If you do that, you'll be forgetting that the only songs that have made it to the "classic" radio stations are the best of the best. From the '70s, we forget about the horrible songs that actually dominated the airwaves back then: the insipid "Billy, Don't Be A Hero", the banal "You Light Up My Life", and the indescribably horrible "One Tin Soldier". Lastly, don't forget this one:
Keeping the blogosphere posted on the goings on of the world of submarines since late 2004... and mocking and belittling general foolishness wherever it may be found. Idaho's first and foremost submarine blog. (If you don't like something on this blog, please E-mail me; don't call me at home.)
Thursday, September 03, 2009
Not Everything About "The Old Days" Was Good
I like listening to classic rock; listening to the great songs of the '60s, '70s, and '80s is one of my favorite pasttimes. If your only knowledge of the music of that period comes from what you hear on radio stations today, you might think that music was a lot better back then.
If you do that, you'll be forgetting that the only songs that have made it to the "classic" radio stations are the best of the best. From the '70s, we forget about the horrible songs that actually dominated the airwaves back then: the insipid "Billy, Don't Be A Hero", the banal "You Light Up My Life", and the indescribably horrible "One Tin Soldier". Lastly, don't forget this one:
If you do that, you'll be forgetting that the only songs that have made it to the "classic" radio stations are the best of the best. From the '70s, we forget about the horrible songs that actually dominated the airwaves back then: the insipid "Billy, Don't Be A Hero", the banal "You Light Up My Life", and the indescribably horrible "One Tin Soldier". Lastly, don't forget this one:
Hmmm... Dregs from the 70s
ReplyDelete"Fly Robin Fly"
and the immortal
"Disco Duck"
Paper Lace: "The Night Chicago Died"
ReplyDeleteIt doesn't get much cheesier than this.
But man I gotta tell you that I really liked The Sweet. Their Desolation Boulevard album is still in my CD collection.
ReplyDeleteWe were dirt poor on the plains of Iowa so I couldn’t afford a lot of music but I bought 45’s and the K-Tel Greatest Hits albums. I still have some of them.
It’s kind of funny how a certain song will take me right back to a point in time and evoke a very vivid memory. Waterloo by ABBA takes me back to the first beer I bought at Mudd’s Place in Badger, Iowa when I was 15. Ring My Bell takes me back to Magsaysay in Olongapo. Now I have a hankering for a San Miguel.
That Damn Good Aganger from Iowa
I really like The Sweet as well, but "Little Willy?" Always thought that was their weakest effort. I much prefer "Fox on the Run", "Ballroom Blitz", and "Love is Like Oxygen".
ReplyDeleteI do feel compelled to respond to Joel's comment about music "back then." It's all subjective, of course, but I believe music WAS better overall back then. Of course, it matters what you define as "back then", too. For me, great music in the 70's kinda died around 1976. I'm still of the mindset that Disco Sucks.
ReplyDeleteI don't know if music today is better or worse than back then. I do think that it is much harder to find good modern music on the radio.
ReplyDeleteVH1 Classics is airing a three part Beatles thing on Wednesday nights. Part two was last night. Part three next Wednesday. They;ll probably show all three parts a million times in the near future.
ReplyDeleteIMO, Pink Floyd's Dark Side Of The Moon is the greatest LP ever recorded. I also doubt that anything will ever top it.
I spent many 12 offs in my rack with headphones on listening to that music.
Birdie..
Chick-a-boom, chick-a-boom, don't you just love it?
ReplyDeleteA child of the '70's myself and absolutely devoted to Led Z. and Pink F.; nevertheless I still hear Gordon Lightfoot, Ann Murray and John Denver in my head when ever I smell toast, bacon or here a Dodge engine start. Every morning, if the public radio station wasn't playing, my Mom had the local soft rock station goin' and it seem like it was always "Snowbird", "Country Roads" or "Sundown" playin'.
ReplyDeletePainful.
Oh, Nitty Gritty Dirt Band -- they were good. And Allman Brothers... And Eric Clapton... I listen to his "Slowhand" album at least once a week.
