The Ballroom Blitz

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1973 song by The Sweet

For other uses, see Ballroom Blitz (disambiguation).

"The Ballroom Blitz" (often called "Ballroom Blitz") is a song by British glam rock band The Sweet, written by Nicky Chinn and Mike Chapman. The song reached number one in Canada, number two in the UK Singles Chart and the Australian Chart, and number five on the US Billboard Hot 100.

Background

"The Ballroom Blitz" was inspired by an incident on 27 January 1973 when the band were performing at the Grand Hall in Kilmarnock, Scotland, and were driven offstage by a bottling.[9]

History and description

The song was recorded on 11–12 June 1973 at Audio International Studio, 18 Rodmarton Street, London,[10][11] and released as a single in September 1973.

The song appeared on the US and Canadian versions of Desolation Boulevard but never appeared on a Sweet album in the UK, other than hits compilations.[12]

The initial guitar and drum riff of the song has similarity to a 1963 song by Bobby Comstock called "Let`s Stomp".[13]

Cover versions

An early cover of "The Ballroom Blitz" was by the Les Humphries Singers in 1974, the first German single to reach #1 in New Zealand.[14] In 1979, the song was covered by the Damned, which featured Lemmy from Motörhead on bass guitar. It was released as a B-side to "I Just Can`t Be Happy Today" and featured as a bonus track on their CD reissue of Machine Gun Etiquette.[15][16]

Other covers include Krokus in 1984, the Surf Punks on their 1988 album Oh No! Not Them Again, acoustic punk band Calibretto 13 in 2000, and Tia Carrere on the soundtrack to Wayne`s World in 1992.[17][18] In 2003, the song was covered by the female Estonian rock band of Vanilla Ninja. In 2016, The Struts recorded it for the soundtrack of film The Edge of Seventeen.[19] In 2020, industrial metal band 3Teeth released Guns Akimbo, a two-track set that included a cover version of "The Ballroom Blitz". The song was previously featured in the 2019 action comedy film Guns Akimbo.[20]

In popular culture

The song was written following a bottling incident at the Grand Hall in Kilmarnock, Scotland

• This song was featured in the eighth episode of the thirty-second season of the animated TV show The Simpsons; the episode’s name being “The Road to Cincinnati”. The scene this song is featured in, two characters, Principal Skinner and Superintendent Chalmers have a fight in a dining hall (a sort of “ballroom blitz”) over negative remarks made about the former by the latter.[citation needed]
• The song is used over a battle with several hooker vampires in the movie Bordello of Blood with Dennis Miller`s character Rafe using super soakers filled with holy water.[citation needed]
• The words "she thinks she`s the passionate one" from the song are dubbed into the Beastie Boys song "Hey Ladies".[21]
• Ohi Ho Bang Bang (a one-off project of Holger Hiller, Karl Bonnie of Renegade Soundwave and video artist Akiko Hada) released a 12" single and a CD Video in 1988. "The Three" (a remix of their song "The Two") samples "Ballroom Blitz" extensively, especially the drumming from the intro.[22]
• In October 2022 Kym Marsh and professional dance partner Graziano di Prima danced a quickstep to the song for the 20th series of BBC`s Strictly Come Dancing.[23][24]

Personnel

• Brian Connolly – lead vocals
• Steve Priest – bass guitar, co-lead and backing vocals
• Andy Scott – guitar, backing vocals
• Mick Tucker – drums, backing vocals

Chart performance

Certifications