The Greatest Oldies Music

Oldies Musics

Dion – Runaround Sue

About the Song

In the early 1960s, the airwaves were filled with the infectious energy of Dion’s “Runaround Sue.” This rock and roll classic, with its playful melody and catchy lyrics, became a chart-topping hit and a cultural touchstone.

“Runaround Sue” is more than just a catchy tune; it’s a cautionary tale about a disloyal lover. The song, written by Dion and Ernie Maresca, tells the story of a woman named Sue who breaks hearts and leaves a trail of disappointed suitors in her wake.

The song’s success can be attributed to several key elements:

  • Memorable Melody: The melody is instantly recognizable, with a driving beat and a simple yet effective hook. It’s the kind of song that gets stuck in your head and makes you want to tap your feet along.
  • Catchy Lyrics: The lyrics are simple and direct, using playful rhymes and repetition to tell the story of Sue’s duplicity. Lines like “Runaround Sue, you know you’re no good” and “She’s got a heart of stone” are both catchy and memorable.
  • Doo-Wop Influences: The song incorporates elements of doo-wop, with its backing vocals and layered harmonies. This adds a nostalgic touch and a sense of youthful energy to the track.
  • Dion’s Charismatic Vocals: Dion’s vocals are a highlight of the song. His powerful and energetic delivery perfectly captures the frustration and warning message of the lyrics.

“Runaround Sue” transcends its era, becoming a timeless classic that continues to be covered by artists across genres. Its catchy melody, relatable theme, and Dion’s charismatic performance make it a song that will forever be etched in the annals of rock and roll history.

Who Was Runaround Sue? Dion In His Own Words

Video

Lyrics: Runaround Sue 

Here’s my story, it’s sad but true
It’s about a girl that I once knew
She took my love then ran around
With every single guy in townYeah, I should have known it from the very start
This girl would leave me with a broken heart
Now listen people what I’m telling you
A-keep away from-a Runaround Sue, yeahI miss her lips and the smile on her face
The touch of her hand and this girl’s warm embrace
So if you don’t wanna cry like I do
A-keep away from-a Runaround SueShe likes to travel around, yeah
She’ll love you and she’ll put you down
Now people let me put you wise
Sue goes out with other guysHere’s the moral in the story from the guy who knows
I fell in love and my love still grows
Ask any fool that she ever knew, they’ll tell ya
Keep away from-a Runaround SueYeah keep away from this girl
I don’t know what she’ll do
Keep away from Sue!

She likes to travel around, yeah
She’ll love you and she’ll put you down
Now people let me put you wise
She goes out with other guys

Here’s the moral in the story from that guy who knows
I fell in love and my love still grows
Ask any fool that she ever knew, they’ll tell ya
A-keep away from-a Runaround Sue

Stay away from that girl
Don’t you know what she’ll do now
Keep away from that girl

Related Post

Elvis Presley’s greatest musical gift was not putting words onto paper. It was hearing something inside a song that other people sometimes could not hear yet. Give him someone else’s melody and lyrics, and he could reshape the emotion through his phrasing, timing and voice until the recording felt intensely personal.

The musicians at RCA Studio B were ready to make records. They were not ready for the way Elvis Presley entered the room. During his celebrated Nashville sessions in 1970, bassist Norbert Putnam remembered Elvis appearing in dramatic fashion—wearing a flowing black cape and carrying an ornate cane. Putnam later recalled the impression that it was almost as though “a prince had walked into the room.”

STONEWALL JACKSON ASKED TOM T. HALL TO WRITE A PRISON SONG, BUT HALL COULD NOT DO IT BECAUSE HE HAD NEVER ACTUALLY BEEN TO PRISON. Tom T. Hall spent his early career turning out the kind of polished, commercial hits that Nashville publishers lived for. He could write what people expected, but he always felt like a fraud. When Stonewall Jackson approached him requesting a prison song—hoping to capture that rugged, authentic aura Johnny Cash was building—Hall hit a wall. He stared at his notepad, realized he had no genuine experience with a cell, and flatly refused to fake it. He was a songwriter, not an actor, and his pride kept him from writing about a world he didn’t know. His wife, Dixie, cut through the tension with a simple reminder: he had indeed spent a week in a county jail in Kentucky after a traffic violation. That memory was not cinematic or heroic. It was just mundane, quiet, and uncomfortable. It involved bad food, the sound of iron bars, and the slow, agonizing crawl of days where the jailer’s wife suddenly started looking like the most beautiful woman on earth. He stopped writing songs that invented generic situations and started reporting the people and places he actually encountered. The result was his first number one hit, written like a man telling a story across a kitchen table. Stonewall Jackson never got his song, but Hall finally found his own voice in the silence of that jail cell.

You Missed

Oldies Musics

Elvis Presley’s greatest musical gift was not putting words onto paper. It was hearing something inside a song that other people sometimes could not hear yet. Give him someone else’s melody and lyrics, and he could reshape the emotion through his phrasing, timing and voice until the recording felt intensely personal.

Oldies Musics

The musicians at RCA Studio B were ready to make records. They were not ready for the way Elvis Presley entered the room. During his celebrated Nashville sessions in 1970, bassist Norbert Putnam remembered Elvis appearing in dramatic fashion—wearing a flowing black cape and carrying an ornate cane. Putnam later recalled the impression that it was almost as though “a prince had walked into the room.”

Country

Lisa Marie Presley grew up in a house visited by some of the most famous people in the world, yet the person who mattered most to her was the man everyone else called the King. To millions, Elvis Presley was an untouchable superstar. To Lisa, he was the father who loved to spoil her, make her laugh and turn ordinary moments at Graceland into childhood adventures.

Country

BOB DYLAN AND JOHNNY CASH SHATTERED THE WALLS OF NASHVILLE WITHOUT FIRING A SINGLE SHOT. Columbia Studio A sat thick with the smell of stale coffee and cigarette smoke on a February morning in 1969. While the rock world was chasing ghosts in psychedelic haze, Bob Dylan stepped into the epicenter of American country music with a voice that sounded like it had been dragged across gravel. He wasn’t there to challenge the gatekeepers at the Opry; he was there to find the heartbeat of a sound he had loved from afar. Johnny Cash walked through the heavy studio doors, guitar in hand, and for two days, the rigid borders of genre simply dissolved into the air. They didn’t record some grand manifesto to change the industry. Instead, they sat on stools and tore through old folk standards and each other’s deep cuts, letting the microphones capture the loose, unvarnished truth of a collaboration that felt more like a porch gathering than a major label session. Carl Perkins added his own licks to the mix, blending the percussive snap of rock and roll with the lonesome ache of a country ballad. It was a deliberate, quiet rebellion that treated the traditions of both worlds as neighbors rather than strangers. When the tape stopped rolling, they walked away having proved that the lines drawn by radio programmers were mostly make-believe. The Ryman Auditorium stage eventually welcomed a new kind of guest, and the air in Nashville felt lighter, forever changed by two men who knew that music didn’t need permission to belong everywhere at once.