Welcome to the third installment of a continuing series exploring some of the best – and some of the most egregiously wronged – hits of the rock era. A whole lot of hits that only reached pop’s runner-up slot have been largely forgotten; for example, oldies radio seems to have little use for the Poppy Family’s “Which Way You Goin’ Billy?” or BT Express’ “Do It Til You’re Satisfied.” But at least, as I looked back at the 1950s and ’60s, it seemed a healthy proportion of the #2 hits were terrific, or truly important songs that were justifiably blocked by other great singles … or at least got the shaft from idiotic trifles whose momentary appeal was understandable.
But then there was the ’70s – when, as it turned out, most of the hits that broke down during the 199th lap were just as silly and insubstantial as the ones that took the checkered flag. (See how the euphemisms keep on comin’? It remains to be seen whether I can maintain this level of cleverness straight through the Oughts, or whether I’ll pull up lame in the final stretch. See – another one!) Anyway, here we go with 10 good ones from the Me Decade. As always, I’ll list some more #2s at the end, and we can debate their merits in the comments.
10. “YMCA,” the Village People. Be honest: Who would you rather have coming after your children – the innocuous, mustachioed and very gay Village People, or “Do Ya Think I’m Sexy”-era Rod Stewart? Well, if you answered Rod, you got your wish in the winter of ’79, as he pulled a Kris Allen on everyone’s favorite bunch of costumed Adam Lamberts and bogarted #1 for four weeks. As for the other 99.9 percent of us, we can take delight in the fact that the last time we heard “Do Ya Think,” we were able to fast-forward through it on the TiVo during the American Idol finale – while you get to dance along to “YMCA” (though not this remix) during every single professional baseball game ever. So there.
9. “Live and Let Die,” Wings. Why did Paul McCartney’s Bond theme fail to reach the pinnacle? Maybe because it’s mostly an instrumental? Nah… (Edgar Winter’s “Frankenstein” had topped the chart just a couple months earlier.) Perhaps because nobody cared much about its host film? As if! (Live and Let Die topped the box office through much of June and July 1973, and was the 10th-biggest film of the year.) Perchance were there simply better songs out at the time? Well, the three (three!) songs that leaped over Roger Moore’s speedboat were Maureen McGovern’s “The Morning After,” fresh off its Poseidon Adventure Oscar victory; Diana Ross’ diva anthem “Touch Me in the Morning”; and Stories’ cover of Hot Chocolate’s “Brother Louie.” So I’d argue, no, that wasn’t it either. (Here’s the original version of the last song, which far less obviously references the Kingsmen.) Personally, I’d like to think that radio still had Macca in the penalty box for turning out so much crap over the past two years, up to and including his previous single “My Love” – one of the Worst #1 Songs of the ’70s. (more…)
Welcome to the second installment of an ongoing series celebrating songs that fell excruciatingly short of ascending to the top of Billboard’s pop singles chart. In the course of compiling and monitoring responses to the series’ first column a couple weeks ago, I learned a number of things, the most important of which were:
1. Unbeknownst to me as I wrote about the #2 hits of the ’50s – and in the process wrote the snappy sentence, “You don’t see Fred Bronson compiling five editions of The Billboard Book of #2 Hits, do you?” – it turns out that a Billboard Book of Number 2 Hits was indeed published in 2000. I have chosen to invoke the Pelosi defense: I was misled by the book’s obscurity into thinking it didn’t exist. My case is bolstered by the facts that Bronson had nothing to do with it (some fella named Christopher Feldman wrote it), and that the book went out of print without ever reaching a second edition. So, ha! You may read much of it on Google Books or buy a copy at Amazon Marketplace, or you may purchase a digital copy for the Amazon Kindle. (Don’t everybody run out all at once to blow $359 on a Kindle.) Needless to say, I didn’t use Feldman’s book as a reference in the first column; I make no such promises from here on out.
2. As I slog through six decades’ worth of fodder for future editions of this column, I’m going to have to dig deep for euphemisms that put some pizzazz behind the idea of a song being kept out of the #1 slot by another song. I believe that my low point in the last column came in the teaser for this one, when I left the distinct impression that Smokey Robinson might once have been “cock-blocked” by Lawrence Welk (see #4 below). Whoever the object of Smokey’s thwarted affections might have been in such a scenario, I am now convinced that at no time was Welk ever involved in blocking Smokey’s cock, and I apologize for the inference.
