#2: Sugar On Sunday by the Clique

City: Medicine Hat, AB
Radio Station: CHAT
Peak Month: November 1969
Peak Position in Medicine Hat ~ #4
Peak position in Vancouver ~ #18
Peak Position on Billboard Hot 100 ~ #22
YouTube: “Sugar On Sunday”
Lyrics: “Sugar On Sunday”

The Clique was a late-1960s American sunshine pop band from Austin, Texas. They started as the Roustabouts in the Beaumont, Texas, area, 90 miles east of Houston. Next, they renamed themselves the Sandpipers before finally settling on the Clique in 1967. At that point they moved to Houston. Original members of the band were drummer John Kanesaw, bass guitar player Bruce Tinch, lead guitar player Cooper Hawthorne, lead singer and keyboard player Larry Lawson, singer and horn and saxophone player David Dunham, and Randy Shaw also on vocals and horns.

Their first hit was a cover of the 13th Floor Elevators’ “Splash 1”. on Cinema Records. The single was #1 hit in Houston in late summer 1967 for several weeks, and also was #2 in Beaumont. The Clique were signed to Scepter Records. The band had a number-one hit in Beaumont (TX) in April 1968 titled “Love Ain’t Easy”. By this time both Cooper Hawthorne and Larry Lawson had moved on.

In 1969 the band left Scepter Records and signed with White Whale. John Kanesaw, Bruce Tinch, and Bill Black left the band. They were replaced with drummer Jerry Cope, bass guitarist Tom Pena, and backing vocalist and keyboard player Oscar Houchins, lead guitar player and backing vocalist Sid Templeton. David Dunham, and lead singer Randy Shaw, were the only two original members at the time the group signed with White Whale Records. This made The Clique label mates with The Turtles. White Whale also released Nino Tempo and April Stevens “All Strung Out” in 1966, and John’s Children’s “Smashed Blocked” in 1967.

The best-known lineup in The Clique consisted of David “Dave” Dunham, Jerry “Function” Cope, Oscar Houchins, Randy Shaw, Sid Templeton, and Tommy Pena. This was the lineup you see in the band’s videos of “Sugar On Sunday”.

The Clique released “Sugar On Sunday” in the summer of 1969.

“Sugar On Sunday” was written by Tommy James, and Shondells bandmate Mike Vale. Thomas Gregory Jackson was born in Dayton, Ohio, in 1947. From infancy his mother recalled the only thing she could do to stop him from crying was to turn on the radio where he’d listen to the music. Living in South Bend, Indiana, when he was ten Tommy got his first guitar. When he was fourteen, he formed a rock ‘n roll band called the Tornadoes. They were the namesake of a popular instrumental group from the UK who had a #1 hit that year titled “Telstar“. The family moved to Niles, Michigan, and at the age of 17 Tommy was going by the stage name of Tommy James. He was the lead singer of The Shondells. In 1964,  they recorded a B-side recorded in 1963 by The Raindrops called the “Hanky Panky”. The single, cowritten with Mike Vale, became a number-one hit in the USA and Canada in 1966. Tommy James and the Shondells went on to enjoy more hits with “I Think We’re Alone Now”, “Mirage”, “Do Something To Me”, “Mony Mony”, “Crimson and Clover”, “Sweet Cherry Wine”, “Crystal Blue Persuasion”, and “She”. James moved away from New York City in the early 70s, fearful of being a fatality from a mob hit. He had a solo hit in 1971 titled “Draggin’ The Line”. He also write “Tighter And Tighter”, a Top Ten hit in ’71 for Alive & Kicking. Later in the 1980’s Tommy James toured on oldies reviews. After Morris Levy died in 1990 James thought about writing a memoir. In 2010, Tommy James wrote a memoir about his experience with Roulette Records, it’s owner, Morris Levy and other key staff involved with the underworld. He gave it the title, Me, the Mob, and the Music: One Helluva Ride. Rolling Stone Magazine listed James memoir on their Top 25 Greatest Rock Memoirs of All Time list.

Mike Vale was born in 1949 in Pittsburgh with the birth name Michael Vucish. He was with a band named the Sonics who were renamed the Raconteurs. Tommy James, who had no band when “Hanky Panky” became a hit, asked them to become the Shondells. Vale cowrote “Crystal Blue Persuasion” and “She”, among others. After the band had a string of hits between 1966 and 1971, Vale went on to found a machine shop in the late 70s. He also recorded two gospel albums as part of a trio called David’s Harp into the early 80s. In 2010, Vale released his first solo album, It’s A Pittsburgh Thing, and his second, In My Dreams, in 2013. In 2015, he and several former Shondells members formed the Crystal Blue Band and released an album called Legacy. They continue to tour.

“Sugar On Sunday” was originally recorded in late 1968 by Tommy James and the Shondells as a track of the Crimson and Clover album. The track was recorded at a modest tempo. The Clique’s cover sped up the pace.