Interesting thing is that my son, now 19 and a pretty decent guitarist, is discovering all those 70's blues and folk based hard rockin' bands such as Zeppelin, Floyd, the Allman Brothers and a score of others. Fun to hear his interpretations of "Black Dog", "Whipping Post, "Layla" and "Wish you Were Here".
WCC
IMO, Pink Floyd's Dark Side Of The Moon is the greatest LP ever recorded. I also doubt that anything will ever top it.
ReplyDeleteGreat choice, tough to top that one, although if you expand outside of Rock Music, there are some other truly awesome choices. My personal vote for all time favorite goes to Miles Davis' Kinda Blue.
Greatest thing about the music of the 60's and most of the 70's - no rap. Of course we are speaking of music.
ReplyDeleteOldCOB
OldCOB,
ReplyDeleteAre you kidding me? How about "Hot Rod Lincoln" by Johnny Bond, "Stone Cold Crazy" by Queen, "The Rapper" by Jaggerz (ok, that's a stretch)? If the first two don't qualify as a precursor to rap, I don't know what does!
(Besides, I just love "King of Rock" and "Walk this Way" by Run-DMC!- Classic!)
630-738
ReplyDeleteAllow me to revise and clarify. I am referring to what is generally termed gangsta rap. It was not my intent to besmirch the fine selections you submitted. I have already written a nonconformance report on my earlier post and shall endeavor to achieve a higher degree of precision in later comments.
OldCOB
This is why I LOVE Guitar Hero. My kids all play GH and suddenly, they know (and like) all these classic rock songs. It's funny though hearing your 11 year old daughter say something about "Holiday In Cambodia" by the Dead Kennedys....
ReplyDeleteOld COB,
ReplyDeleteWho are your trying to kid!
The best COB's I knew were nonconformant.
You guys are all alot of queers. Disco was the best, espically Suzan Summers.
ReplyDeleteMike Mulligan
I’ll never forget the day my 13 year old son came to me and asked “Dad, have you heard of group called AC/DC. He had heard Highway to Hell and liked the bells.
ReplyDeleteNow at 18, he likes a lot of the 70’s, 80’s bands but more importantly, he has introduced me to some really great music that I would have passed up because I was stuck in the 70’s.
That Damn Good Aganger from Iowa
"Son Of A Rotten Gambler", now there is a nonsense song. The Hollies, Anne Murray and Emmy Lou Harris all successfully recorded it for different target audiences and did well with it. It was on the Radio a lot, all through 1974.
ReplyDeleteOldCOB,
ReplyDeleteIf I ever had any questions about your COBliness, they have been answered fully now!
Cmon folks, we need more cheese! I'll do my part, how about this:
There were funky China men from funky Chinatown
They were trapping when up, they were trapping when down
It's an ancient Chinese art, and everybody knew their part
For my friend, ain't you a stiff, then I'm kickin' from the hip
Lesss seee--- First WesPac in 1962, Chubby Checker and the twist, trying to teach the JoSans in the starlight how to do it. All the folk music in the early sixties. Dylan goes electric at Newport in 65? Motown. Buck Owens, "There gonna put me in the movies..." on the juke box in a dozen beer joints on Reynolds Ave just outside the main gate at Charleston Naval Station. Don Ho and "Pearly Shells" in Hawaii in the late 60's. "Time is tight" Booker T and the MG's and "When I think of all the good times that I've wasted having good times" by some Brit whose name I can't remember, both on the juke boxes in another dozen bars in Wanchai HK in 1970. CSNY, Hot August Nights, Jackson Browne, and the Eagles in the 70's. Motown covers by Filipino Bar Bands in the CPO Club Naval Station Subic Bay, slow dancin with the Filipina "Hostesses" in the Subic CPO Club.... Yaaa, thats the way it was in those days.........
ReplyDeleteKeep a zero bubble........
DBFTMC(SS)USNRET
I know one thing during those times, I was either under the water and sober, or drunk or throwing up, except when standing in port watch...there is a huge chunk of the 1970’s that is missing. I completely missed the president Carter years and TMI. I was listening to the brand new 1970’s music right through the mid 1980’s trying to catch up.
