Cherokee Studios, Los Angeles
Producer: Arif Mardin
Ringo Starr recorded ‘Cryin” for his fifth studio album, Ringo’s Rotogravure, on 6 June 1976.
It was co-written by Starr and his then partner, American photographer Nancy Lee Andrews. The song was named after the Las Brisas Hotel in Acapulco, where the couple stayed on holiday. “Las brisas” is Spanish for “the breezes”.
Nancy and I wrote one in Mexico, and I put a mariachi band on it. Just a mariachi band – from a restaurant – and me. I played maracas.We looked around all these Mexican restaurants and found this band who were sensational. They don’t actually dance while they play, but they’re great players. I don’t think they’d ever been to a recording session in their lives.
So, I walk in with my mirror shades on – really paranoiac shades. And they’re all tuning up. No-one says hello or anything. Then I take my glasses off, and all of a sudden – ‘Hey!! One of the Bottles! Hey!! De Bettles!! Binga-loo!! Pappa-lay!! One-a-da-Bodles!!’ I just fell to the floor.
New Musical Express, 16 October 1976