As a reminder, we’re giving extra weight to hits by artists who never reached #1, to songs that were far superior to the rivals that overtook them on the charts, and to plain old great songs that deserved the extra glory that the top of the Hot 100 brings. I’ll follow my choices with a list of other #2 hits of the decade, and we can debate their merits in the comments section. Now, on with the countdown!
11. “She’s Not There,” the Zombies. Keyboardist/songwriter Rod Argent made the Top 10 four times between 1964 and ’72 – three as leader of the Zombies, before he got greedy and named his next band after himself. Colin Blumstone sang lead for the Zombies, and just as his vocals offered more nuance than most of his early-British Invasion counterparts, “She’s Not There” was an awfully sophisticated single for an era when even the Beatles were still cranking out “I Feel Fine” and “Eight Days a Week.” Sadly, “She’s Not There” was left knocking on #1’s door while Bobby Vinton came through the window with “Mr. Lonely.” Even more annoying, Vinton’s hit version used the exact same backing track as Buddy Greco’s #64 smash of two years before! That’s just not right. (more…)
Almost three decades ago, a new pop station transformed the radio market around my hometown in southwestern Virginia. It quickly dominated the ratings and began leaving its imprint all over the landscape, in the form of personality-fueled DJs, wildly popular remote broadcasts and a regionally focused mix of music combining national hits with Southern rock and a smattering of local artists. A lot of people loved it, just as many loathed it, but no one could deny its impact on a fast-growing region that, for the first time, had a state-of-the-art pop station that nonetheless sounded little like its counterparts to the north or west.
The station was WXLK-FM in Roanoke – K-92 to you – and its rise to dominance was a phenomenon the likes of which we’ll probably never see again … not since Congress conspired with Clear Channel, Cumulus and other budding radio conglomerates to practically destroy local radio 15 years ago. I’ve been thinking a lot in recent weeks about K-92 and the lost radio culture it represented, thanks to a confluence of events that has left an unlikely earworm chewing up my gray matter. I know it’s not exactly cutting-edge to bemoan the consolidation of radio, but it’s worth looking back occasionally to remember the regional focus that has been obliterated as music programming has become homogenized nationally and local disc jockeys have lost their status as tastemakers.
But first, about that confluence of events: About a month ago my wife and I finally got serious about the need to replace her leased car, and she decided that she wanted the replacement to be a girlish red convertible – a real midlife-crisis car, female division. At about the same time, my Popdose colleague Jason Hare posted a typically delightful Chart Attack column, during which he betrayed his obliviousness to the car-color references in Lou Gramm’s awesome 1987 hit “Midnight Blue.” As I lamely attempted to school him in the many shades of rural/suburban car culture – while trying to track down the perfect bright-red vehicle for the wife, a process that eventually led to a dealer 200 miles away – the earworm struck. (more…)
Last year, in the midst of compiling my “Worst Number One Songs of the Rock Era” series, I began contemplating the sad, sorry fate of those records that have come up just short of the top slot on Billboard’s pop charts. After all, nobody celebrates even the greatest, or biggest-selling, #2 hit as a colossal achievement, the same way even the worst #1 hit ever (“Honey”?) is honored. You don’t see Fred Bronson compiling five editions of The Billboard Book of Number 2 Hits, do you?
Put it this way: “Waiting for a Girl like You” sat at #2 for 10 weeks in 1981, behind a bunch of fat guys doing aerobics. “I Want to Know What Love Is” got to #1 for two weeks in 1985. A quarter-century later, which song is considered Foreigner’s biggest hit?
So, beginning this week we honor some of those great songs that, for whatever reason, never got that Casey Kasem drumroll on American Top 40. And when I say “for whatever reason,” I mean it: Sure, many times a single has simply been blocked by a bigger, better rival, but heaven knows there have been plenty of payola/cocaine/label/radio shenanigans through the years that have kept a deserving song from ascending to glory. As I explored last year, the Top 40 has never been a perfect beast; who knows how many times a single has gotten stuck at #2 because some program director’s girlfriend just adored those cute Osmond boys?
Today we start with five singles that never reached the top during the post-“Rock Around the Clock” 1950s. But first, a brief explanation of my methodology for including records in this survey. Initial choices were based on quality; if one’s first response to a song title is “I can’t believe that didn’t make it to #1,” or if a #2 single seems (in retrospect) infinitely better than the song that screwed it out of the top spot, it’s here. Beyond that, over the course of the survey I’ll feature some singles that topped out at #2 during the latter stages of another song’s extended run in the top spot, figuring things might have been different if it weren’t for some amount of programming inertia at radio. After I identify my picks for each decade, I’ll list some other #2s and open the comments section for debate on who got shafted the worst.
For Manhattanites, “bridge and tunnel” is a term of superiority if not annoyance, directed at the millions who come in from the ‘burbs or the outer boroughs every day to work, play, eat, or see a show. For those suburbanites, however, the gateways to the big city – particularly when they’re jammed with traffic – symbolize their position on the outside looking in, a gauntlet to be run in order to get Where the Action Is (or to get away from it).
Singer/songwriter (and onetime Manhattanite) Linda Draper now lives in not-so-glamorous Woodside, Queens, but she titled her new album Bridge and Tunnel as a matter of metaphor more than fact. In the song of the same name, they represent light and darkness – two possible options for a girl struggling to figure out her next move. As an allegory for her own career, “bridge and tunnel” represent Draper’s own options – to continue the struggle for commercial success as a recording artist, or to pursue a livelihood with less glamour but better odds.
So far, she’s chosen both. Even as she released Bridge and Tunnel this month – it’s her sixth album overall, and her third on Virginia Beach-based Planting Seeds Records – she’s finishing up a long-delayed degree in Music Therapy at Molloy College on Long Island. Indeed, the new album’s release was timed to give it a few weeks to build awareness while she prepares to graduate next month, at which point she’ll set out for a few weeks of touring before returning home to begin job-hunting … and to get married in August.
Draper’s new songs speak to everything that’s going on in her life — sometimes abstractly, as on “Bridge and Tunnel,” and sometimes with a more straightforward voice, as on the hopeful “Sharks and Royalty.” In a recent interview, however, she spoke with clear-eyed realism about her prospects both personal and professional – which is to say, she’s keeping expectations for the new album in check. (more…)
To fans of her four albums of marvelous acoustic pop in the mid-to-late ’80s, Marti Jones seemed on the cusp of becoming the next (albeit far hipper) Linda Ronstadt. Jones had inherited La Ronstadt’s knack for putting a mainstream sheen on the songs of neglected rock tunesmiths; meanwhile, her partnership (professional and otherwise) with producer Don Dixon brought her music a modernist edge even as the couple matched terrific melodies with her bright, if slightly world-weary, alto voice.
Their creative alchemy reached its zenith on 1988’s Used Guitars, one of the decade’s finest recordings, and a celebratory four-night run at the Bottom Line in New York that brought together all the album’s songwriters. Those shows (and a subsequent appearance on Late Night with David Letterman) were a highlight of Jones and Dixon’s never-ending tours of those years, which we discussed last week here at Popdose. But a funny thing happened along Jones’ ascent as the pre-eminent interpreter of modern pop: Used Guitars, like her previous albums, didn’t sell, and neither did its highly touted follow-up, Any Kind of Lie. Within a couple years she had parted ways with two different major labels and found herself effectively out of the industry.
Since then Jones has released precisely two studio albums in two decades, focusing instead on her budding career as a painter; these days you’re far more likely to find the fruits of her creative labor on a gallery wall than in a concert hall. Her paintings reveal the same idiosyncratic spirit that always characterized her musical performances – sometimes serious, sometimes whimsical, always authentic. Popdose posted an exclusive “official bootleg” of a Don-and-Marti show last week; next week, Jones will discuss her recent endeavors, as well as the highlights of her musical career, in an exhaustive Popdose interview. Until then, you may view some of her artwork at www.martijonesdixon.com, and join us now as we explore her back (and, in far too many cases, out-of-print) catalog.