ReplyDeleteI’ll never forget the day my 13 year old son came to me and asked “Dad, have you heard of group called AC/DC. He had heard Highway to Hell and liked the bells.
ReplyDeleteMan, can I relate to this one! When the movie "Waynes World" came out, my (then) step-son asked me if I could get him the "New Queen Album" "Queen has a new album out"? I asked. He says: "Yeah, it's got this cool song on it...I think it's called 'Bohemian Rhapsody'. Sigh. Had to explain to him that the song was nearly 20 years old when the movie came out...kinda made ME feel old!
Anyway, my list of all-time favorites:
Santana - Abraxas
Frampton Comes Alive
Anything by Rush
Anything by Clapton
Classic Yes
Older REM
and the list goes on!
Have a great long weekend!
Oh, yeah...I forgot my votes for Cheesiness........
ReplyDeleteRay Stevens...most of what he wrote (Though I do like them!)
Johnny Horton...Battle of New Orleans
ANYTHING by America and Bread!
And of the lesser-known songwriters: The Ballad of Whitey Mack!
In 1973 while in Boot Camp in Orlando, over Christmas (Company 320), our CC let us pool our money to buy an 8-track player. After we bought the player, we had only enough money for Pink Floyds Dark Side of the Moon. We listened to that every chance we got for the full 9 weeks. To this day, I still listen to that album (now CD).
ReplyDeleteI remember many nights on my first deployment on DLG-34 (yea I started life as a skimmer) in 1974 listening to Oliva Newton John while doing chart corrections (alone inthe chart house).
ReplyDeleteHave to say as great as Dark Side of the Moon is, Sgt Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band is my all time favorite. Barely remember singing and drinking to "Yellow Submarine" at Jimmy Pistola's Cactus Lounge in Naples!
ReplyDeleteOn USTAFISH, in the seventies, David Alan Coe's "You Don't Have To Call Me Darlin" could be heard more often than anything else. It was also the most popular song, by an order of magnitude, at the H&C Ballroom. In a distant second place was anything from the "Outlaws" album, by Willy & Waylon.
ReplyDeleteMulligan,
ReplyDeleteDo a reality check. If you think it's only a chunk of the 1970s that slipped by you, you need to think again. It's so obvious to the rest of us that a large part of the 80s, 90s, and 2000s have slipped past you as well.
By the way, how's your truck and your fat, ugly Wal-Mart women?
The women of WalMart are hotter than heck...they drive me nuts.
ReplyDeleteMy wife was caught bending over on this page: http://www.facebook.com/pages/wwwpeopleofwalmartcom/243188470516?v=photos&so=45
http://peopleofwalmart.com/
This is a picture of me and my other wife, guess which one?
http://wal-quitting.blogspot.com/
Well, obviously, tastes vary. But there is no accounting for your taste, Joel. How can you not like One Tin Soldier? And, as for one of the anon. posters, there is nothing wrong with Anne Murray, Gordon Lightfoot (how can any sailor dis the man who wrote The Wreck Of The Edmund Fitzgerald?) or John Denver - in the right settings.
ReplyDeleteI am surprised that no one has seen to mention Seasons In The Sun by Terry Jacks. I suppose it has its admirers, but I do not number amongst them.
I didn't think anyone dissed Gordon Lightfoot. I love the "Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald." Awesome song.
ReplyDeleteOne of my favorite albums from the 70s is "Lamb Lies Down on Broadway," by Genesis (last Peter Gabriel-led Genesis album).
My commute from NAS Jax to 7th grade at Bolles always included Freddy Fender. I got sooo tired of his songs.
ReplyDeleteLater, in Alabama, I was a definite "Disco Sucks" kid (had the T-shirt) but looking back it may have been a reaction to how it pushed rock off the only Top 40 station in range. I can listen to the better disco stuff now, but I still say God bless The Knack!
-3383
Afternoon Delight, The Lion Sleeps Tonight.......
ReplyDeleteI liked "One Tin Soldier"......
ReplyDelete