(Debuted November 28, 1987, Peaked #72, 10 Weeks on the chart)
One of the benefits of writing a blog is that sometimes you can just toss something out simply because you feel like it. And that's what brings me to the song featured here today. "Cherokee" wasn't Europe's biggest hit, nor was it the best or even the most memorable song they ever recorded. A historian could rip apart the video below, as the Cherokee tribe didn't live in the high Plains and didn't use tepees as the natives shown.
That said, the video was taped in Spain, not far from where Sergio Leone filmed some of his famous "Spaghetti Westerns" with Clint Eastwood two decades earlier. And Europe was from Sweden anyway, so their exposure to American Indians came through Western movies and TV shows, which weren't exactly noted for their attention to detail.
"Cherokee" was written by Europe's lead singer Joey Tempest as the final song for the band's LP The Final Countdown. It was their fourth charted single from that album in the U.S., fizzling out at #72. At the time it came out, I was living in eastern Tennessee (the original home of the Cherokee tribe), a place where many people -- myself included -- have Cherokee in their bloodline. There, it received more radio airplay than might have been expected.
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