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Top 100 Singles Of The 70's - 45-41

Top 100 Singles Of The 70's - According to Bradley
#45-41
Welcome back, I was just washing my hair with my fab new 'poo and gee does my hair smell terrific. With my new cords and earth shoes I'm good to boogie, and so will you be after viewing our next line up of hot sizzlin' singles of the 70's.


#45 – Mama Mia – ABBA
(Andersson/Ulvaeus)
Atlantic single #3315 US / Epic single #3790 UK
Chart Debut: US Pop 05/22/1976 #32 / UK 12/13/1975 #1
Our second and last ABBA addition, “Mama Mia” is to me the best ABBA song in a catalog filled with Best Of’s. Coming off as more of a pop confection piece than the disco tinged “Dancing Queen” or the theatrics of “Money Money Money”, this song has all the elements that make pop great - a simple little lyric about love, excellent instrumentation, perfect production and great vocals. The fact that the music melody changes with instruments all completely falling out to leave us with a keyboard and vocals for the chorus is actually really brilliant. I guess it’s a breakdown and you all know how much I love them. Of all the ABBA songs, I think “Mama Mia” probably holds up the strongest in our minds, of course it doesn’t hurt that it launched that silly little musical that refuses to go away.














#44 – Bad Girls – Donna Summer (Summer/Eposito/Hokenson/Sudano)
Casablanca single #988 US / #155 UK
Chart Debut: US Pop 05/26/1979 #1 / UK 07/07/1979 #14
The title track pulled from the best Donna Summer album ever made, “Bad Girls” took what was then the Queen Of Disco and turned her into a full-fledged superstar capable of singing and selling anything she put her mind to. The concept of hookers, their pimps and their clients is probably something the post 1980 Jesus reinvented Summer would not have done. In fact, the song is something she almost didn’t do at all. She had written it and sung it, recorded it and all in 1977 when Neil Bogart, head of Casablanca nixed the idea. Then while searching through tapes engineer Eposito came upon the song, and brought it back to everyone’s attention. Luckily he did or I wouldn’t be able to have “toot toot ha ha/beep beep” on my voice mail. The song is an ingenious fold of dance pop and rock with hooker back vocals and Donna’s steamy presence as the lead prostitute. A full song of seedy decadence that makes you feel like you’ve just wandered into the wrong side of Los Angeles, it’s that good. In fact, with the other singles launched, the album cuts and the great cover artwork Bad Girls is by far one of the best albums of the entire decade. Besides who can’t resist, “Bad girl/ sad girl/ you’re such a dirty bad girl/ beep beep”?


#43 – Jolene – Dolly Parton
(Dolly Parton)
RCA single #0145 US / #2675 UK
Chart Debut: US Pop 01/26/1974 #60 / UK 05/15/1976 #7
Country 12/08/1973 #1
Donna may have played streetwalker in “Bad Girls” but I think the real whore is the lead character in Dolly’s excellent “Jolene.” Sure, Dolly would never stoop to the level of calling the woman a whore so instead she makes a plea to the woman who could easily take her man. Personally I think it takes a strong person to appeal in such a way and it takes an equally strong performer to pull off this song. I mean to think that Dolly could lose a man at all is hard to believe but the way Dolly puts the song together, with its subdued instrumentation and Dolly’s sincere cries, you totally believe Dolly is in fear of losing the only man she loves. Incidentally, the story is apparently a true one, though told in Dolly’s penchant for humor she tells us Jolene was a bank teller that her husband was visiting, and he was visiting the bank a lot more often than their meager bank account would need.

#42 – Cars – Gary Numan
(Gary Numan)
Atco single #7211 US / Beggars Banquet single #23 UK
Chart Debut: US Pop 02/16/1980 #9 / UK 09/01/1979 #1
I’m not sure why this particular single took so long to debut on the US charts. Perhaps it was only released in the early months of 1980 as a single here, but it is most definitely a single of the 70’s reaching #1 in the UK months before the 70’s ended. The synth-laden electronics of Gary Numan are often underappreciated even by someone as “worldly” as myself but “Cars” is one of those songs that can’t be ignored. Nothing else on the charts at the time had that mechanical sound that came off as slightly withdrawn yet somehow warm. I remember the first time I ever heard the song, I was at Crystal Rock, a roller skating rink with my Aunt Sarah when the song came on the jukebox. I was stunned. I had to run over to the big box and see exactly what it was that was coming out of those speakers. An amazingly catchy yet hard to sing ditty that really started the new wave of electronic sounds that would capture the early 80’s.

#41 – Don’t Bring Me Down – ELO
(Jeff Lynne)
Jet single #5060 US / #153 UK
Chart Debut: US Pop 08/04/1979 #4 / UK 09/01/1979 #3
Jeff Lynne’s take on rock and roll was a whole lot different than a lot of his peers. There is an essential sound to anything Electric Light Orchestra releases and with the onset of new wave, Lynne took his original sound and sensibility and applied it in all the right places to create “Don’t Bring Me Down.” Irritatingly catchy, once the song starts it won’t leave your head for days. ELO would keep this type of sound going through the early 80’s with the Xanadu soundtrack and the cool 1981 single “Hold On Tight” but it’s this song that really captures the ELO sound.

Well I'm off to hit up a brand new website I just found Stuck In The 70's and see if perhaps they have any more little jaunts into the past I'm just itching to see - until next time when we play Casey Kasem and head into Bradley's Top 40 - don't worry I will take long distance dedications if you ask me politely.

Labels: 70s, ABBA, Bad Girls, Bradley, Dolly, Donna Summer, ELO, Gary Numan, Retro songs

posted by swivek @ 12:42 PM