The Top 70 Hits of the '70's
During our countdown we commented on a few tracks that we were surprised to see ranking so high on the list ... by the same token, there were also quite a few surprises missing from this list that I thought would have ranked much higher.
Working my way strictly through The Top 200, some notable exceptions for me were:
Escape (The Pina Colada Song) by Rupert Holmes (it finished at #73)
Thank You Falettinme Be Mice Elf Agin - Sly and the Family Stone (80)
Make It With You - Bread (89)
Heart Of Glass - Blondie (117)
Spill The Wine - Eric Burdon and War (118)
I Am Woman - Helen Reddy (132)
Lady Marmalade - LaBelle (134)
Love Will Keep Us Together - The Captain and Tennille (137)
C'mon, this record was HUGE ... it helped define the '70's!
Lean On Me - Bill Withers (138)
Don't Go Breaking My Heart - Elton John and Kiki Dee (140)
Seasons In The Sun - Terry Jacks (161)
Midnight Train To Georgia - Gladys Knight and the Pips (168)
Mandy - Barry Manilow (176)
Having My Baby - Paul Anka (183)
Bad Bad Leroy Brown - Jim Croce (192)
This is what I mean about your memory playing tricks on you. ALL of these songs seemed to be MONSTER hits at the time in my memory banks ... yet all fell short of those Top 70 coveted spots.
Other tracks I considered to be bigger hits:
Brown Sugar by The Rolling Stones (#234)
Bennie and the Jets by Elton John (#209)
Saturday Night by The Bay City Rollers (#205)
We're An American Band by Grand Funk Railroad (#243)
Band On The Run by Paul McCartney and Wings (#280)
You Should Be Dancing - The Bee Gees (#292)
Dancing Queen - ABBA (#315)
Just My Imagination and Papa Was A Rolling Stone by The Temptations (#79 and #348 respectively)
Hotel California by The Eagles (#378)
Vehicle by The Ides Of March (#624)
By comparison, "Mr. Jaws" by Dickie Goodman comes in at #412!
This is why this book is such a valuable tool ... it tells it like it WAS ... EXACTLY as it was when these records were first on the charts ... no distorted portrayal ... just the real deal.
Again, interested parties can order both "Ranking the '70's" and its companion piece "Ranking the '60's" through Amazon.com:
http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Dstripbooks&field-keywords=dann+isbell&rh=n%3A283155%2Ck%3Adann+isbell
Over the next nine weeks, I’ll be awarding copies of “Ranking the 70s” and “Ranking the 60s” to listeners of “That Thing with Rich Appel.” Dann and Bill have compiled the “Pumpkin 100,” the biggest fall hits of the 60s and 70s, based on the data in both books, which I’m counting down another 10 songs from each week. Check our website (http://www.thatthingshow.com/) for air times.
- Rich
Great job on the '70's Countdown, Kent.
Rich Turner
Kent:
Thanks a million for your help and excellent review.
To address a couple of the points you brought up during the countdown:
It takes too long to tell here, but this is where my scientists's eyes help out. While Billboard's charts are recognized as "the bible", they were not without issues when compiling those charts.
We went with the Cash Box charts this time as this allowed us to pack more features into the book, most importantly, the peak positions, which were denied to Dann by Billboard the last time around for the commercial version of RT60s. (You might recall highlighting that section (3) in your review of RT60s a few years back.)
As such, the books are different, but which one is "right"? The problem is that the underlying data from which they were generated are ... crap. Perhaps the charitable way of putting that is that they are more art than science. Our recap is only as good as the original charts themselves ... and in many cases their methods for collecting data wasn't very sophisticated.
Billboard was the gold standard but if you read the work published by Peter Hesbacher, who was on the inside, the editors all but made up the charts. There were no real sales numbers or real airplay numbers. While the methodologies of the other two magazines haven't been published in the same way, it's hard to imagine that they were any better.
The era of real data started in 1991 when Billboard adopted Soundscan, which got data straight from the cash register. And it was controversial because the charts changed immediately, showing how far off they were previously.
