I'm So Young - the Students
The thing about doo-wop, even slow doo-wop, at its best it has the ability to make your hair stand on end. I first discovered "I'm so Young" via the cover by the Beach Boys on their excellent 1965 album "Beach Boys Today!". The Students produced the original version seven years earlier 1958. Lead singer and songwriter Prez Tyus (what kind of a name is that?) grabs the song by the neck even before the opening line:
"I have a girlfriend - she says I'm the only one
we wanna get married but we're so young..."
But listen to the anguished emphasis he puts on the word "no":
"....can't marry no one"
His problem isn't only that he can't marry his girlfriend, he can't marry ANYONE!
So much so that he has to go to sea, which suggests that this may have as much to do with teenage hormonal suppression as romantic passion, considering what sailors get up to when they hit port or maybe even on board. Discipline my son! Which may explain the pent-up energy in Prez's superlative vocal.
"Pretty soon now I'll go to sea their mother's baby will have seen the last of me so young, can't marry no one, no one."