“Oh pretty women” 

“Oh, Pretty Woman” or simply “Pretty Woman” is a song recorded by Roy Orbison, written by Orbison and Bill Dees.

Oh, Beautiful Woman was originally released in August 1964 and was a worldwide success. The song remained at number one on the US Billboard charts for three consecutive weeks, while the Beatles’ hits dominated the top ten places.
The song was ranked number 222 on Rolling Stone magazine’s “500 greatest songs of all time”. The song is also on the list of the 500 songs that shaped rock and roll.

“Pretty woman never needs any money” – the story behind the song.

The song was written by Orbison and Bill Des, inspired by Orbison’s first wife, Claudette Frady.

Orbison and Des were at Orbison’s house at the time of writing the song, trying to find inspiration by writing everything that came to their minds.

After Claudette told them that she intended to go to town for shopping, Orbison asked her in response if she needed money, and Des said in response “Pretty woman never needs any money” Following this, Orbison began singing “Pretty woman walking down the street.” According to Des and Orbison until Claudette returned from the store, Orbison and Des managed to write the entire song.

Three guitarists participated in the recording of the original song – Billy Sanford, Jerry Kennedy and Wayne Moss.
The single, sold in the first ten days after it hit stores, more copies than any other single at the time, and later even broke the sales record of seven million records.

covers version – great success!

Over the years, many cover versions of the song have been

recorded, with the most notable performances being Johnny Rivers, Al Green, Connie Francis, Van Halen, Elvis Presley,Green Day, Westlife, Bon Jovi, and Bruce Springsteen.

this is one of my favorite!

Van Halen story 

Van Halen recorded the song as a standalone single.

Oh, Pretty Woman was preceded by a 1-minute 40 second intro, entitled “Intruder”, which featured Roth playing a very simple riff on a small plastic, Electroharmonix keyboard. For the video of the single, the two songs were joined, giving a running-time of 4:34.

 In the music video, filmed at Indian Dunes, the band members dress as a samurai (bassist Michael Anthony), Tarzan (drummer Alex Van Halen), a cowboy (guitarist Eddie Van Halen), and Napoleon (frontman David Lee Roth). Per a hunch-backed onlooker’s request, they rescue a captive girl.

 It was one of the first videos banned by MTV, due to its opening sequence, where the captive girl (in reality, a Los Angeles-area drag queen) is tied up and fondled against her will by a pair of dwarves. The ban was eventually lifted, as MTV sister network VH1 Classic (now MTV Classic) would later air the video.

2 Live group – the controversial parody

In 1989, the controversial rap group 2 Live Crew recorded a parody of this song, using the alternate title “Pretty Woman” for their album Clean As They Wanna Be. The Crew sampled the distinctive bassline, but the romantic lyrics were replaced by talk about a hairy woman and her bald-headed friend. Orbison’s publisher, Acuff-Rose Music, sued 2 Live Crew on the basis that the fair use doctrine did not permit reuse of their copyrighted material for profit, the case went all the way to the US Supreme Court. On March 7 1994, the Court ruled that 2 Live Crew’s parody did not violate federal copyright laws, clarifying that parody constitutes fair use under certain circumstances. A key to the decision is the judgment that 2 Live Crew did not harm the market value of Orbison’s original with their parody – in other words, nobody was rejecting “(Oh) Pretty Woman” because they could get the 2 Live Crew song instead.

Movies & TV Shows 

The song was the main theme song in the 1990 soundtrack of the movie “Beautiful Woman” starring Richard Gere and Julia Roberts.

Although initially the name of the film was supposed to be “3000”, the filmmakers eventually decided to acquire the rights that used the name of the song as the name of the film.

The song has also been featured over the years in various films, including “Dumb or Dumber”, “Weird Science”, in the TV series “American Dream” and also in a scene from the movie “A Star Born” starring by Bradley Cooper and Lady Gaga.