One of my next academic articles will try to break down some of those differences in the three magazines for the era they covered (to the extent Music Vendor is available) to see if there really were systematic differences the way the artists claimed. But in the end, being consistent with one magazine gives one snapshot. Maybe Randy Price's three chart method is better, but I'm comfortable that Cash Box is not measurably "worse" than Billboard for what this is.
One other point ...
You mentioned in your countdown that "I Want You Back" by The Jackson Five would have charted higher had the points it earned in 1969 been included in its total.
For the record, we did not just count points in the decade. We counted the entire lifecycle for all songs that peaked in the 70s. No points left behind for those songs.
All the best,
Bill Carroll
Over the years of doing this we published a lot of local radio station surveys and talked to many of the folks who were responsible for doing the research to compile these lists. Almost all would agree that The Top 20 was damn near perfect in terms of accuracy ... and the bottom 20 were typically songs the radio station was pushing (or perhaps being given "incentives" to push) or personal favorites.
Payola didn't stop at the radio stations ... we've also heard about all kinds of tactics to have your record take a huge leap (or earn a bullet) on the chart if only the record label would take a full page ad in next week's edition of the magazine. ALL kinds of things over the years went on behind the scenes ... and I believe EVERYBODY was guilty of partaking in some fashion.
However Joel Whitburn (who has researched the charts of all three major national trade publications ... and has been doing so for about 45 years now) swears Billboard kept the most accurate statistics and therefore had the most accurate rankings. (Each publication monitored sales to some degree ... distributors and record stores around the country reported their weekly statistics. Some favored radio airplay more. Heck, in the early days even jukebox plays was often a determining factor.)
But when all is said and done it's still probably pretty safe to say that The Top 20 on each chart was probably the best representation of what was really going on sales-wise and airplay-wise from coast to coast. A genuine, legitimate hit record pretty much made The Top 20 in all three publications. You didn't see a swing until you got a little deeper into the countdown ... which is where you often saw 20-point discrepancies between some titles.
Just as each publication monitored different stores and distributors, they also monitored different radio stations ... and, depending on how much weight they might give one station's playlist, we'd also see wide swings in overall popularity. (As our most cited example, WLS-AM here in Chicago had one of the strongest signals in the USA at the time ... and on a clear night you could often pick it up in 46 different states! When they would jump on a local act and start playing their latest record fans from coast to coast would hear music that their own local station wasn't always playing. However, if they liked a particular tune they couldn't necessarily go into their local record store and buy it ... because more often than not, those stores only carried the songs that were hits on their own local stations. By the same token, songs often broke out at different times in different cities ... thus a record that first started getting airplay in Chicago in March might not be heard in several other cities until May or June. Because these records never had enough accumulative airplay and sales, they tended to peak considerably lower on the national charts. Here in Chicago The Cryan' Shames topped both the WLS Silver Dollar Survey and WCFL's Big Ten Countdown for FOUR WEEKS with their summer classic "It Could Be We're In Love" ... yet despite being #1 on one of the highest ranked and regarded stations in the country, the record only climbed to #89 in Billboard Magazine.)
It is because of the wide variety of resources these three national publications used to arrive at their weekly rankings that I suggested The Super Charts several years ago ... a cumulative chart based on the research and results of all three major publications. To me, this seems to be the most accurate statistics possibly since they take ALL statistics into consideration. Randy Price worked incredibly long hours to finally arrive at what I believe is the only TRULY authenticated charts simply because it takes ALL research and statistics into consideration. (kk)
Hi kk,
A big "thank you" for counting down the Top 70 songs of the '70s.
And thanks for the great review and coverage of our latest book, Ranking the '70s. I was pleased to have been able to invite you to be the first to review this new book, just as you were the first to review Ranking the '60s. You'll find your praises and inspiration noted within the opening pages of this new volume.
There's been nobody better at recognizing the value or usefulness of the features of RT60s than you and I'd like the FH readers to learn directly from you what they can expect to see if they browse the new volume.
A few points:
In reading your comments about "Silly Love Songs" and "Bridge Over Troubled Water," andbeing more familiar with the Billboard charts, I'm reminded of a few others in the top 25 that came in higher than expected:
ABC
Knock Three Times
Venus
Spirit In The Sky
Two reasons for this:
1) A difference in song positioning between Cash Box and Billboard ...
and 2) the normalization applied across the decade which boosted early '70s songs while lowering late '70s songs. Normalization is explained in the book's appendix.
