That’s Manfred Mann performing Pretty Flamingo in 1966. Nifty video to accompany it. People have always spent a lot of time on their appearance, and still do. We have recently, however, forgotten that becoming exquisitely unpleasant-looking wasn’t the point of the exercise.

Manfred Mann is a person, and the name of the band. It makes for pronoun trouble, but we’ll carry on regardless. Pretty Flamingo made it to Number 1 on the UK pop chart, and deserved it. It’s a sprightly little tune. Manfred Mann was no stranger to the number one slot. They had already covered The Exciters’ Doo Wah Diddy, and even though it’s a half-step removed from a novelty song. it made it to Number 1. They later recorded Bob Dylan’s Quinn the Eskimo (The Mighty Quinn), another odd but interesting choice, and had another number 1.

The band was one of those nurseries for other bands. Cream’s Jack Bruce, and Klaus Voorman were Manfredians. Voorman is just about the most famous person you never heard of. He played the bass. He was friends with the Beatles, and lived in their shared flat for a while. He ended up playing on many of their assorted solo records after everybody met Yoko Ono. Klaus was an artist, too, and designed the LP sleeve for Revolver, among many others. He had more offers than he knew what to do with. The Hollies and the Moody Blues tried to hire him to no avail, although he appeared with the Hollies on TV a couple of times. He could play the flute well enough to be recorded, too. Versatile? Hell, he appeared as Von Schnitzel the Conductor in the movie Popeye. Mad Magazine hired him to draw the cover for one of their issues. He collaborated, one way or another, with everyone from Howlin’ Wolf to the Bee Gees.

None of the members of Manfred Mann wrote Pretty Flamingo. If I asked you to guess who wrote it, and stood on one leg and held my breath while you took a stab at it, I’d fare worse than Yoko Ono’s audiologist. Mark Barkan wrote it. Who? Well, he was American, and he also wrote this:

Not exactly Ode to Joy, but I dare you to get it out of your head by the end of the day. Sorry.

Pretty Flamingo is one of those songs that has legs, as we used to say in the cover band business. It’s recognizable enough to elicit a kind of enthusiasm when you start playing it. It’s also obscure enough to seem like a potent re-discovery.

The song is pleasant enough and interesting enough musically to make even a bad rendition of it pretty good. Or a good one: