When I look at this collection, what strikes me is how clueless I was as a kid when it came to a song’s lyrics.
So long as I could hum along, what the artists were singing about evidently didn’t matter.
- This can’t be any clearer than songs six and seven, where the duo Brewer and Shipley’s “One Toke Over the Line” is followed by Ocean’s “Put Your Hand in the Hand.”
Or maybe as a 7-year-old I heard the former’s references to “sweet Jesus” and “sweet Mary” and thought the two songs had more in common? Who knows?
- I remember being amused by all the music references in Pete Wingfield’s “Eighteen With a Bullet,” even if the double entendres went right over my preteen head.
- But by 1978, at 15, I understood Exile’s “Kiss You All Over” enough to know I wouldn’t be singing along with it, though I did enjoy its groove.
- I’ve written before about the satisfaction of getting my hands on a hard-to-find CD featuring Marcus Joseph’s adult contemporary ballad “I Don’t Want to Get Over You.”
That track, not surprisingly, is one of two in this set not available on Spotify. Here’s a YouTube link:
The song’s producer and writer each had AC success in the period:
- His compositions “I’d Really Love to See You Tonight” and “Nights Are Forever Without You” launched the careers of England Dan and John Ford Coley.
But McGee didn’t write the Joseph tune:
- The writer was our “Piña Colada” buddy Rupert Holmes, who would break out with that song and a few others a few years after the release of “I Don’t Want to Get Over You.”
The next YouTube link is for a song that was much bigger – a Top 20 hit in 1979 – but is not on Spotify: Bell and James’ “Livin’ It Up (Friday Night.)”
It, and the next track on volume five from another duo, McFadden and Whitehead’s “Ain’t No Stoppin’ Us Now,” were among the top R&B disco jams of 1979.
Both duos were more successful in the background than in the foreground.
Bell and James wrote Elton John’s “Mama Can’t Buy You Love,” while McFadden and Whitehead co-wrote (with Leon Huff) TNOCS favorite “Back Stabbers” by the O’Jays (it’s a 10) as well as two Harold Melvin and the Blue Notes songs I love, “Bad Luck” and “Wake Up Everybody.”
Here’s the playlist for volume five:
Your turn!
What ones do you love? What ones do you hate?
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I know a number of these. And you’re right, I had no idea who sang them!
Except “Knock on Wood,” because the answer is David Bowie. When he covered it at least. 😊
Great collection of songs!
Whenever I hear the Brewer and Shipley record, I cringe. Not because there’s anything wrong with it, but because it reminds me of how profoundly obtuse I was in my early teens. I had absolutely no idea that it was any kind of a drug reference. I thought “toke“ was just a slang expression for… I have no idea, but something. Literally, it was nowhere on the radar.
Speaking of: whenever all of the guys would get together and talk about the pretty girls, Mark would systematically dismiss each and every girl in the class. “No, don’t like her. No, don’t like her hair.”
Years later, everybody claimed that they could see it a mile away, but I truly had absolutely no idea of what was going on.
Looking back, It’s a miracle I would get through a school year.
We’ve all been there! If you’ve never studied DeTokeVille, how can you be expected to know the lingo?
And I would take your classmates’ claims that they knew all along about Mark with a whole shaker of salt. Hindsight is 20/20, but I bet no one whispered their convictions to you in those school days.
I didn’t think it was obvious in the case of my brother. But once I knew, looking back…how could I not have known?
I still don’t know what you guys are talking about.
I wouldn’t be too hard on your young self. Not liking any of the girls in the class would not have been enough intel for me either. If he had mentioned having a crush on a guy, then that’s a different story, but that wasn’t the sort of thing that would likely come up back then.
There were lots of girls I liked in high school, many I found pretty and two I accompanied to proms. It wasn’t until college that I knew the distinction between “liked” and “was sexually attracted to,” and once I realized the difference, that was when I could say with certainty that I was gay.
I was also a pre-teen, and I knew exactly what it meant. But I couldn’t convince my older sister, who retained a touching (or maddening, depending on the day) degree of naivete throughout her life. She didn’t know what it meant, but she was sure that it wasn’t THAT.
Apparently others shared the confusion with the two of you, since the song was rather famously performed on “The Lawrence Welk Show”, not exactly a bastion of stoner culture. God only knows what they thought it was about. Maybe the Jesus reference confused them as much as it did Chuck.
I would have loved to see the expression on Lawrence Welk’s face when someone explained to him what had just taken place on his show.
I prefer to think Welk was being secretly subversive. Myron Floren, who introduced the number, clearly knew what it meant as he gamely masked a laugh with a fake cough.
Bong hits will do that to your throat.
Famous people were lucky to live in an era without social media. It prevents us from admiring anybody. I want Lawrence Welk, the man, the persona, to match his public image. I don’t want to know about the potentiality of skeletons.
Stories! I mentioned them in the comments just yesterday. “Brother Louie” is a terrific tune and I remember being disappointed with Tom’s 7/10, but that’s realistically a fair score. I’d probably give it an 8.
