Carl Douglas' "Kung Fu Fighting" hits No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 - December 7th, 1974

On this day in 1974, “Kung Fu Fighting” by Carl Douglas kicked its way to the top spot on the U.S. singles chart. 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
This Day in History Class is a production of iHeartRadio,
Hello and Welcome to This Day in History Class, a
show that goes toe to toe with history every day
of the week. I'm Gay, Blues Yay, and today we're
talking about one of the strangest musical mashups of the

(00:22):
twentieth century, a cheesy British disco song about Chinese martial
arts that somehow caught fire with a global audience. The
day was December seventh, nineteen seventy four, Kung Fu Fighting

(00:43):
by Carl Douglas kicked its way to the top spot
on the US Singles Chart. The catchy novelty song spent
the next two weeks at number one and nine weeks
on the chart altogether. It also went on to sell
more than eleven million copies world wide, making it one
of the best selling singles in music history. Of course,

(01:05):
Kung Fu Fighting is also one of the most controversial
singles due to the heavy racial stereotyping in both its
lyrics and its music. Despite the song's subject matter, no
one of Chinese descent was involved in making it, a
fact that's abundantly clear when you hear it for yourself.
Everybody was co Fu Fighting. Those gets the fastest lining.

(01:34):
In fact, it was a li fighting, but they exp
tim Man from funcky China town. They were chucking them down.
It's a version Chinese heart. I never by fair pot

(01:58):
from a fant ridiculous and exploitative in equal measure. The
song wasn't your standard chart topper, but it had two
popular trends working in its favor. First, there was the
disco factor. In the summer of nineteen seventy four, uptempo

(02:21):
dance music finally went mainstream, with multiple disco artists breaking
through to the pop charts. Kung Fu Fighting launched at
the height of the craze and quickly became an anthem
in American disco texts. The song also capitalized on the
rising popularity of martial arts films, including those of revered
martial artists and actor Bruce Lee. Throughout the nineteen seventies,

(02:45):
Hong Kong and Hollywood joined forces on dozens of kung
fu and karate themed movies. Most were produced quickly and cheaply,
characterized by over the top special effects and violence, and
by their hasty, often hilarious English dubbing. The movie's focus
on discipline training and exoticism struck a chord with Western audiences,

(03:08):
especially with teens and young adults. Some of them were
inspired to take up martial arts themselves, while others settled
for play fighting in the streets with their friends. It
was the latter group that inspired Carl Douglas to write
kung Fu Fighting. The Jamaican born British singer knew nothing
about martial arts or Chinese culture, and neither did his

(03:30):
British Indian producer Bido A Paya. He knew about the
kung fu movie trend, though, and after walking past a
group of kids shadow boxing in London, he thought to himself, Wow,
it looks like everyone is kung fu fighting. The phrase
stuck in his head, and before he knew it, he'd
written a whole song about an imaginary gang fight in Chinatown.

(03:53):
Up to that point, Douglas had made his living as
a session singer, performing on other artists albums and singles
on a per contract basis. In nineteen seventy four, though,
he started working on what would become his own debut album,
and he had high hopes for the proposed first single,
a song written by Larry Weiss called I Wanna Give

(04:14):
you my everything. Here's the taste I got you nun
for now, gonna put chip on the now, cook, dine
and singer my sweet payment. No place for you to run.
Why you can see John Robinson. I'll step the fingers
you've him. Wait. Douglas met with Bedoo to record the

(04:40):
single in the fall of nineteen seventy four, and after
spending about two hours on that one track, they only
had ten minutes left to work on a B side.
It was at that point the Douglas suggested a goofy
song he'd written as an homage to martial arts films.
He showed the lyrics to bea doo, and after a
bit of brainstorming, they were rewarded it in just two takes. Lyrically,

(05:03):
the song is pretty straightforward, telling the story of an
epic martial arts throwdown as witnessed by a startled narrator
who's impressed by what he sees. This plot, such as
it is, is short on details and lacks a true resolution.
For instance, we never find out who wins the fight,
or even why it broke out in the first place.

(05:24):
The bare bones nature of the lyrics isn't a problem
in itself, but when punctuated by phrases like funky Chinaman,
the whole venture starts to feel a bit tone death.
The same is true for the song's use of a
highly stereotypical nine note motif, popularly known as the quote
Oriental riff. The tune has a long history of its own,

(05:52):
supposedly dating back to an eighteen forty seven stage play
based on the Middle Eastern folk tale Aladdin, and although
that would mean the riff isn't even Chinese in origin,
it's nonetheless been used for more than one hundred and
fifty years as a Western trope to signify something's Chineseness.
Despite the song's objectionable qualities, Kung Fu Fighting doesn't come

(06:17):
across as mean spirited. It was ill conceived, thoughtlessly written,
and hastily produced, But you don't get the sense that
Douglas or Bedo set out to mock Chinese culture. Unfortunately,
it doesn't seem they put much effort into its portrayal either.
Reflecting on the song years later, Bidu admitted as much,
saying quote, I went over the top on the hoos

(06:40):
and has and the chopping sounds. It was a B
side who was going to listen in the end, Though
the song wasn't a B side, Pie Records executive Robin
Blancheflower thought the track's catchy beat and timely subject could
catch on at dance clubs, so he insisted they make
it the A side instead. It took a few weeks,

(07:01):
but the label was ultimately proven right. By September of
that year, Kung Fu Fighting had reached number one on
the UK Singles Chart, and then on December seventh, it
did the same on the Billboard Hot one hundred. Despite
its reliance on Chinese stereotypes, the song still managed to
achieve some progressive milestones for the music business. In England,

(07:23):
it was the first number one song with an Asian producer,
and in the US it was the first number one
by a Jamaican born singer. Remarkably, the song's appeal didn't
stop at the UK and the US, and in nineteen
seventy five it went to the top of the charts
in ten more countries Australia, Austria, Belgium, Canada, France, Ireland,

(07:46):
the Netherlands, New Zealand, South Africa and West Germany. The
song was not as well received in China for obvious reasons,
Taking a page from dance craze artists before him, Carl
Douglas followed up his big hit with a sequel song
called Dance the kung Fu. It wasn't as offensive or

(08:07):
as popular as the original, and its peak position at
number forty eight on the Billboard marked Douglas's final chart
appearance in the US. The artist may have been a
one hit wonder, but his signature song has continued to
resonate in the cultural consciousness for decades since. The original
version popped up in all kinds of TV shows and movies,

(08:29):
occasionally as the backing for actual kung fu fighting, and
in two thousand and eight the song got a newly
sawn life when it was remade by se Lo Green
and Jack Black for The DreamWork's animated film kung Fu Panda.
Then eight years after that, a third version was recorded
by British band The Vamps for the franchise's third installment,

(08:51):
the aptly named kung Fu Panda three. Both remakes wisely
substituted new aspirational lyrics in place of the old ones,
but the lack of involvement from Chinese artists and the
use of the oriental riff for the same as ever,
so while the future may come at us fast as lightning,
sometimes it's the things that don't change that are the

(09:14):
most frightening. I'm Gabe Lucy and hopefully you now know
a little more about history today than you did yesterday.
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(09:37):
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History class.