Jones, a product of the surprising musical hotbed that was northeastern Ohio in the 1970s, began her career playing the club circuit in the Akron-Canton area. Friend and fellow Ohioan Liam Sternberg, who was already an established producer and songwriter by 1980, gave Jones her first studio experience singing demos – including one for a Sternberg ditty that eventually became one of the decade’s biggest and most polarizing hits (more about that next week). It was Sternberg who suggested she join up with the three members of Color Me Gone, an established Akron act in need of a lead singer. He then arranged a deal for the band with A&M Records, resulting in this six-song EP of promising, if slight, jangle-pop.
The tuneful lead track “Lose Control” set the tone; songwriter/guitarist George Cabaniss (formerly, if briefly, one of the Stiv Bators-led Dead Boys) kept things tuneful and gave Jones plenty of dramatic high notes, qualities also employed to good effect on “Almost Heaven” and “July/December.” The production (by the high-profile trio of Sternberg, David Anderle and Barry Mraz) and the musicianship are workmanlike, the harmonies somewhat less so. What really leaps off the grooves, of course, is Jones’ voice – which explains why, when Jones bailed out on the band following a dust-up with Cabaniss, A&M gave her a solo deal and relegated the rest of the band to obscurity. (more…)
For a few precious years in the late 1980s and early ’90s, the most communal experience on the pop touring circuit was a family affair. Recording artist-producer Don Dixon and his wife, the singer-songwriter Marti Jones, traversed the nation practically nonstop during those years, giving audiences in rock clubs and small theaters an irresistible two-for-one package: great tunes, of course, and the casual banter of two free – and kindred – spirits who were at the peak of their creative powers and clearly having the time of their lives.
This column represents a first for Popdose: our initial opportunity to post an “official bootleg” recording provided to us by the artists themselves. If you’re a loyal Popdose reader or Dixon fan, you hopefully recall the seriesofarticles my colleague Will Harris and I devoted to him last autumn; in the coming weeks you may look forward to a similar series spotlighting Jones and her career. Today, we’re focusing on the unique alchemy Dixon and Jones created onstage, and the small but dedicated following they built during their touring years – a following of which I’m proud to have been a member.
The high church of the Don-and-Marti cult may have been Washington, DC’s old 9:30 Club, where the pair set up shop at least three or four times a year, often for multiple nights. Since the club’s capacity was only about 450, it wasn’t difficult to pick out some familiar faces at every show – the heavy-set guy who came alone, planted himself in the front row (slightly stage right) and sang along to every song; the slightly built, bespectacled guy who was always close (but not too close) to the stage and never looked like he was having too great a time, yet was always back for the next show. There were several couples we could rely on seeing as well, and my (future) wife Gwen and I would secretly (and competitively) keep count of their appearances at the gigs.
“Those shows at the 9:30 Club were definitely special,” Jones told me last week. “We loved those audiences, because they obviously knew our songs and they were so wonderfully warm to us. We felt like we attracted fans who were a lot like us, so a lot of times it seemed like we were in a roomful of friends. There were a number of places like DC and the 9:30 Club during that time – pockets around the country where we got more airplay and could play larger venues, where we could count on folks showing up who were actual fans of our music. But then there were also times like the show I did at a little club in Detroit, where the marquee said ‘Mary Jones.’ I mean, that’s my grandmother.”
The shows themselves were intimate yet rollicking occasions, Dixon and Jones trading the spotlight and sharing silly asides between songs. Jones would poke fun at Dixon and encourage his self-deprecation; she would even playfully mock his songs (a habit displayed to great effect on Dixon’s live Chi-Town Budget Show CD, on which Jones sings his “Heart in a Box” to the tune of John Denver’s “Annie’s Song.”) Dixon, inevitably, would at some point pick up a towel and wrap it around his head, Lawrence of Arabia-style. They seemed willing, even eager, to give their audiences a real sense of themselves and their relationship, and their set lists flowed almost as though they were being conceived on the fly.
Almost. “If that was the sense you got, that’s a great compliment, because those shows were always carefully structured,” Jones says. “We would put a set list together, we’d label it, and we’d keep doing that same set through a particular batch of shows. We’d organize them based on who had a record out at the moment – we would go on ‘Don Dixon’ tours and ‘Marti Jones’ tours, and whichever one of us wasn’t pitching something would get fewer songs. But then, when both of us were between records, we’d do ‘Don and Marti’ shows where we evened things out. Those were always the best shows, as far as I was concerned, because we had the least pressure on us and the most fun.” (more…)
My brief tenure as a resident of Philadelphia, from 1990 to ‘92, coincided with a period of remarkable growth for the Hard Rock Cafe chain of restaurants. The chain’s cofounders, Isaac Tigrett and Peter Morton, had chosen a divide-and-conquer strategy for expanding their domain beyond the rock capitals of London, NYC and L.A., and during the late ‘80s and early ’90s HRCs popped up in Chicago, Houston, Orlando, Washington, D.C., and elsewhere.