I never would have come up with Q as the artist for “Dancing Man,” or R. Dean Taylor for “Indiana Wants Me.” They’re both good tunes but the singers haven’t stayed with me. Another good list, Chuck!
Last week, my boss told me that I needed to change travel plans, and get myself to Fort Wayne and Muncie, ASAP.
Note to future self: Not everyone appreciates or understands Top-40 obscurities. Just say, “OK, got it.” Do not invoke an R. Dean Taylor song title.
The resultant blank stare was a 1/10; wound not recommend.
Oh, I hope you picked up a couple of Bun bars!
I would have gotten it, but that means nothing out in the wild.
Fort Wayne is home to Sweetwater Sound, retailers of instruments and AV equipment. I have a young cousin there who will fix you right up.
If you get to Muncie, order pizza from Pizza King. You won’t regret it.
I would have known R. Dean Taylor. I grew up in Indiana, so the song was probably around a lot longer there.
The definitive take on that Brewer & Shipley song
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t8tdmaEhMHE
Thoughts regarding to select songs on the playlist-
A friend of mine, an amazing Gospel singer, also mistook “One Toke Over the Line” as a religious song. As mt indicated, it comes down to whether or not you know what the word “toke” is referring to, and she did not, until her husband pointed it out to her to let her know it would not be an appropriate song to sing in church.
“Ain’t No Stoppin’ Us Now” was on my “great basslines” playlist in one of my earliest posts. It is a total banger of the highest proportions. I am always greatly pleased to see it mentioned.
I absolutely loathe “Kiss You All Over” and my wife finds it flat out gross.
Any self-respecting White Sox fan would approve of “Na Na Hey Hey…” so I was happy to see that on the list. Kudos to you, considering you are a Cub fan, as I recall.
“Magnet and Steel” was always a favorite as a kid, and remains a track I always like to hear. It doesn’t hurt that members of Fleetwood Mac are featured on the recording. Those harmonies! No small compensation for Walter Egan for getting his heart broken by Stevie Nicks.
Any reference to Rupert Holmes in any context is enough to darken my day if I let it.
The Roger Whitaker song is one I remember liking when I would hear it on the muzak/easy listening station my dad seemed to have on constantly. WGN tv used its intro as bumper music at one point.
So I knew 15 out of 20 on this list. I always think I have a handle on the era you are covering in this series, and there are always some I don’t know.
RB: If I had to guess the five, my guess would be Q, Enchantment, Delegation, Marcus Joseph, and Alton McClain and Destiny. How close am I?
More of an obscure selection for me. Some well known classics; Amii Stewart, Pete Wingfield, McFadden and Whitehead, John Paul Young and The Bellamy Brothers but after that I’m lost.
I’m familiar with Roger Whittaker – who seems an outlier in amongst a lot of disco – but never heard that song.
Seeing the title I thought It Must Be Love might be the Labi Siffre song that became one of Madness’ biggest hits but no.
As for Na Na Hey Hey…. it’ll always be a Bananarama classic to me no matter how many times the Steam original comes up here.
That’s funny about the Roger Whittaker, since he is from the UK, and that song is one of the biggest selling worldwide singles of all time. Despite its worldwide success, I wouldn’t say its a household name in the US, either. But I LOVE that song. That French horn line repels demons.
Just looked it up and turns out it reached #2 here, I had no idea. In my defence it was 3 years before I was born and it has completely disappeared from view since its release. Which is quite an achievement for such a huge hit. I’d have to guess it’s because Roger wasn’t exactly in line with pop trends and by the late 70s / early 80s it was so out of step with what was going on that it was simply ignored.
I’m trying to decide if “Livin It Up (Friday Night)” is being referenced in the song from Hadestown, “Livin It Up On Top.”
https://youtu.be/Qc_lZC55MI4?si=NTDOSz9DM35jwoca
Last year I stumbled on an estate sale featuring car tools, oscilloscopes, and 2 boxes of vinyl by exactly 3 artists: Brewer & Shipley, Firesign Theatre, and Dan Fogelberg. I wasn’t sure if this deceased engineer was either a secret stoner (not including Fogelberg in that category) or had a huge record collection that had been picked clean before I got there. I offered $10 to take the 40-50 albums off their hands, but the albums were priced about $5 each, and the people running the sale refused, so I went home empty-handed. So I’ll probably never know the other 60 or so B & S songs, but I def remember this one when it hit the charts.
Michael Pennix- “Washington Wants Me”.
There’s some good stuff here. “Knock on Wood” and “The Last Farewell” are both 10s for me, and “Magnet and Steel” and probably a couple others are likely 9s. Another collection that I could enjoy straight through…though there’s a couple there that I don’t know.
“Magnet and Steel” is OK, but I much prefer NRBQ’s “Magnet.” It’s more fun.
https://youtu.be/e98qWKLRpRU