Bradley's Buzz

Top 100 Singles Of The 70's - 90-86

I had to do a little bit of research and a whole lot of re-organizing but I am finally back and ready to move on with our countdown of the top 100 Singles Of The 70's - according to me of course. So we've seen the likes of Patti LaBelle, Barry Manilow and the Village People but are you ready for what today may bring? Perhaps a little bit of singer/songwriter nostalgia, a warbling of ballads and beach parties? Oh well, I won't give too much away, so here are numbers 90 through 86 for your listening, or reading rather, pleasure...

#90 – Bridge Over Troubled Water – Simon & Garfunkel
(Paul Simon)
Columbia/CBS single #4579 US / #4790 UK
Chart Debut: US Pop 02/07/1970 #1 / UK 02/21/1970 #1
Oh, the sentimental warbling of Rhymin’ Simon and his strangely coiffed pal. What is it about duos that always has one being so much more famous than the other, George Michael had Andrew Ridgely, Darryl Hall has John Oates, and Paul Simon had Art Garfunkel who it must be said is just as important in the duo as Paul, though it was Paul who wrote this little ditty right before he ditched the duo and made the 70’s his own little centerpiece of AM radio staples. “Bridge Over Troubled Water” has that nice little singer songwriter thing that was just emerging in the early 70’s, with plaintive and sweet lyrics of reassurance that we will be protected and loved – “when you’re weary feeling small/ when tears are in your eyes I will wipe them all…like a bridge over troubled water/ I will lay me down…” It could be a song to a lover or it could be Paul’s song to Art, in either fashion lover/friend it totally works and it’s uprising from guitar ballad to full on string orchestrated and blaring singing makes it impossible to ignore that this guy really will be dropping down like a bridge and taking all my misfortunes. Aw, what a nice couple of guys.

#89 - Fly Like An Eagle – Steve Miller Band
(Steve Miller)
Capitol single #4372 US / #6078802 UK
Chart Debut: US Pop 12/18/1976 #2
Stevie “Guitar” Miller is very much a part of the 70’s in my book, the only problem is when all my friends and I were smoking joints and listening to him it was well into the 90’s, oh well we weren’t around when his songs were hits but thanks to Steve Miller Band’s Greatest Hits 74-78, I think almost everyone knows the songs. I was hard pressed to pick the best of Steve’s endless streams of 70’s psychedelic meets blues rock and though “The Joker” is cool and “Take The Money & Run” has all those woo hoos, his 1976 title track really tells the world what Steve Miller is capable of. He is a bit more on the experimental side than most people realize. “Fly Like An Eagle” has a space age backdrop running through it with a swirling sound coming in before the guitar kicks and the futuristic vocals, “time keeps on slippin’ slippin’ into the future…” while the lyrics themselves actually say something more than just taking a smoke or robbing a bank, “feed the babies who don’t have enough to eat/ shoe the children with no shoes on their feet/ house the people living in the street/oh there’s a solution…” It makes me want to take a toke and fly like an eagle til I’m free from the revolution.

#88 – Orgasm Addict – The Buzzcocks
(Peter Shelly/Howard Devoto)
United Artists single #36316
Released October 1977 – Not Charted
A punk rock classic if ever there was one, The Buzzcocks would have more chart success than this debut single but come on, it’s a song about being addicted to having an orgasm. Masturbation songs are always fun but when combined with a sex addict storyline in a 3 minute punk song you’ve got me hooked. “Sneaking in the back door with dirty magazines/ now your mother wants to know what are those stains on your jeans and you’re an orgasm addict…” This guy is trying to make it with every one, school kids and winos and heads of State, as rampaging drums and Pete Shelly’s endless high energy vocal and endless pants keep the whole song going fast and furious for all of it’s brief time.

#87 – Rock Lobster – The B-52’s
(Schneider/Wilson)
Boo-Fant single #52 Released 1978
Island single #6506 UK
Chart Debut: UK 08/11/1979 #37
My pal Luther has “Rock Lobster” as his voice mail rings so whenever I call him, I start bopping around and around until he answers. I guess that’s the case with the debut single from the B-52’s, not quite punk enough to be punky, not new wavey enough to full new wave, Fred and his gang were always on a plateau of their own. In my Pop Singles Book which is a chart entry little book they list “Rock Lobster” as a novelty song, but I have always wondered what Fred would think of that. Is it really a novelty song and if it is all those crazy beach songs by the likes of Frankie and Elvis also novelty? “Rock Lobster” itself could’ve come right out of the 60’s if it weren’t for the synths, the whole thing is like the Apocalypse on the Beach, very Blondie-ish if you think of “The Attack Of The Giant Ants” or even “The Beast” but despite it’s somewhat light appearance “Rock Lobster” actually has a foreboding and dark layer in it, particularly toward the end of the song where Fred’s vocals go deeper and the music changes melody, but eventually Cindy comes in and brings it all back into the light surf sound and we are left with a great little cut of what happens when the future and the past meet. Incidentally, “Rock Lobster” was originally released independently in 1978 on the Boo-Fant label (get it?) and then in 1979 on Island in the UK and Sire in the US, the Sire version eventually did hit the top 100 at #87 in early 1980.

#86 – Big Yellow Taxi – Joni Mitchell
(Joni Mitchell)
Reprise single #906 US / #20906 UK
Chart Debut: US Pop 09/25/1970 #67 / UK 06/30/1970 #11
What an interesting gal Joni Mitchell is. She is one of the most performers who are always adored by the critics and yet I barely know anyone of her songs when I read the titles, but when you need someone to come out with hippy hair, lines and attitude you need look no further. Joni was on the recent Rosanna Arquette documentary about rock music and she had more than a few choice words for the record industry, all of which I agree with. But this is 2006 and back in 1970 she may have not been so bitter. Particularly when some of her compositions became big hits for others including “Both Sides Now” for Judy Collins and “Woodstock” for Crosby Stills Nash & Young, but she came into her own with this little ditty, a song that has been remade by countless people and used as the main theme through Janet Jackson’s hip hoppy “Got Til It’s Gone”. As the story goes Joni was in Hawaii when she was overlooking the beautiful beach and as her eyes wandered back from the water she saw the blacky muck of a parking lot. The crumbling of beautiful nature to be replaced by modern advances of concrete and steel are the main parts of the song with one of the best rhymes ever written – “they took all the trees and put them in a tree museum/ and they charge the people a dollar and a half just to see them,” a line which is supposedly about an actual museum in Waikiki which has or had a lot of endangered trees in it, and the most fascinating thing about the song is the tearing down of Paradise which apparently is about the House Of Allah, which was the home of Tallulah Bankhead and one of the biggest brothels of old Hollywood, which was torn down in the 70’s like almost anything cool in Hollywood. Yes, I can hear the chompy yet stylistic guitar playing of Miss Mitchell and despite the laugh at the end, I know the heartbreak and bitterness that comes from blatant demolition, and just like the big yellow taxi that took away her old man, I too know that you don’t know what you got til it’s gone.

Well that's it for today - I know don't it always seem to go that you don't know what you've got til it's gone? Don't worry like a bridge over troubled water I'll be back but first I must address my orgasm addictions by bopping with a rock lobster who really just wants to fly like an eagle -- can you believe I even attempted that string of words?

posted by swivek @ 8:09 AM