Rockin' Song of the Week No. 69 - Crazy Cavan

Crazy Cavan & the Rhythm Rockers – Chasing Rainbows

Chasing rainbows comes from the excellent 1996 album It’s Wild, It’s Weird, It’s Crazy, the first on their own label. For such a great album, none of the songs have gone on to be Cavan classics, and I can’t recall seeing them sing any of these live.

Lyrically the song shows there’s more to Cavan Grogan than switchblade knives and teddy boy boogies. He comes across like a soul-searching bluesman, “Well, can you hear the highway, it's a-callin' me / That old wind's a-blowin', settin' my soul free / 'Cause I'm leavin', yeah I'm on my way / I'm goin' chasin' rainbows, blowin' the clouds away”. Musically the song is hypnotic rockabilly with a beautifully melodic riff from Lyndon Needs running right through it. Cavan provides plenty of Buddy Hollyesque hiccups and is in total command.

This band are so often overlooked as a bunch of heavy, loud rockers, when a listen to songs like this should set everyone straight. This band are the ducks nuts, and probably still the best thing out there. I’d love to hear them do this live, while I’m doing the teddy boy roll with Johnny T and Flip 54.