Okay, we're closer to my wheelhouse. I was four. Within my earshot, disco was dawning. Beyond, punk was in its birth throes. Could be cool. Here goes:
40 - "Give It What You Got," B.T. Express
39 - "Your Love," Graham Central Station
38 - "Do It Any Way You Wanna," The People's Choice
37 - "Theme from Jaws," John Williams
36 - "Carolina in the Pines," Michael Murphey
35 - "Lady Blue," Leon Russell
34 - "Miracles," Jefferson Starship
33 - "Someone Saved My Life Tonight," Elton John
32 - "Brazil," The Ritchie Family
31 - "Mr. Jaws," Dickie Goodman
Disco is present right off the bat with three entries. B.T Express are probably best remembered for their 1974 hit "Do It ('Til You're Satisfied). This song didn't get any higher than 40, and that is completely justified. "Do It Any Way You Wanna," is a semi-instrumental in which the title is sung slightly more than in, say, "The Hustle." And the Ritchie Family weren't an actual family, just a group of session singers who were put together by the man who would later create The Village People. If you hear this record and it sounds familiar, it's a song that dates back to the 30s, and if you are familiar with SCTV (and you should be), you might remember John Candy (as Mr. Mambo) shaking his maracas to it in the closing credits of one episode.
Two artists who spent a lot of time in the background of the music biz are in this group. Larry Graham was the bass player for Sly and the Family Stone before forming his own group, heard here with a cool little funk ballad. Leon Russell was a member of The Wrecking Crew, the preeminent L.A. session band of the early sixties (they played on many of Phil Spector's productions, and have hundreds of other credits) before gaining fame on his own. I hadn't heard this song before, and my major impression of it was that his voice sounded like a cross between Willie Nelson and Barry Manilow.
Three songs I will group together under the general heading of "general pop." Michael Murphey is here with his more uptempo, less ghost-filled follow-up to his smash "Wildfire." Elton John had yet another hit by recounting the time when he was talked out of marrying a girlfriend (probably best for all concerned). And Jefferson Starship begin the string of hits that would shit all over the legacy of Jefferson Airplane (many say the worst of these was "We Built This City," but I don't know, I find that a guilty pleasure. I'd go with that song from that mannequin movie. "Excreable," seems too nice for that one.) with the MOR dungball "Miracles."
And finally...bum bum....Do you hear that?...bum bum...Yes, it's not one, but two songs related to Steven Spielberg's game-changing sharkcentric blockbuster. First, there's John Williams original theme, whose appearance on the pop chart would have surprised me more if I hadn't been through this a few weeks ago with Star Wars. Then there's "Mr. Jaws," the parody record by Dickie Goodman that is this week's clear winner of the Uneasy Rider Award. This track is typical of the so-called "break-in" records Goodman had been doing since the fifties. In it, he pretends to be a reporter interviewing characters in the film, including Jaws himself, and the answers to the questions are provided by snippets of recent radio hits (five of which appear later in this very chart. I'll point them out as we go along.) You get an idea of just how massive the Jaws phenomenon was when you learn that this mildly funny, extremely cheesy trifle made it all the way to Number 4.
30 - "Gone at Last," Paul Simon and Phoebe Snow
29 - "One of These Nights," The Eagles
28 - "Rocky," Austin Roberts
27 - "It Only Takes A Minute," Tavares
26 - "How Long (Betcha' Got a Chick on the Side)" The Pointer Sisters
25 - "Games People Play," The Spinners
24 - "The Proud One," The Osmonds
23 - "Daisy Jane," America
22 - "Feelings," Morris Albert
21 - "Black Superman (Muhammad Ali)" Johnny Wakelin and the Kinshasa Band
Only one real disco song here, Tavares' "It Only Takes A Minute." In it, the band once known as Chubby and the Turnpikes remind us that while we occupy our minds with worries about the weather, money, employment and health, we should remember that only sixty seconds (give or take) are required to fall in love. Later, a cover version of this became the first hit for British boy band Take That, so in a way, Tavares get some of the credit and/or blame for the career of Robbie Williams.
There are two more conventional R&B/soul numbers in this group as well. The Pointer Sisters return with more strutting funk, while the Spinners lament the duplicitous nature of humanity in a deceptively bouncy song that I know I loved back in the day.
Four frequent contributors to the decade's airwaves are in this quarter. Paul Simon duets with Phoebe Snow on a song that's even more gospelly (is that a word? It should be.) than "Loves Me Like A Rock." The Eagles make their first appearance in this blog with a song that finds Don Henley pursing Satan's female offspring in one part of the lyric (it's also the first of this week's hits sampled in "Mr. Jaws.") The Osmonds had their last Top 40 hit with a very bland offering, and America's then-current single wasn't much more memorable. But they both had strong brands, and that was enough to get them into the middle ranges of this chart. Neither song got much higher, however.
We'll wrap up this portion of this week's examination of the countdown with three much less prolific artists. Austin Roberts worked on music for cartoons like Scooby-Doo and Josie and the Pussycats before scoring a couple of pop hits, the biggest of which was tearjerker in which a man named Rocky helps his unnamed beloved through the process of falling in love, having a baby, and then, in a shocking twist, dying young. But it's okay, because we learn that this lady is somehow helping poor Rocky deal with loneliness and single parenthood from beyond the grave. Ain't that sweet. Brazillian Morris Albert probably thought "Feelings," was the start of a long and glorious career, but sadly, his lone hit has become a longstanding musical punchline. And Brit Johnny Wakelin briefly found himself side by side with music's giants by literallysinging the praises of one of sport's biggest personalities. The reggae-ish "Black Superman," was probably the source of my first real awareness of Muhammad Ali, so I wouldn't have known that Wakelin named his backing group after the city where Ali beat George Foreman to regain the heavyweight title. What would I have done with that information? Who knows?
So that covers the first 20. I'll be back soon with the conclusion, featuring many of the decade's MOR heavyweights, yet another Classic Rock Double Shot, and a song even more tragic than "Rocky." Until then, then.
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