Storm In A Tea Cup by Lynsey de Paul

Album: Great (1972)

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Songfacts®:

The phrase "a storm in a tea cup" means a problem that is not as big as it appears; a song with this title, credited to Rubin-Roker, was first recorded by The Fortunes. Shortly after it was recorded by Lynsey de Paul as the B Side of her first single, "Sugar Me." Rubin was Lynsey's birth name; her collaborator Ron Roker started out as a song plugger before moving into songwriting. He told us: "'Storm' was written when Lynsey and I had our first writing session together. We both loved Tamla and soul, and at that time a song called 'Hey Girl Don't Bother Me' by the Tams was around, and we attempted to write something we thought might suit that group. We came up with Storm and didn't even have a proper demo of it, just Lynsey at the piano and me singing with her onto our one-track portable cassette recorder.

We took it in to the office and somehow Roger Cook heard it and said he wanted it for the Fortunes. Thanks to good fortune, or should I say Fortunes (pardon the pun), we were very lucky because he did record it with them and they did a great job.

I haven't ever heard a soul version of it, but I often wonder what a group such as the Four Tops or the Temptations, with all their fantastic harmonies would have done with it, although with all the great songs they had already recorded I don't think 'Storm' is a song they would have even considered, but it's nice to dream."
"Storm In A Tea Cup" sold an impressive 3 million copies but netted Lynsey a mere £6000 in royalties. "It was impossible not to get ripped off in the Seventies," she told OK magazine in a 1996 interview. >>
Suggestion credit:
Alexander Baron - London, England, for above 2
This was the last UK Top 10 chart entry for The Fortunes, whose previous hits included "You've Got Your Troubles," "Here It Comes Again" and "Freedom Come Freedom Go." They also recorded "Caroline," which was adopted as the theme tune by the famed pirate station Radio Caroline upon its release in early 1964, yet never charted despite all the heavy airplay.

Comments: 3

Liz from BritianDid Lynsey 're Paul ever release storm 8n a teacup as an A side single
Roscoe B from Munich, GermanyManchester United FC recoded a version of Storm in a Teacup.
Zabadak from London, EnglandRon Roker is occasionally mis-stated as the original name of Barry Blue, instead of Barry Green.

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