The year, according to … AT-Faux-ty

How do you take a time-out from reality? Fantasy football? Daytime drama? Renaissance festivals? Fan fiction? Lately, Casey Kasem has been my companion while I’ve created an alternate reality of year-end Hot 100s.

I belong to a few Facebook groups devoted to “American Top 40,” Kasem’s legendary radio series. One of the folks responsible for its continuing presence on oldies radio stations is Shannon Lynn, audio restorationist and owner of Charis Music Group. Shannon worked with the network that owns the rights to AT40 to restore the sound quality of the master recordings and transfer them from their original media (reel-to-reel tapes, vinyl records, etc.) to digital files capable for streaming and play at contemporary radio stations.

Charis Music Group is the only site legally permitted by the AT40 rights-holders to sell copies of the program. Periodically Shannon has made the entire series available at a bulk rate. In late 2020, I bought a copy of the 1970-1995 series (including a few later episodes available to stations in commemoration of Kasem’s passing). It was a gift to myself for getting through that year.

Last summer, I worked to lose 30 pandemic pounds, and a big piece of that was walking at least four days a week. I found I enjoyed those walks a lot more with a soundtrack. And since I had Casey (along with Shadoe Stevens) at my disposal, why not make that soundtrack AT40? After a few weeks of listening to a particular show as is (or was), I started to mix and match songs. Shannon had saved every episode digitally, so taking a song and a story from one episode, and another song and story from another, wasn’t difficult once I had the audio software available to make that happen.

I’ve mentioned before that I kept my own weekly charts more or less from 1981 to 2018:
https://www.crownnote.com/charts/cstolliver/music-of-a-lifetime-top-100-of-1970

About four months ago, I had an idea. Could I use my year-end countdowns (I had created them from 1963 on) and edit Casey’s AT40 year-end countdowns as well as weekly episodes to create an alternate Hot 100?

It wouldn’t work for the ’60s since AT40 wasn’t on then. But 1970 and onward was fair game.

That first year was a bit rough because AT40 made its debut in July 1970. Many big hits of the first six months did wind up in AT40’s year-end Top 80. But since I was doing a Top 100, it meant there would be some that Casey never counted down – for example, my No. 100 for 1970 was Joe South’s “Walk a Mile in My Shoes,” which peaked at No. 12 in February.

Getting the song was easy enough; I had it on my iPod and could transfer it to my computer. But what about the intro and outro? Hmm … I remembered listening to a previous countdown in which Casey referred to South as the author of Lynn Anderson’s “Rose Garden,” so that got me the artist’s name.

From there, it was cobbling the song title from other Casey references: “ Walk Like an Egyptian,” a story that mentioned artist Gary Miles, and Nigel Olsson’s “Dancin’ Shoes.”

I could get in legal trouble if I uploaded snippets of AT40, even (perhaps especially) the Frankenstein versions I’m describing, to accompany this. But to give you a taste of the fantasy countdown, here’s my Top 100 for that year vs. Wikipedia’s playlist of Billboard’s Top 100 of 1970 . (Remember, AT40 did a Top 80, or I would’ve had that Joe South song without all the effort!)

Some of the fun of these “fantasy Hot 100s” include using:

• Songs that failed to make Billboard’s year-end countdowns (my No. 1 for 1976 was Billy Ocean’s “Love Really Hurts Without You,” a song that peaked at No. 22.)

• Songs that never made the Hot 100 because they weren’t released as singles (Led Zeppelin’s “Stairway to Heaven” gets in a year-end countdown fairly easily because Casey once played it as an AT40 extra.)

• Songs that completely missed AT40 because they peaked lower on the Hot 100 (No. 68 in 1976, “You to Me Are Everything” by England’s The Real Thing, gets an introduction taken from Casey’s intro to Donny and Marie Osmond’s remake of “Ain’t Nothin’ Like the Real Thing.”)

• And, songs that are included in the year they peaked, not the “survey year” that AT40 and Billboard typically used. So Carl Douglas’ “Kung Fu Fighting” is a 1974 song, KC and the Sunshine Band’s “That’s the Way I Like It” is a 1975 song, and the Bee Gees’ “How Deep Is Your Love” is a 1977 song.

The edits aren’t always flawless: Not only do I lack the highest-quality editing software but, more to the point, I don’t have the talent of, say, Ken Martin, DJ and music director at WTOJ in Watertown, N.Y., who edits supersized versions of AT40 for its syndicator Premiere. Still, these fantasy countdowns do the job. They bridge my favorite songs of each year with Casey’s voice and, when possible, his impeccable delivery and amusing stories. And they make my daily trek much smoother.

I enjoy the time I spend both listening to the classic countdowns and editing my Frankenstein versions. For every critically agreed-upon classic (“My Sweet Lord,” “Backstabbers,” the Emotions’ “Best of My Love”), there’s one that would raise TNOCS eyebrows (the Captain and Tennille’s remake of “Shop Around,” Meri Wilson’s goofy “Telephone Man”…)

…. and some that just would get blank looks (Larry Santos’ “We Can’t Hide It Anymore,” Silvetti’s “Spring Rain,” Harold Melvin and the Blue Notes’ “Satisfaction Guaranteed (or Take Your Love Back)”). It’s the inclusion of those songs that make the fantasy countdowns my fantasy countdowns. I know why I loved those songs then and why I will still listen to them today (though I admit “Telephone Man” quickly wears out its welcome).

I’ve just finished 1977 and am heading into 1978. I figure I’ll do one for each of the Casey years – I haven’t committed yet to the Shadoe years, but I’ll think about it. I didn’t listen as much to AT40 during that time, so it may be that continuing this would expose my ears and mind to some pleasant surprises.

What year do you think you’d most like to remake in your own way? And what songs would make your Top 100s?

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