Bradley's Buzz

Top 100 Singles Of The 70's 100-96

Welcome to our very first installment in my latest kick - looking back at the best singles of the decade that brought us avacado green kitchens, shag carpeting, earth shoes, disco and punk! Yes the 70's were a time and to share just a little secret with all of you, I admit I actually was born in the 70's though I will never frickin' tell you exactly which year but at least I got the truth off my chest...


#100 – The Night The Lights Went Out In Georgia – Vicki Lawrence
(Bobby Sherrill)
Bell single #45303
Chart Debut: Pop 02/10/1973 #1 Country 04/28/1973 #36

That’s right Miss Mama Thelma Harper of The Carol Burnett Show and Mama’s Family had a #1 pop hit in 1973, not only did she have a hit single but she had one of the best story song hit singles ever. The gothic tale of cheating wives, cheating friends, bad lawyers, crooked judges, hangings and one little sister who doesn’t miss when she aims her gun. I have always loved this little ditty and even that cross eyed leprechaun known as Reba McEntire ended up covering it and making it a hit all over again in 1991. Miss Vicki recorded the original version while she was working with Carol, and married to songwriter Bobby Russell. As legend has it, Bobby passed the song onto Cher through Sonny who turned it down, unbeknownst to poor Cher so he somehow convinced his comedic wife to record the song and her demo ended up being a pop hit. They also turned the savage story into a great 80’s flick starring Kristy McNichol and Dennis Quaid as the brother and sister who fight with the small mind and slutty women of small town Georgia. Though the theme song to the film was sung by my fav Tanya Tucker, the words were all reworked I guess in an attempt to not give away the story too much. But anyone who knew the original knows where it’s going. The best lines by far are at the end where after poor Andy ends up dead seemingly from the gun shot by his one time best friend we find out it’s actually the singer (the little sister) who tells us, “his little cheating wife never left town/ and that’s one body that will never be found/ see little sister don’t miss when she aims her gun.” Classic 70’s.

#99 – Nobody Likes Lovin’ More Than I Do (Dreamer Of Dreams) – Lisa Hartman
(Alan Touissant)
Kirshner/CBS single #4275
Released 1978 Not charted

Here’s one most won’t remember as most probably never even heard it to begin with but you can bet your sweet Ciji Dunne I wouldn’t let a chance like this pass without giving some kudos to my girl Lisa. Poor Lisa, always working, always singing, always getting the short end of the celebrity stick. Her first album, a self titled adult contemporary piece from 1976 yielded three singles none of which went anywhere, so Lisa took to modeling and acting to pay her bills, but Don Kirshner who gave her the record deal and Jeff Barry of the Brill Building songwriting block in the 60’s plucked her from the bars of Houston to make her a singer, so she added one more single to her resume with this classy pop song from 1978. Perhaps she was a little too much like Olivia Newton-John to score anything too big but there’s absolutely nothing wrong with her music selections, her looks or her voice. Pumping along on a steady mid-70’s backbeat, Nobody Like’s Lovin’ More Than I Do has our girl letting her new suitor know that she is worth a little more than just a role in the hay – “nobody likes lovin’ more than I do/ but I got to know you better/ I’ve got to find out whether or not you’re good for me/ if you’ll be good to me/ cuz I’m a dreamer of dreams/ that may never come true/ and I want all/ that just one night with you…” Perhaps if she had been just slightly more slutty she could’ve made a dent in the charts. Actually had her next album Hold On, sprung the her Sam & Dave cover “Hold On I’m Comin’” or the sassy “If You Want To Come Home” as singles she may have seen at least a little chart action, but alas it would take a couple more decades and a marriage to get Lisa onto a music chart.

#98 – I Am Woman – Helen Reddy
(Helen Reddy/Ray Burton)
Capitol single #3350
Chart Debut: Pop 06/24/1972 #1

Yes, I am invincible, I am woman…. She is woman hear her roar in numbers too big to ignore; sure it may sound silly and strange now but this was a very important statement to make back in 1972. Mary Tyler Moore was on the air and though she was living her life as a single woman she was still calling her boss Mr. Grant and barely able to ask for a raise or responsibility. Helen Reddy had done some Broadway tunes and when the record company asked for a full album she sent them a bunch of jazz songs and this very personal little ditty. It seems Helen had tried to find a song that could convey her feelings as a 70’s woman, something that could tell people how she should feel empowered, with nothing on the charts or anywhere near her to give her that feeling, our poor girl had to take pen to paper and come up with her own ideas. Luckily, it worked and the song is still very important if not for anything else but that strange nostalgia that comes with thinking how the world used to be – if you realize that in 1979 when Stockard Channing made her TV debut her character was getting divorced and found it almost impossible to get credit on her own because she was separated, in 1980 the girls of 9 To 5 were still experiencing separate pay wages and indefinite bouts of male chauvinism, and the bra burners were still fighting their way to make their marks decades after the song came out. On a separate note, there is a new commercial for Burger King with men singing the song and crying out cuz they want to eat meat and act like men, it’s actually pretty hilarious with the major highlight being a scene where a man is burning his underwear instead of a bra. Hilarity ensues.

#97 – Copacabana (At The Copa) – Barry Manilow
(Feldman/Manilow/Sussman)
Arista single #339
Chart Debut: US Pop 06/10/1978 #8 / UK 07/29/1978 #42

Copacabana is the first mainstream song I remember liking as a kid, one more story song in a whole decade of story songs, but this one had a calypso beat, a gunshot, crazy ladies singing and of course a bit of a disco breakdown. Barry Manilow is by no means ever going to be considered cool expect in the Don Knotts kind of cool way, but the fact is he can sing and he made some fairly entertaining songs in the day. I thought by the time it was 2007, this would be one song that would not make me turn it up and sing along yet as I drove to the Valley a few months ago and this song came on a mixer I had made, I did just that. Turning it up, singing as we meet Lola, the showgirl, Tony, her bartending friend and that bastard in the night who wants a piece of Lola for himself; though we never know just who shot who, we do learn that Tony is long gone as by the end of the song Lola is a drunkard still wearing the faded feathers in her hair, which she thinks are so refined, and drinks her self half blind, and now she’s lost her mind, so heed Mr. Manilow’s warning, don’t fall in love at the Copa, and you may also want to stay away from the 1985 TV movie Barry made based on the song, you’ll probably wish you’d be shot along with Tony.

#96 – Lady Marmalade – LaBelle
(Bob Crewe/Kenny Nolan)
Epic/CBS single #50048
Chart Debut: US Pop 01/04/1975 #1 / UK 03/22/1975 #17

Voulez vous coucher avec moi (ce soir)… I have been told repeatedly what those dirty little French words mean yet I always forget and you know the brilliance about the song is, I don’t care if I even know what it means. With Patti LaBelle’s screaming queen antics along with her girls of the LaBelle group, we get to venture to old New Orleans and hook up with a 9 to 5-er who can’t forget the love of the hooker he meant there, the mocha choca latte that she is. Of course the whole world is familiar with the song now that it hit #1 in every single country in the world when P!nk, Mya, Little Kim and Christina redid it for Moulin Rouge, and even though the cover version has a few more vocal acrobatics than the original (an actual surprise since Miss LaBelle is known for her acrobatics), this is still the better version in my opinion. If only for the fact that I can’t think of another disco funk type of song that made such an impact and had everyone in the world singing words they had no idea what they meant. I mean a song about a hooker and sung mostly in French, come on, it’s genius.

stay tuned as we venture further into the world of the psychedelic disco punky new wave that the 70's brought us....

posted by swivek @ 11:10 PM