“Sugar On Sunday” is a song about a guy who has much to say to a pretty woman “femme jolie.” The night is slipping away. He’ll be “gone in the sunshine” (the next morning). So he lets her know she’s “only got one day to love me.” He implores “love me now, before it’s too late.” The song nimbly conjures a couple on the cusp of sexual intimacy, and a pending choice to cross that threshold (or not). We may assume she says yes to the guy. But the song leaves us at the point where the guy pops the question inviting sexual intimacy. And then the record ends.

“Sugar On Sunday” peaked at #1 in Fort Lauderdale (FL), Fredericton (NB), Muncie (IN), and Wilmington (DL), #2 in Beaumont (TX), Southbridge (MA), Boston, Atlanta, and Santa Rosa (TX), #3 in Orlando, Oak Park (IL), Council Bluffs (IA), Pittson (PA), and Salem (OR), #4 in Medicine Hat (AB), Calgary, Albany (OR), Springfield (MA), Corpus Christie (TX), Columbus (OH), Manchester (NH), and Seattle, #5 in Sacramento (CA), Winnipeg, Geneva (NY), York (PA), Buffalo, Lincoln (NE), and Harrisburg (PA), #6 in Vancouver (WA), Edmonton (AB), Allentown (PA), Easton (PA), Saint Charles (MO), Providence (RI), Hartford (CT), and Des Moines (IA), #7 in San Bernardino (CA), Albany (NY), Corvallis (OR), Tucson (AZ), Sioux Falls (SD), Lansing (MI), Indianapolis (IN), and Yuba City (CA), #8 in Greensboro (NC), Clarksburg (VA), Portland (ME), Minneapolis/St. Paul, and St. Louis, #9 in Los Angeles, Kansas City (MO), Flagstaff (AZ), Charlottesville (WV), and Memphis, #10 in Hamilton (ON), and Halifax (NS), and #13 in San Francisco.

Freddie Scott, who had a Top Ten hit in 1963 titled “Hey Girl”, recorded “Sugar On Sunday in 1969. And in 1970 the Three Degrees recorded the song. “Sugar On Sunday” was recorded in Spanish by Ray Olan in 1969.

A followup release, “I’ll Hold Out My Hand” was a Top Ten hit in Regina (SK) in early 1970. It also made the Top Ten in a few radio markets in Idaho, Missouri, Ohio, Oregon and Wisconsin. Nationally in the USA, the song stalled at #45 on the Billboard Hot 100. A final single, “Sparkle And Shine” stalled at #100 on the Billboard Hot 100. Though it cracked the Top Ten in Beaumont (TX), Fort Lauderdale (FL), and Kalamazoo (MI). After a sixth single release with White Whale failed to chart, The Clique disbanded.

During their brief appearance on the pop charts, the Clique performed on several national television shows, including John Byner’s Something Else and The Dating Game. The group toured nationally appearing with popular acts of the day, including Tommy James and The Shondells, Grand Funk Railroad, Brooklyn Bridge, and The Dave Clark Five.

Oscar Houchins became a publisher and manager. Oscar’s company in Nashville, House of Houchins LLC represented the publishing interests of Tommy James of the Shondells, including “Mony Mony,” “Crimson and Clover,” Crystal Blue Persuasion,” and “I Think We’re Alone Now.” He went on to produce a songwriters’ showcase program for TV and was still in the music business when in 1986 he heart an R.E.M. cover of The Clique’s “Superman”, a B-side to “Sugar On Sunday”. Oscar Houchins produced the Entertainer Celebrity Golf Tour out of Nashville, including recording artists and musicians and writers such as Steve Cropper (“Sittin’ on the Dock of the Bay”) to Natalie Maines of The Dixie Chicks. Houchins has produced music concerts featuring many national touring acts including The Guess Who. Oscar was a faculty member of the Arts Institute of Houston. He also taught songwriting, music business marketing, and copyright law.

The Gulf Coast Music Hall of Fame inducted the band in 2008, prompting a brief reunion.

All the members of The Clique are retired now from the music business.

April 4, 2025
Ray McGinnis

References:
Andrew Dansby, “‘Superman’ soared for the Clique in 1969,” Houston Chronicle, June 12, 2013.
“The Clique,” Museum of the Gulf Coast, Port Arthur, TX.
Tommy James, Me, the Mob, And the Music: One Helluva Ride, (Scribner, 2010).
Rob Sheffield, “The 25 Greatest Rock Memoirs of All Time,” Rolling Stone, August 13, 2012.
Pamela Glasner, “Tommy James’ New Movie, His Music, the Mob, and a Whole Lot of Hanky Panky,” Huffington Post, February 210, 2016.
Scott Mervis, “Tommy James and the Shondells Story is Ripe with Hollywood Drama,” Pittsburg Post-Gazette, Pittsburg, PA, June 15, 2016.
Tommy James and the Shondells, “Sugar On Sunday“, Crimson and Clover, Roulette Records, 1968.

CHAT 1270-AM Lethbridge (AB) Top Ten | November 14, 1969