The years 1974 - 1976 were not well represented in the Top 70, accounting for just 10% of the total. Elton John scored seven of his No. 1s during that three-year period which goes a long way in explaining why only "Crocodile Rock" from 1972 made it in. Another reason is that Elton's songs generally accumulated fewer points during their chart runs in Cash Box than in Billboard. He did, however, score three No. 1s in Cash Box that did not hit No. 1 in Billboard: "Goodbye Yellow Brick Road, "Someone Saved My Life Tonight," and "Don't Let the Sun Go Down On Me."
Dann Isbell
Kent,
The first 20 songs on the 70's countdown serve to remind me just how lugubrious and listless the decade was in comparison to the 60's. When Does Barry Manilow arrive with Copa Cabana?
Frankly, I blame Buddah records and its bubble gum approach to music (See Yummy Yummy Yummy I got love in my Tummy) for sending hard rock lurching down a course that gave us marshmallow music. The 80's into the early 90's were significantly better then the 70's. Fortunately, like so many boomers I have very few memories of the7 0's. Blame it on Johnny Walker Red and the pursuit
of the almighty dollar.
Chet Coppock
Host: Notre Dame football on 89-WLS
Great countdown! Remarkably, I would have to say that at least 80 percent of the songs listed on this ranking are still regularly played today by at least one radio station genre or another. Now just list out the top 60 of the (late) 60s and the top 80 of the 80s and you pretty much have the 200-song playlist of every Classic Hits station in the country (sigh).
Uncle T. Jay
(Next Vinyl Arkhives show on 9/30 -- 9 PM Mountain Time @ www.kafmradio.org)
Great countdown ... with lots of surprises.
Thanks for posting ... and of course I'd love to win the book! Bill
We had an especially good response to our free book give-away ... which tells me a LOT of you out there were diggin' this countdown! Hoping this means quite a few of you will order copies for your own collection. Next week we'll be giving away a copy to one lucky Forgotten Hits Reader. We will continue to accept entries thru Tuesday. (kk)
Kent,
Love your website, I'm here almost every day. I'm one of those few who love numbers and music surveys so that's why I'm here so often. However, your recent posting of the 70 hits of the 70s (I know it's not your research) seemed a little odd.
The first thing you notice is that its an obvious ranking of 70 "adult contemporary" hits of the 70s. No true rockers to be found. And if that's true, where are The Doobie Bros, Seals and Crofts, Chicago, Jim Croce, America, The Eagles, The Little River Band, John Denver, and on and on.
Not sure what the authors are trying to accomplish. Seems more like a ranking of some of the 70s.
Dave
Hoffman Estates
I can assure that the results come from the actual rankings of Cash Box's weekly Top 100 Pop Singles Chart. It may have skewed a little bit toward the Adult Contemporary" side (for me, I thought it was a bit "Disco-Heavy"!), but this is the way these records placed based on their accumulated points earned throughout the decade.
Keep in mind that many of the artists listed in your email didn't score a lot of #1 hits ... if any. When you devise a countdown as small as 70 hits, the greatest majority of those hits were most likely #1 Records.
That being said, I thought there was some pretty good rock representation there ... The Knack, Norman Greenbaum, Sly and the Family Stone, "American Woman" by The Guess Who, "War" by Edwin Starr, etc.
For what it's worth, America just missed the countdown, coming in at #75 with "A Horse With No Name", The Rolling Stones came in at #83 with "Miss You" (although hardly a "rock" track in my mind", The Doobie Brothers finished at #86 with "What A Fool Believes", just ahead of Neil Young's "Heart Of Gold (#87), John Lennon's "Instant Karma" (#104) and Stevie Wonder's "Superstition" (#108). kk
Hi Kent.
Love your story about the DJ playing the Debby Boone song in pieces during his shift. That is probably the best way to hear that track.
As much as I enjoy music from the '50s and '60s my favorites are from the '70s. I graduated from high school in June of '79 so that decade of music is near and dear to my childhood memories.
Have a great weekend.
