Bubbling Under: Mal- "Mighty Mighty And Roly Poly"

"My name is Mighty Mighty, I'm pleased to meet you mister Roly Poly"

Welcome to Bubbling Under. Each edition I cover an artist that charted outside the Hot 100 on Billboard's Bubbling Under chart. This week: Mal

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I'm going to be upfront. "Mighty Mighty And Roly Poly" is a really weird song. Like, if you could rate weirdness on a scale of 0-10, it would be about a 9.5.

“Mighty” starts out as a folk number sung by a guy with a slightly warbly voice before the psychedelic flourishes and wild-sounding drums kick in. And that’s before the weird lyrics really sink in.

Initially, one would assume this song is about a guy who got picked on when he was a kid for his weight:

"I remember when I was young

The name I had at school

And everyone used to laugh at me

And take me for a fool

And then one day my biggest friend

Took me to one side and he said:

"My name is Mighty Mighty

I'm pleased to meet you mister Roly Poly

My name is Mighty Mighty

I'm pleased to meet you mister Roly Poly"

But then it gets weirder to the point where I’m not sure what it’s about. I wonder if Mal himself even knew:

"My friend's a troublesome person

Always fighting like a Hannibal near the pool

One day he punched the teacher's son, you know

Reminding me of letting at school"

So, who was Mal?

Because of the strange lyrics, I had wrongly assumed that Mal was probably a European singer whose first language was something other than English. When I went to research this piece, I was shocked to find out that Mal was a British singer.

Paul Bradley Couling was born on February 27, 1944, in Llanfrechfa, Wales. He moved to Oxford, working as an electrician and singing in some local bands.

Changing his name to Mal Ryder, in 1963, he formed a group called Mal Ryder and the Spirits, and later, The Primitives.

The latter group released some singles during 1964-1965 in their home country on the Pye label. They never really caught on, though.

Changing his name to Mal Ryder, in 1963 he formed a group called Mal Ryder and the Spirits, and later, The Primitives.

The latter group released some singles during 1964-1965 in their home country on the Pye label. They never really caught on, though.

In Italy, it was another story. The Primitives accepted an offer to perform at a club in Rome. They embarked on a successful tour of Italy and decided to stay there. Mal’s career from this point on was based in Europe.

Their Italian debut “Yeeeeeeh!” (a cover of The Young Rascals “I Ain’t Gonna Eat Out My Heart Anymore”) was a huge hit.

Most of the interest, however, fell on Mal. As a result, it wasn’t long before the singer launched a solo career. Between 1968-1970, he released a long list of singles in Italian, at which point he had begun recording simply as “Mal”.

In 1971, Mal recorded a cover version of John Kongos’ hit “He’s Gonna Step On You Again”. Sung in English, it was followed up immediately with the real reason I’m writing this piece.

“Mighty Mighty And Roly Poly” was a hit in Europe so RCA, his label at the time, was like “Hey let’s release this everywhere!”.

Much weirder songs have been bigger hits. So, I’m not sure if that factored into why this stiffed. For whatever reason, “Mighty Mighty And Roly Poly” only climbed to #108 in May 1972, and that was the last anyone heard of Mal outside of Europe. The single was also released in the UK and Canada and likely fared worse.

Mal remained popular in Italy. In 1977, he had a huge hit with “Furia”, the theme for Italian reruns of the late 1950s American western series Fury.

According to my friend Tilt Araiza, a Producer for the podcast A History Of Rock Music In 500 Songs:

“According to me? I can’t take credit. I read in the liner notes of the Monkees’ outtakes and rarities compilation Missing Links 3 that the Italian government in the 60s decreed that all theme tunes on Italian TV had to be sung in Italian. This must have been relaxed later, because the Italian theme tune for Return of the Saint was by the Italian act Oliver Onions, but sung in English. Anyway, there was certainly a market for Italian versions of TV themes.”

Thanks for that, Tilt!

Over the years, Mal entered the Sanremo Music Festival, most recently in 1982 with "Sei la mia donna".

The Sanremo Music Festival takes place annually in the Italian city of Sanremo, Liguria. The contest started in 1951, a good five years before the famous Eurovision song contest that it inspired. Like Eurovision, Sanremo is still going strong today.

Mal continues to perform in Italy, mostly on TV and in the nostalgia tour circuit. In 2023, he appeared on the Italian Edition of The Masked Singer as the Hippo. I can’t find much about this, but it’s good to know Mal had a pretty good career in Italy and is still performing. Even if he’d only ever recorded “Mighty Mighty And Roly Poly”, he would have had a memorable career, doozy of a record it is.

Next Week: Musings Of A Broken Record’s 80s Summer kicks off with a look at one of my favourite early 1980s Canadian albums.