But not in Philadelphia, where local boosters predictably commenced a round of wailing and gnashing of teeth upon the opening of the DC restaurant in 1990. Soon enough there appeared, in a nondescript shopping strip near the Delaware River waterfront, the Philly Rock Bar & Grill, a short-order joint that dedicated itself to the city’s own rock ’n’ roll heritage. The place sported memorabilia related to Philly greats including Dick Clark (don’t forget, American Bandstand started there), Bobby Rydell, Kenny Gamble & Leon Huff and their stable of Philly-soul artists, Hall & Oates, the Hooters, and more.
It wasn’t a bad place, exactly, but it certainly seemed second-rate compared to your basic Hard Rock Cafe. Here, of course, is the point where I deploy this morsel of pop-culture minutiae as a metaphor for Philadelphia in general – and where I piss off untold numbers of friends and readers (not to mention Popdose colleagues) who have called Philly home. If Phillies fans can boo their MVP mercilessly and Eagles fans can pelt Santa with snowballs, I can only imagine what I’m in for. Bring it on!
When Gwen and I were choosing among graduate-school options during the spring of 1990, we fretted about the impending student-loan debt only slightly more than we worried about losing the cosmopolitan life we imagined we were living in DC at the time. So it was with a mixture of bemusement and horror that we viewed the University of Pennsylvania’s admissions brochures, which couldn’t get more than a sentence or two into their sales pitch for Philadelphia before noting that the city is “midway between the financial and political capitals of New York and Washington, DC.” Really? Your best selling point is that I can hop on a train and get somewhere else in a hurry? Really?(more…)
Editor’s note: What follows is no less than the third column that Popdose writer Jon Cummings has attempted to wring out of a single interview last fall with former Letters to Cleo vocalist Kay Hanley. The first one, a Popdose Interview, was quite nice, really; the second, however – a treatise on the band’s participation in the 1999 film 10 Things I Hate About You – began to betray diminishing returns. (The SOB even snuck a backhanded reference to Hanley into a column about Miley Cyrus a couple weeks back.) And now comes this essay, about which the less said in advance the better. Please rest assured, gentle readers, that Mr. Cummings has been put on notice – and that if the words “Kay” and “Hanley” appear in succession in one more of his columns during this calendar year, his status will be downgraded to something no more elevated than, say, “Cardinal Mahoney of Cool.” Without further ado:
Usually a film soundtrack becomes a big seller for one of two reasons: because the disc features music that played an indelible role in a hit movie, or because it includes one or more hit singles. But then there’s the curious case of Josie and the Pussycats, a 2001 film whose box office totaled just $14 million and which featured no charting songs, yet whose soundtrack reached Number 16 on the Billboard album chart and sold well over half a million copies.
So, what could possibly explain this anomaly, this rupture in the cinema-soundtrack continuum? Was it baby-boomer nostalgia at the prospect of hearing once more the theme from the animated Josie series of the early 1970s? Doubt it. Did the film’s trailer for some reason send viewers running for the record store rather than the movie theater? Probably not, but decide for yourself: (more…)
Almost exactly a year ago on this site, my esteemed Popdose colleague Dw. Dunphy closed a column by asking, “What has modernity offered you? Hannah Montana?” He was concluding a well-considered paean to vinyl-record listening, but never mind the context – Hannah/Miley has been taking it on the chin from grown-up critics quite a bit lately, even as her bank account swells and her seemingly never-ending Sweet Sixteen party continues unabated (at least on Disney Channel). Many of the complaints adopt a common theme – namely, that Miley/Hannah’s music doesn’t hold a candle to what we listened to when we were kids, and may very well be melting our poor children’s minds.
The music that has emerged from both sides of the Hannah/Miley Schizophrenopalooza is hardly Lennon/McCartney – but then, neither were “Yummy Yummy Yummy” or Leif Garrett or New Kids on the Block or N’Sync. Yes, the Hannah Montana TV/music/film/ merchandise phenomenon is perhaps the most perfect representation yet of media-conglomerate synergy – but, really, so what? More to the point, should the final verdict on the quality of what has emerged from this mighty commercial enterprise really be left to grumpy old music critics like myself, who can barely be bothered to give a cursory listen to Miley’s latest in between attempts to wrap our heads around the latest Radiohead opus?
As a public service for those unfortunate readers who don’t have a member of Miley/Hannah’s demographic bouncing around the house, I’ve decided to turn my first column of 2009 over to my daughter Catie and her best friend, our next-door neighbor Bridget. They’re both 7 years old, and already steeped in the magic and the mythology of Miley. (Editor’s note: For the purposes of this article, all instances of the word “awesome” should be read in a high-pitched, sing-songy, little-girl tone – as opposed to, say, the voice of a WWE ringside announcer.) Without further ado…
Jon: Hi, girls! Bridget: Hi, Popdose! Catie: Yeah. Hi. Jon: Do you remember why we’re doing this interview? Catie: Yeah. Because we’re the biggest fans of Hannah Montana that were ever made. Bridget: She’s, like, awesome. Catie:Awesome!
Jon: I dunno … Hannah doesn’t seem so awesome to me. Bridget: Quiet, mister! Catie: She is, too! She is so awesome. Jon: Why? Bridget: Because she’s so cool, of course. Catie: She inspirates little kids to be what they want to be when they grow up. Jon: Yeah? And what do you want to be when you grow up? Bridget: I want to be a singer like Hannah Montana! And an actress. I’m really good, you know. (She proceeds to demonstrate, caterwauling a rendition of “Life’s What You Make It” while flailing around the room.) Catie: That wasn’t very good at all. (a slap-fight ensues)
11. 
For Manhattanites, “bridge and tunnel” is a term of superiority if not annoyance, directed at the millions who come in from the ‘burbs or the outer boroughs every day to work, play, eat, or see a show. For those suburbanites, however, the gateways to the big city – particularly when they’re jammed with traffic – symbolize their position on the outside looking in, a gauntlet to be run in order to get Where the Action Is (or to get away from it).
To fans of her four albums of marvelous acoustic pop in the mid-to-late ’80s, Marti Jones seemed on the cusp of becoming the next (albeit far hipper) Linda Ronstadt. Jones had inherited La Ronstadt’s knack for putting a mainstream sheen on the songs of neglected rock tunesmiths; meanwhile, her partnership (professional and otherwise) with 
Color Me Gone (1984)
For a few precious years in the late 1980s and early ’90s, the most communal experience on the pop touring circuit was a family affair. Recording artist-producer Don Dixon and his wife, the singer-songwriter Marti Jones, traversed the nation practically nonstop during those years, giving audiences in rock clubs and small theaters an irresistible two-for-one package: great tunes, of course, and the casual banter of two free – and kindred – spirits who were at the peak of their creative powers and clearly having the time of their lives.
“Those shows at the 9:30 Club were definitely special,” Jones told me last week. “We loved those audiences, because they obviously knew our songs and they were so wonderfully warm to us. We felt like we attracted fans who were a lot like us, so a lot of times it seemed like we were in a roomful of friends. There were a number of places like DC and the 9:30 Club during that time – pockets around the country where we got more airplay and could play larger venues, where we could count on folks showing up who were actual fans of our music. But then there were also times like the show I did at a little club in Detroit, where the marquee said ‘Mary Jones.’ I mean, that’s my grandmother.”
When Gwen and I were choosing among graduate-school options during the spring of 1990, we fretted about the impending student-loan debt only slightly more than we worried about losing the cosmopolitan life we imagined we were living in DC at the time. So it was with a mixture of bemusement and horror that we viewed the University of Pennsylvania’s admissions brochures, which couldn’t get more than a sentence or two into their sales pitch for Philadelphia before noting that the city is “midway between the financial and political capitals of New York and Washington, DC.” Really? Your best selling point is that I can hop on a train and get somewhere else in a hurry? Really? 
Jon: I dunno … Hannah doesn’t seem so awesome to me.