Santiago Paradoa
Miami, Florida
It was, without question, one of the funniest things I've ever heard on the radio ... because by then (something like the record's ninth week at #1) virtually the entire country was sick of hearing it.
The disc jockey in question was John Records Landecker. When competing jock Steve Dahl's novelty hit "Do You Think I'm Disco" went to #1 on the WLS Chart, Landecker was supposed to play it as part of his nightly countdown ... but there was absolutely NO way WLS was going to help promote the work of another radio station's disc jockey ... so when he got to #1 (and everybody knew what it was because it was a HUGE hit here in Chicago ... and you could pick up a copy of the weekly survey at your favorite record store), Landecker opted instead to blow the record up on the air ... a fitting homage to Dahl's infamous Disco Demolition promotion that went incredibly wrong. Great stuff. (kk)
Speaking of the '70's, London's Daily Mail is announcing a Bay City Rollers Reunion Tour ... or would that be GREY City Rollers? Check out some of these photos. Three original members have agreed to reunite "for the good of Scotland" (and one more is reportedly on the fence) ... but sadly our new FH Buddy Kyle Vincent isn't anywhere to be found amongst the ruins. (Guessing the never got as far as #17!)
You can check out all the details here ...
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3245307/Now-s-GREY-City-Rollers-1970s-heartthrobs-make-surprise-comeback-40-years-stormed-charts-Bye-Bye-Baby.html
Far more popular in The UK (where they charted a dozen Top 40 Hits), The Rollers managed FIVE Top 20 Hits here in The States as well: Saturday Night (#1, 1975); Money Honey (#7, 1976); I Only Want To Be With You (#8, 1976), You Made Me Believe In Magic (#7, 1977) and The Way I Feel Tonight (#19, 1977).
Burton Cummings
I'm still thinking about last week's Burton Cummings concert at The Arcada Theatre ... what a GREAT show.
Three more quick observations ...
During the show at The Arcada Theatre last Friday Night Burton mentioned that he may dress up as Jim Kale for Halloween this year. Seems only fair really ... Kale and Garry Peterson have been masquerading as The Guess Who for a couple of decades now ... seems like turnabout would be fair play.
I still maintain that Joe Perry of Aerosmith HAD to go to The Guess Who School of Guitar-Playing when he was growing up. Listen to virtually ANY early Aerosmith track and see if you don't find traces of "Heartbroken Bopper" (a GREAT overlooked classic) in there somewhere.
And finally, I mentioned the other day that "American Woman" was The Guess Who's all-time biggest album. I'm sure it has since been eclipsed by their "Best Of" collection, one of the truly most complete and comprehensive greatest hits compilations released up to that time. But MY three all-time favorite Guess Who albums might surprise you ... as they are hardly what many would consider to be "the norm".
First and foremost, it has ALWAYS been "Share The Land" ... for my money, it's the best variety of material they ever released on LP. EVERY track still stands up today and it remains one of the few albums that I can still listen to all the way through without ever skipping a track.
Second would be "Rockin'" ... this is just a fun LP and it sounds like the band is having a blast recording it. A bit of clowning around here and there ... but all in all an incredibly solid collection of material.
And finally I have to go with "Artificial Paradise", an album that didn't do especially well on the charts but has always been a favorite of mine. I remember catching The Guess Who the night they hosted The Midnight Special (why isn't any of THAT material available on all these new Midnight Special DVDs???) and, in addition to a couple of their best known hits, they featured several tracks from their latest LP. I fell in love with it immediately and had to run out and buy it the very next day. "Bye Bye Babe" (my favorite), "Those Show-Biz Shoes", "Orly" (and the story behind it), "Follow Your Daughter Home" (outstanding!), "Hamba Gahle-Usalang Gahle" and "Lost And Found Town" are all EXCELLENT tracks ... and I would LOVE to hear Burton incorporate a track or two from this long-lost gem into his live set some day.
Perhaps most surprising ... ALL of these releases came during the post-Randy Bachman era. While the songwriting team of Bachman and Cummings certainly launched the band with great classics like "These Eyes", "No Time", "Laughing", "Undun" and "American Woman" ... undeniably some of the best rock and roll created in the late '60's and early '70's ... it was the LATER material that I still hold most precious today. (kk)
Great video of you and Burton Cummings. Wasn't he the lead singer of The Animals?
