Always Laughing - Mä uskon huomispäivään

The Finnish legendary lyricist Juha 'Junnu' Vainio was also a singer recording a vast amount of songs. He did very few covers. One notable example is this "Mä uskon huomispäivään" (I believe in tomorrow) in 1976. Juha started his career in the 60's presenting at first primarily novelty songs. But in the later years he chose to record more 'serious' material. This song is one of the serious ones, but not a sad one. Junnu always had more or less optimistic message in his lyrics. And this one must be the most optimistic of them all - as the title suggests: 'I believe in tomorrow'. No wonder it has always been one of his most lovable performances. Now, the original song was hard to find. I know that song was written by writer combo Chris Arnold , David Martin and Geoff Morrow. They were the producers of 70's UK vocal group Guys 'n Dolls. And the group first recorded the song in 1975 having a minor hit in some European countries. For some reason this original version is hard to come by. But - fortunately I have another 'almost original' version (in fact, it might be the one Junnu versioned). In the 70's I bought a bunch of obscure singles and one of those happened to be "Always Laughing" by Joe Brown (also recorded in 1975). When I first heard it, I immediately fell in love with it, and thought that this warm-hearted song is custom-made for Finnish taste. And I'm happy Junnu discovered this song, too. I don't know how Joe Brown came about to record the song. There's a print on the label of the single saying "adapted from 'The Story of Noss'" . I guess the song has been included in some theatrical play or TV series. Joe Brown was 60's rock'n roll star cutting some top ten hits with his group The Bruvvers. Enjoy and sing along!

Here's the pair: