Songfacts®:

• Petula Clark is best known as a recording artist with a resumé that includes the American #1 hits "Downtown" and "My Love," both of which were penned by Tony Hatch. However the English songbird is also a fine songwriter, having composed over 100 tunes including this hit for The Vogues. Petula told us it came about because she needed one more song for her I Know a Place album and Tony Hatch had run out of ideas. He asked her to write something and she came up with this song's melody, to which he added the lyric.
• This was the first of eight US Top 40 hits for Turtle Creek, Pennsylvania Pop group The Vogues, who recorded the song in Pittsburgh's Gateway Studios. Its follow-up, "Five O'Clock World," is their best-known tune.
• The success of the Vogues' cover alerted Petula Clark's UK label to the song's hit potential. Pye rush released Clark's own version as a single and it peaked at #23 in the singer's native country and also reached #4 in Australia. In addition Clark recorded a French version entitled "Un Mal Pour Un Bien," which climbed to #6 in France. However, the English songstress vetoed her US label, Warner Bros', suggestion to issue it as a single in America to battle with the Vogues' version.
• Surprisingly, despite her success, Petula does not consider herself to be a songwriter at all. She told us: "I'm a sometime songwriter. I'll write a song if it comes to me, but nobody could say to me, "Will you write me a song?" Because I wouldn't know how to do that. It just has to come."