parlando

seventies survival, update five

Posted on August 3rd, 2007 by Scraps.
Categories: Music, Songs, 70s Survival.

I am listening to the top 1000 singles of the 1970s (as determined by Billboard) on shuffle play on my mp3 player, and gradually weeding out the songs I don't want to hear anymore.

I haven't been updating this often enough, so I'm going to try shorter, more frequent entries.

Charlie Rich, Behind Closed Doors
Namechecked by Rob in High Fidelity, though he implies it's about not talking about what goes on behind closed doors, while in fact the song is all about what happens behind closed doors: "She lets her hair hang down, and she makes me glad I'm a man," he allows, telling about as much about what goes on behind closed doors as a country song in 1973 can; he then inexplicably adds "No one knows what goes on behind closed doors." Dude, you just told us! And he praises her for her non-demonstrativeness in public, too, so we can infer that when she lets her hair down she sure makes up for it. Does your prim and proper lady know you're singing about her making you glad you're a man, Charlie? Anyway, nice tune.

New Seekers, I'd Like To Teach the World To Sing
Good melody, sweet harmonies, but impossible to separate in my head from the commercial that spawned it; I hear "it's the real thing, Coke is" whether I want to or not. So off the song goes after one play. Allmusic's writers can't agree whether the New Seekers recorded the original commercial or whether it was the Hillside Singers; the entry for the Hillside Singers makes a more convincing case, though.

Chairmen of the Board, Give Me Just a Little More Time
Clearly imitative of the Motown songwriting style. The lead singer sounds like his throat is being squeezed.

Joe Cocker, The Letter
To begin with, I can't fucking stand Joe Cocker and his vocal histrionics, so this never stood a chance with me. But I also love "The Letter", and Cocker messes with its perfect arrangement as well, so this rose straight to the top of my list of songs Joe Cocker pissed on the worst, to be displaced just a couple nights ago by hearing him vomit up "I Think It's Going To Rain Today", which was a good signal for us to leave the bar.

Vicki Sue Robinson, Turn the Beat Around
One of the many disco songs about disco music. The melody's more memorable than most; it's stuck in my head all these years. I never would have thought it was a candidate for a hit cover, though. Maybe Gloria Estefan liked the latin percussion in the original? Estefan's cover is so faithful I can't hear why it was worth doing.

Mac Davis, One Hell of a Woman
Opens exactly like "Satisfaction" -- and probably a thousand other songs. It's got a couple nice changes in the chorus. "She's one hell of a woman, young and strong and tan...." Well, it was the 1970s. Davis is probably best known for "Baby Don't Get Hooked on Me" and acting in North Dallas Forty, but he was a good songwriter for other people; he wrote "A Little Less Conversation" and "In the Ghetto" -- did you know the Cranberries covered "In the Ghetto"? I think I'd rather hear Sammy Davis Jr's version -- and "Something's Burnin'" and "I Believe in Music" and "Watching Scott Grow". He definitely had the cheesy touch. (Mind you, I am not putting down "A Little Less Conversation".)

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