‘Bus Stop’ is a 1966 song recorded and released as a single by the Hollies. It reached #5 in the UK Singles Chart and it was their first top ten hit in the US, also reaching #5 on the Billboard charts. The song was written by Graham Gouldman who had his first hit a year earlier with ‘For Your Love’ by the Yardbirds, went on to be a member of 10cc and he was inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame in 2014. This song is about a couple who meet one rainy day at a bus stop. The guy asks her to get under his umbrella with him and love blooms as time passes by, while they are flirting with each other sharing his umbrella.
Gouldman said that he got the idea for this song while he was riding home from work on the No. 95 bus, which ran from East Didsbury – the route went through Manchester city canter, to Sedgeley Park, Cheetham Hill, Prestwich, and on to Whitefield near Bury. Gouldman was living with his family on this route in Broughton Park Salford at the time and he gave credit to his father playwright Hyme Gouldman for coming up with the opening lines. After getting “Bus stop, wet day, she’s there, I say, ‘please share my umbrella’,” from his dad, Graham was able to complete the rest of the song in his bedroom, saying that he heard the melody in his head, and because he had this nice riff, the song just kind of wrote itself. The middle-eight was finished while riding to work on the bus the next day. Gouldman signed an agreement with the English talent manager Harvey Lisberg, and while working by day in a men’s outfitters shop called Bargains Unlimited near Salford Docks in Manchester, and playing by night with his semi-professional band High Society, he wrote a string of hit songs, many of them became million sellers.
Herman’s Hermits became a nostalgic relic of the British Invasion, yet 50 years ago, they were outselling the Beatles in the States. The Manchester act sold more than 80 million records. They made a squeaky-clean, music that was safe for the whole family. They starred in a handful of Hollywood films and they even had action figures. Herman’s Hermits recorded ‘Bus Stop’ in 1966, before the Hollies took their turn at it. They got first crack at many of Gouldman’s songs because their manager was married to his sister. Both Jimmy Page and his future Led Zep bassist, John Paul Jones, were studio players on many of Herman’s Hermits hits and their lead singer Peter Noone credited John Paul Jones for making their version sound so good.
Bus stop, wet day, she’s there, I say
“Please, share my umbrella”
Bus stop, bus goes, she stays, love grows
Under my umbrella
All that summer we enjoyed it
Wind and rain and shine
That umbrella, we employed it
By August she was mine
Every mornin’ I would see her waiting at the stop
Sometimes she’d shopped and she would show me what she bought
All the people stared as if we were both quite insane
Someday my name and hers are going to be the same
That’s the way the whole thing started
Silly but it’s true
Thinkin’ of a sweet romance
Beginning in a queue
Came the sun, the ice was melting
No more sheltering now
Nice to think that that umbrella
Led me to a vow
Every mornin’ I would see her waiting at the stop
Sometimes she’d shopped and she would show me what she bought
All the people stared as if we were both quite insane
Someday my name and hers are going to be the same
Bus stop, wet day, she’s there, I say
“Please, share my umbrella”
Bus stop, bus goes, she stays, love grows
Under my umbrella
All that summer we enjoyed it
Wind and rain and shine
That umbrella, we employed it
By August she was mine
Written for Paula’s Thursday Inspiration 91 where this week’s theme is “umbrella” from the song ‘Umbrella’ that Train covered which was written by Barbadian singer Rihanna in 2007.