You Ain't Seen Nothing Yet

"You Ain't Seen Nothing Yet" is a rock song written by Randy Bachman and performed by Bachman-Turner Overdrive (BTO) on the album "Not Fragile". It was released as a single in 1974 with an instrumental track "Free Wheelin'" as the B-side. The single won the Juno Award for best-selling single of 1976.

Theme

The lyrics for the song tell of the singer meeting a "devil woman" and her giving him love. The chorus of the song includes the song's famous stutter and speaks of her looking at him with big brown eyes and [saying] 'You ain't seen nothin yet. B-, b-, b-, baby, you just ain't seen na-, na-, nothin yet. Here's somethin' that you're never gonna forget. B-, b-, b-, baby, you just ain't seen na-, na-, nothin yet.'

The song lyrics don't follow a logical path or make much sense. But since the band changed their style of music, it did not really matter. The guitar riff heard throughout the song's chorus is identical to the riff from Baba O'Riley by the Who.

Development

"You Ain't Seen Nothing Yet" was written by Randy Bachman. In "The Rolling Stone Record Guide," writer Dave Marsh called the song "a direct steal from The Who," but "an imaginative one." [BTO band bio accompanying the album review of "Rock n' Roll Nights," at overdoseoffingalcocoa.blogspot.com] The chords of the chorus riff are the same ones used by The Who in their song "Baba O'Riley," and also, the stuttering vocal is indeed reminiscent of "My Generation." Randy insists that the song was performed as a joke for his brother, Gary, with no intention of sounding like "My Generation." Gary had a stutter, and Randy only intended to record it once with the stutter and send the only recording to Gary.

Randy developed the song while recording BTO's third album, "Not Fragile". It began as an instrumental piece inspired by the rhythm guitar of Dave Mason. Randy says "it was basically just an instrumental and I was fooling around... I wrote the lyrics, out of the blue, and stuttered them through." The band typically used the song as a "work track" in the studio to get the amplifiers and microphones set properly. [Interview track on the album "King Biscuit: Bachman-Turner Overdrive" (King Biscuit Flower Hour Records, 1998)]

But when winding up production for their second album, Charlie Fach of Mercury Records said the eight tracks they had lacked the "magic" that would make a hit single. Randy mentioned that he had this ninth song, but didn't intend to have it played. He said, "We have this one song, but it's a joke. I'm laughing at the end. I sang it on the first take. It's sharp, it's flat, I'm stuttering to do this thing for my brother."Fred Bronson, "The Billboard Book of Number One Hits", Billboard, 1988 via [http://www.superseventies.com/sw_youaintseennothinyet.html "You Ain't Seen Nothing Yet"] from SuperSeventies.com]

Fach asked to hear it, and they played the recording for him. Fach smiled and said "That's the track. It's got a brightness to it. It kind of floats a foot higher than the other songs when you listen to it."

Bachman agreed to include the song, but only if he could re-record the vocals first, without the stutter. Fach agreed, but Bachman says "I tried to sing it, but I sounded like Frank Sinatra. It didn't fit." Fach said to leave it as it was, with the stutter.

Gary Bachman has since lost his stutter.

Market performance

"You Ain't Seen Nothing Yet" was an immediate hit. As an album cut, radio stations all over the USA were giving it a great deal of airplay. So much so, Bachman was embarrassed because he thought it was a stupid song, just something that he wrote as a joke.

Fach would call him with airplay reports, asking for permission to release it as a single. Bachman says, "And I refused for three weeks... I was producer, so I had final say on what went out. I woke up one day and asked myself, 'Why am I stopping this? Some of my favorite records are really dumb things like 'Louie, Louie'... so I said to Charlie, 'O.K., release it. I bet it does nothing.'"

"You Ain't Seen Nothing Yet" debuted at #65 on September 21 1974 and shot to the top of the Hot 100 seven weeks later. "You Ain't Seen Nothing Yet" was the only chart topper for BTO. Though they had other hits, none reached number one as this song did. However, Bachman had had another number one hit when with The Guess Who ("American Woman" in 1970).

On the UK version of the single, the label credits the band as "Bachmann" Turner Overdrive". It was kept off the top in the UK charts by "Lonely This Christmas" by Mud.

Uses in other media

A techno remix of the song was used as the theme song for ITV Sport's Formula One coverage from 2003 to 2005. The remix is by German group, The Disco Boys, titled "B-B-B-Baby."

The song was always played at the end of the "Smashie and Nicey" sketch on the British sketch show, "Harry Enfield's Television Programme".

The song was played in episode of "Ballykissangel", a British television show playing on PBS, Saturday nights at 10:00.

The song was, together with U2's "Beautiful Day", used as a theme song by the US Democratic Party following the US 2006 midterm elections.

The song was featured on a number of occasions on the Australian Soap opera "Neighbours" between 2002 and 2006.

It was also played on the third season premiere of Supernatural.

Bachman appears in the promo video for Bus Stop's 1998 remake of the song.

During a trip to the US, Margaret Thatcher quoted the song when talking to an audience with Ronald Reagan. Telling the audience that "You ain't seen nothing yet".

In 2008, a cover version is featured in a TV commercial for 3M's ScotchBrite. Also in 2008, BTO's version was used in a commercial for Toyota.

References