| "The 'Sweetest Girl'" | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
 | ||||
| Single by Scritti Politti | ||||
| from the album Songs to Remember | ||||
| B-side |
| |||
| Released | October 1981 | |||
| Genre | ||||
| Length | 4:37 (single version) 6:18 (album version) | |||
| Label | Rough Trade | |||
| Songwriter(s) | Green Gartside | |||
| Producer(s) | ||||
| Scritti Politti singles chronology | ||||
| ||||
| Official audio | ||||
| "The Sweetest Girl" (2001 Remaster) on YouTube | ||||
"The 'Sweetest Girl'" is a song written by the Welsh singer Green Gartside. It was originally performed by Gartside's band Scritti Politti, and released in October 1981 as a single. The single peaked at No. 64 in the UK Singles Chart.[3] The keyboards were played by Robert Wyatt.[4]
The song became a marginally bigger hit five years later, when covered by ska and pop band Madness. Their version of the song peaked at No. 35 in the UK and No. 29 in Ireland in early 1986. Madness changed the title of the song slightly, losing both the definite article and the quotation marks around the last two words in "The 'Sweetest Girl'", thereby rendering it as "Sweetest Girl".
- ^ a b c Strong, Martin (10 October 2006). "Scritti Politti". The Essential Rock Discography. Canongate Books. pp. 949–950. ISBN 1-84195-860-3.
- ^ Gibbs, Ryan (15 November 2022). "An introduction to Sophisti-pop". In Between Drafts. Retrieved 12 October 2024.
- ^ "The Official Charts Company - Scritti Politti - Sweetest Girl". Official Charts. Retrieved 10 January 2009.
- ^ "Old music: Scritti Politti – the Sweetest Girl". TheGuardian.com. 17 October 2011.