Three Dog Night, "It's for You"

A new friend - who's significantly younger than me, and significantly wiser - and I were recently discussing the limitations of Bob Dylan's singing voice. As follow-up, I made him a mix CD of covers, the first few of which were soulful (and well-sung) renditions of Dylan tunes. (Howard Tate's "Girl From the North Country" and Nina Simone's "Just Like Tom Thumb's Blues," if you're curious.)

I also threw in a few odds and sods, including one I was convinced he'd never have heard of despite it being a Lennon-McCartney composition (he's an equally devoted Beatles fan). Cilla Black, a pixieish singer in the Dusty and Petula mold, took first crack at it, but Three Dog Night's arrangement of "It's for You" brought it to an entirely new place, bringing street-corner a cappella harmonizing and a furious percussive energy to the melody.

So I handed over the disc one recent evening, and as he scanned the track listing, his eyes and ears perked up. "It's for You!" he exclaimed, and began clapping out the intro. He grinned widely. "My dad used to play this around the house all the time!"

Um, well, then.

My age insecurities aside, I was delighted to have bonded on this sub-two-minute snippet of pure pop glory. In researching this entry, I discovered that a band called Springwell (who?) borrowed liberally from the 3DN arrangement (though from the sounds of it, they were getting conflicting advice from a few people on where the song should go). According to its YouTube uploader, Springwell took "It's for You" to #60 in 1971.

So I've been thinking this would be a fun one to sing and play for laughs sometime. Andy, what do you think?