter smash hit. The song was originally recorded in 1965 by Jordan Christopher & the Wild Ones but became famous a year later as the hit single for the Troggs and Jimi Hendrix’s 1967 live performance.
Speaking to The Independent during a recent interview, Taylor first recalled writing songs for Johnny Cash, who famously enjoyed playing gigs at prisons. “Playing songs in maximum security prisons is one of my favourite things to do,” he said. “I’ve always liked talking to prisoners because, for the most part, they’re extremely honest. They talk about what they’ve done, how they feel about being incarcerated”.
Taylor added: “Most of them feel they deserve to be there and – no matter what crimes they’ve committed – I never met a prisoner I didn’t have empathy for. I wrote that at 6am one morning when I realised I had some shows for prisoners coming up, and I wanted to write something that was just for them. I had borrowed this odd guitar at the time so that song just came out of me.” He sings: “To be or not to be?/ To free or not to free?… Some chose to dismember your rise and fall/ Fuck all those perfect people. I knew it was good because I got a chill.”
Later, Taylor recalled how he wrote ‘Wild Thing’ after the Troggs’ producer called him asking whether he had any new songs available. “Let me get off the phone and see if something comes to me right now,” he remembered replying. “Well, I hung up and started banging on the guitar and ‘Wild Thing’ just flew out of me. Well, ahhh, my window opened on to the broadway with all those pretty girls walking by. So, I was looking at them and writing in that spirit. It was a real New York moment…”
After grabbing his guitar for a rough demonstration, Taylor noted, “that upstrum, there? You wouldn’t play that if you were properly schooled. I did it because I didn’t know any better. I ended up with this innocent energy. It came out of me looser that way, the feeling just flew out of me.”
Just an hour later, Taylor booked a demo session to get the track down. He admitted that “the pauses, the spaces around the words and chords” that give the song its intensity were a consequence of his lack of ideas. “I wasn’t quite sure what to sing next!”
Listen to the classic track as recorded by The Troggs below.
Never Miss A Beat
The Far Out Music Newsletter
All the latest music news from the independent voice of culture.
Straight to your inbox.