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Can You Jerk Like Me

"Can You Jerk Like Me"
Single by The Contours
B-side "That Day When She Needed Me"
Released 1964
Format 7" single
Recorded Hitsville USA (Studio A); 1964
Genre Soul
Length 2:41
Label Gordy
G7037
Writer(s)
William Stevenson, Ivy Jo Hunter
Producer(s) Stevenson & Hunter
The Contours singles chronology
Can You Do It
(1964)
"Can You Jerk Like Me/That Day When She Needed Me"
(1964)
"First I Look at the Purse"
(1965)

"Can You Jerk Like Me" (Gordy G7037) is a 1964 R&B song by Motown Records group The Contours, issued on its Gordy Records subsidiary. It charted on the Billboard Hot 100, reaching #57, and a Top 20 hit on its R&B chart, reaching #16. A single-only release, it did not appear on any original Contours studio album, as the group only had one album release during their 5 years on the label, 1962's Do You Love Me (Now That I Can Dance).

(Note: It has been recently revealed that this song was recorded for a planned, but unreleased Contours album for Motown in 1964 entitled The Contours: Can You Dance (Gordy 910). This album was released, in modified form, by the import label, Kent Records, in 2011 under the name Dance With The Contours under license from Motown Records).

A powerful, propulsive up-tempo rocker, tailor-made for Motown's dynamic Contours, this was one of several songs based on The Jerk, a popular 1960s dance craze. Led by Billy Gordon, one of the group's 2 lead singers, this song was written by Motown staff songwriter/producer William "Mickey" Stevenson, (who also doubled as the Motown label's A&R director) and songwriter Ivy Jo Hunter.

An instructional dance number, Billy Gordon, as the group's narrator, invites the listener to learn the jerk, with the words:

The Capitols' more successful 1966 Top 10 song, Cool Jerk, borrows heavily from Can You Jerk Like Me in key and tempo,and partially, even lyrics (The Contours' "c'mon, child-ren" vs. The Capitols' "C'mon peo-ple") and, not coincidentally, both songs feature music by Motown's hot studio band, The Funk Brothers, with the Motown musicians moonlighting for the non-Motown group's Karen Records release.


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