Ted
Uhmm...................................no!
Cummings led The Guess Who to over a dozen National Top 40 Hits ... and then added a few of his own as a solo artist to the list, too.
I guess if I dig deep enough I can kinda get the confusion ... BURTON Cummings ... Eric BURDON ... Burdon ... Burton ... nope, sorry. While there is no mistaking EITHER of these great voices. there is definitely a clear distinction between the two! (kk)
John Lennon Birthday Bash
We're aware of a couple of neat get-togethers coming up, celebrating what would have been John Lennon's 75th birthday ...
First of all, right here close to home, you can catch The Liverpool Legends performing at The Arcada Theatre. The show kicks off at 8:00 on Friday, October 9th. For more ticket information, visit www.oshows.com.
Also ...
Tickets Are Now On Sale for the October 9th John Lennon "Imagine 75" Tribute Concert Event
New Haven, CT: On October 9, 2015, John Lennon would have turned 75 years of age. On the exact date of this momentous occasion, Friday evening, October 9, Beatles fans and music aficionados from all over the area will "come together" at the newly-renovated College Street Music Hall, 238 College Street (across from the Shubert Theater) in downtown New Haven for a very special theatrical concert event entitled "Remember Lennon: Imagine 75." Doors open at 7 pm and showtime is 8 pm. The show stars Peter Gendron.
Singer / songwriter Gendron has been in the music field for years. A long-time Beatles fan, Gendron portrayed John Lennon in the 90s in a group called "A Fab Four" which later became "The Best of Beatlemania," playing across the USA, Canada and Mexico. This morphed into a show starring Gendron entitled "Lennon-Live," with an all-Lennon repertoire and accompanying ensemble of musicians. Unlike his previous Beatles shows, though, this one did not tour, only playing very special events. Out of the many Beatles and Lennon impersonators and tribute acts out there, because of the exclusive nature of Gendron's show, Peter was hand-picked by the Connecticut-based Liverpool Productions Beatles Fan Club in 2010 to perform his tribute to John Lennon at the Shubert Theater in New Haven in celebration of John Lennon's 70th birthday. The show was a speculative representation of a concert that Lennon may have performed had he still been alive and actually playing out. The show incorporated multi-media slide-shows and rare video, a full backing band and state-of-the art production to present an evening of John Lennon's Beatles and post-Beatles material live in concert. It included not only Lennon's earlier "Moptop" hits with his mates Paul McCartney, George Harrison, and Ringo Starr, but also covered John's most memorable and poignant recordings as a solo artist. The set-list featured many songs that John never played live. The concert at the Shubert did very well, and attendees wanted the show to come back as an annual event, but both Gendron and Charles F. Rosenay!!!, fan club president and executive producer of Liverpool Productions, wanted to make it special and keep it as an exclusive event.
Both Gendron and Rosenay wanted to commemorate John's 75th birthday by reprising the show that garnered such great reviews and accolades. It will actually be the final time the show plays a stage; Gendron is retiring his Lennon tribute after this historic performance on Friday evening, October 9, the very last time Beatles fans and music aficionados will be able to experience this very special theatrical experience. College Street Music Hall doors open at 7 pm and showtime is 8 pm. Tickets are $50 and $35, with a limited number of $75 VIP meet & greet packages available.
"Remember Lennon: Imagine 75" is presented by Liverpool Productions, the same organization that produce the Beatles Conventions in New Haven in the 8's, and more recently the Beatles 50th Anniversary events in New York and the "Danbury Fields Forever" Connecticut Beatles Music Festivals.
SONGS:
Imagine / Dear Prudence / Ballad of John & Yoko / Come Together / Crippled Inside / Don't Let Me Down / It's So Hard / Revolution / Stand By Me / Jealous Guy / Instant Karma / Mind Games / (Just Like) Starting Over / #9 Dream / Whatever Gets You Through The Night / Woman / Bad Boy / Hey Bulldog / Cold Turkey / Cry Baby Cry / Slow Down / You Can't Do That / I'm So Tired / <span style="border-color: -moz-use-text-color; border-style: none; border-width: 0px; margin: 0px; paddin