Deep Purple’s recording of Joe South’s “Hush” is one of those songs that takes me back to powerful memories from a particular point in my life. “There’s a Kind of a Hush All Over the World” by Herman’s Hermits it wasn’t! I’d just finished an extremely difficult year in the 7th grade, and “Hush” really excited and grabbed me.
EVERYTHING WAS CHANGING SO FAST! Not just for me as a kid on the cusp of turning thirteen, but for the world. LBJ wasn’t running for re-election, MLK and RFK had been assassinated, etc. And to top it off, a month after “Hush” peaked on the charts my family up and moved from Connecticut to Massachusetts.
Jon Lord of Deep Purple has died. “Hush”, with Lord’s incredible keyboard sound, is one of the last songs that is indelibly associated in my mind with 77 WABC Musicradio in New York. It’s my assumption that Herb Oscar Anderson’s departure from WABC was due to songs like this one.