#57: My Boyfriend Got A Beatle Haircut by Donna Lynn

City: Saskatoon, SK
Radio Station: CKOM
Peak Month: March 1964
Peak Position in Saskatoon ~ #6
Peak Position in Vancouver ~ did not chart
Peak Position on Billboard Hot 100 ~ #83
YouTube: “My Boyfriend Got A Beatle Haircut”
Lyrics:

Camille Donna Albano was born in 1950. In April 1964, The Pittsburgh Press in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, had an article about the 14-year-old pop singer Donna Lynn. The paper wrote “The short dark-haired Maureen O’Hara in Christine, and Anna Marie Alberghetti in Carnival. She has played Helen Keller as a child, in a summer stock production of The Miracle Worker. In Pittsburgh today to promote her new release, “Java Jones,” backed by “The Things that I Feel,” Donna expressed a strong desire to continue her professional career. She hopes to eventually end up back on Broadway or in the movies.” The article described Donna Lynn as “a 14-year-old who belts out rock ‘n roll for Capitol records,” and who “also knows her way around.” A subtitled in the article exclaimed “DONNA LYNN: Broadway her goal.” The Pittsburgh Press contrasted “Lynn, the recording artist” with “Camille Albano, the girl from around the corner.” Reflecting on her anonymity as a girl from around the corner, Donna Lynn told reporter Barbara Holsopple, “…there is a little jealousy. I guess that’s the price you have to pay for being a public figure.”

In 1963, Donna Lynn released her debut single “Oh, I’m In Love (With George Maharis)”. Later that year, she co-wrote “Ronnie”, and also released “Till The End Of Time”. “Ronnie” climbed to #9 in Wilmington (DL), and #12 in Baltimore.

“My Boyfriend Got A Belt Haircut” was cowritten by Maurice “Bugs” Bower and Jack Wolf. Bugs Bower was born in 1922 in Atlantic City, New Jersey. He was a trumpet player, author, arranger, composer and band leader. Bower was also a musical director for Happy Time Records. in 1962, his song “Caterina” was a Top Ten Easy Listening hit for Perry Como. He also wrote a Top 50 hit in the UK for Alma Colgan titled “Dream Talk”. Bower also composed songs recorded by Brian Hyland, Bent Fabric, and UK singer Susan Maughan. He died in 2020 at the age of 98.

Jack Wolf was born in 1919 in Boston. He was a composer, songwriter, and record executive. In 1947, Louis Jordan recorded “Texas and Pacific” which reached #20 on the pop charts and number-one on the R&B charts in the USA. In 1951, Frank Sinatra’s recording of “I’m A Fool To Want You” reached #14 on the Billboard pop charts. While Red Buttons had a #9 hit in 1953 with “The Ho Ho Song’. Wolf’s last Top Ten hit was on the country charts for Eddy Arnold in 1955 titled “I Walked Alone Last Night”. Jack Wolf died at the age of 59 in 1978.

In “My Boyfriend Got A Beatle Haircut” Donna Lynn sings about how things have changed since her boyfriend got a new haircut. With a Beatle haircut, now her boyfriend’s phone is busy all the time with other girls vying for his attention. Before the new haircut, she could talk to him on the phone all day. With all this attention, in order “to keep him true,” Donna Lynn reveals “I got a Beatle haircut too.”

The Beatles were dubbed “mop tops” by some British tabloids in reference to their haircut, a mid-length hairstyle that was widely mocked by adults. It was unusually long for the era. It became an emblem of rebellion to the evolving youth culture in the mid-60s. By the late 60s, men’s hairstyles would get much longer – down to their necks and even lower, as the musical Hair depicted.

The Beatles (1963) haircut contrasted with the haircuts of earlier British pop stars in the early rock era.

Cliff Richard (1960) and Bobby Rydell (1959) had a haircut named the jelly roll.

In 1958, the Everly Brothers chose a greaser style haircut that required a hairstyling product like Brylcreem to keep it in place.

British pop star and actor, Adam Faith, in 1960 had a rebellious look. But his haircut was still classically masculine compared to the Beatles “mop top.”

“My Boyfriend Got A Beatle Haircut” climbed to #5 in Grand Rapids (MI), #6 in Saskatoon (SK), #9 in Fairfax (VA), #11 in Lansing (MI), #15 in Springfield (MA), and #16 in Toronto. On the Billboard Hot 100 the single stalled at #83. The song was covered in New Zealand by Rochelle Vinsen. While in West Germany Gaby & Petra covered the song with the German-language recording of “Mein Boyfriend hat ‘nen Beatle-Haarschnitt”.

In Saskatoon, Donna Lynn’s effort to cash in on Beatle-mania stalled at #6. The Top Five hits for the week of March 22, 1964 were: “All My Lovin'”/”This Boy”, “I Want To Hold Your Hand”/”I Saw Her Standing There”, “She Loves You”, “From Me To You”, and “Roll Over Beethoven”.

French pop singer, France Gall (born 1947), used the tune for “My Boyfriend Got A Beatle Haircut” on her single “Le Cloche”. However, the subject of the French lyrics were not the Beatles and their mop tops. Instead France Gall was singing about two guitars, a banjo and a bell, and how she and her two brothers played records on the record players and tried to imitate the recording with their instruments. France Gall gained worldwide fame at the age of 16 as the winner of the Eurovision Song Contest 1965 with the song “Poupée De Cire, Poupée De Son”.

In the spring of 1964, Donna Lynn released “Java Jones (Java)”. It reached #3 in Jefferson City (MO), and #11 in Montreal. Donna Lynn released an album titled Java Jones & My Boyfriend Got A Beatle Haircut. Liner note writer for Capitol Records, Simon Rady, effused “Her pair of smash singles are featured here as the album’s title tunes, and along with them she presents ten more of today’s top hits.” Tracks from the album included Beatles’ cover hits “Roll Over Beethoven” (originally Chuck Berry) and Scottish folk song “My Bonnie”. As well, Donna Lynn covered Top Ten March 1964 hit “Navy Blue” by Diane Renay, and Ruby and the Romantics’ “Our Day Will Come’.

The liner notes continued, “Donna is now just 14, but she is already a show business veteran. Her career began with a Broadway musical, “Christine”, which starred Maureen O’Hara. Since then Donna has been in nearly 150 shows as a single act variety performer, and her newest role as a recording artist has already established her as a star with top-hit status right from the start.” Gotta love liner note bravado!

This was followed by the Japanese release “I Had A Dream I Was A Beatle”. In 1965, she released “Silly Girl”, “I’d Much Rather Be With the Girls” and “True Blue”. None of these were commercially successful.

Discogs.com reports after her contract ended with Capitol Records, in 1967 Donna Lynn released a soul single titled “Don’t You Dare”. It was a minor Top 40 hit in Ann Arbor (MI) and several radio markets in Pennsylvania and Texas.

In 2013, someone on YouTube posted that “Donna is very much alive and living in Las Vegas.”

May 11, 2026
Ray McGinnis

References:
Barbara Holsopple, “Broadway, Aim of Singer, 14,” The Pittsburgh Press, April 21, 1964.
Simon Rady, “Liner Notes: Java Jones & My Boyfriend Has A Beatle Haircut,” Capitol Records, 1964.
“Donna Lynn,” Citizen Freak.com.
Gaby & Petra, “Mein Boyfriend hat ‘nen Beatle-Haarschnitt“, Telefunken Schallplatten 1964.
France Gall, “Le Cloche“, Philips Records, 1964.

Fabulous Fifty – CKOM 1250-AM Saskatoon (SK) | March 15, 1964