Count me among the many who couldn't understand the lyrics of "Brown Sugar" for the longest time -- meaning I wasn't sure what words were being sung, and by extension the bigger context.
WRT religious/gospel songs in early '70s, the "Day by Day" I remember most is not the 5th Dimension version, but rather the version by Godspell which went top 20 in mid-1972.
I use to hate it but am more neutral about it today. I use to hate the Stones but in the past year or so, have taken a liking to them. I don't think I'd ever purchase anything by them, but have recorded, via online sites like Spotify, their biggest 60s hits, which I prefer over the mid-70s-forward.
Surprised this one got to #1. It's alright and I like it, but apart from the chorus it's not all that strong. Things were definitely on an upswing by '71, and ever since I figured out what the song was about it seemed like the intentions were good, if not necessarily the results... Back in the '80s when old '60s and '70s hits started to be extensively mined for commercials I recall a really funny SNL skit - probably written by the great Phil Hartman - which parodied some of the ridiculous variants Madison Avenue had concocted for these classic rock tunes. My favorite was "Incense, Feen-a-mint, things that you chew..."
Although never reaching the top position, this song just got through with a month long stint in the top 10, and was sitting at #1 on the Adult contemporary chart for 3 weeks.. a song that seems to have taken on a life of it's own, and has become as iconic as most number ones.
Everything I love and hate about early '70s mellow rolled into one there. (I mean that mostly in a good way.)
I'd say it's a lot more iconic than most #1s from this year. A bunch of them strike me as outliers - although as noted they're more generally-upbeat than the hits of the previous year - whereas "If" represented the coming rise of the light rock and singer/songwriter movement. Along with America, Bread and their brief stretch of hits pretty much defined the sound of pop radio in the first half of the decade, and I think to some degree led to the rise of The Eagles, the retooled Linda Ronstadt and other acts along that whole singer/songwriter and folk & country/rock spectrum.
That's what Jagger tried to claim it was about for decades. They aren't that garbled, though that's what he claimed to do when he mixed the mono single. Brown sugar is indeed a slang term for a kind of heroin, and that's what Jaggar claimed the song was about all these years, but he did go on record apologizing for the lyrics and owned up to the real meaning. Anyone with a brain knows it's about raping slaves in the American south. Do a Google search.
And the floodgates certainly open on the singer/songwriter soft rock genre in the next couple months.
A very nice Bread tune, not a top pick of mine by them. That goes to songs like "Make It With You", "Aubry", Everything I Own", "Lost Without Your Love", and "Baby, I'm-A-Want You".
That flood of wah-wah guitar (I'm assuming it's guitar) on "If" was certainly fairly unique on the pop charts, though.
Sadly, most countries except the U.S. misattributed Ms. Collins as writer of "Amazing Grace" when The Royal Scots Dragoon Guards' bagpipe-heavy instrumental version was released in 1972. At least the States had the dignity to have "Traditional" in the writing credits. (However, on Gold Standard reissues, her publishing company - Rocky Mountain Natl. Park Music - was cited, though the "Traditional" writing credit still held; the original release credited RCA's in-house ASCAP affiliate Sunbury Music.)
Like Jerry Lee Lewis viz Elvis, Negron, given his past hard drug use and accompanying reputation that dogged him (no pun intended), must've been amazed that he's lived longer than onetime Dog-mate Cory Wells.
Because of ongoing battles at the time with onetime manager Allan Klein, this track and the next single off their Rolling Stones Records' debut LP Sticky Fingers, "Wild Horses," would be featured on their UK Decca/US London compilation Hot Rocks: 1964-1971. From what I could gather (having both that LP and the mono Rolling Stones Records 45), the mix on that compilation LP differed somewhat. I am reminded of this aspect because of a 1977 compilation LP put out by Columbia, supposedly covering Dinah Shore's four-year run (1946-1950) with that label . . . but for some crazy reason, ended up putting on The Best Of Dinah Shore, a recording she did of "If I Were A Bell" that she didn't even do until much later - in 1963, in fact, as part of the "Reprise Musical Repertory Theatre's" version of music from Guys And Dolls. (The liner notes writer did say it was "the most recent offering in the set," but didn't say how recent . . . but it was the only true stereo track on the whole album, everything else was "electronically reprocessed.")
One wonders, had the "Fresh" music format so prevalent on radio today been around in those years, whether those songs would have been high up on their playlists. Sure seems like it . . .
I know many Stones over the years were on drugs for various periods, but on autopilot? I thought on that, that would come later . . .
Given the whole business about slang terms for different types of heroin, for how many years was Kellogg's Sugar Smacks cereal the subject of such speculation? (Especially given how "smack" was yet another euphemism for "the big H.")
Interesting that that clip was from the same year (more or less) as Kojak star Telly Savalas', er, rendition . . .
In 1987, during my college days, a classmate told me he attended a 3DN concert around that same time. He thought it was hysterical seeing these past-30 women in leather pants screaming for an aging rock band on the revival circuit. (Remember, we would have all been in our late teens or early twenties at the time, which I guess is why he considered thirty as being old.)
Not particularly. I'm guessing Curtis Mayfield and Isaac Hayes (among others) may have beat Bread to it, as far as wah-wah guitar being dominant on the pop Top 40.
With good reason. "Spirit In The Sky" was definitely a one-off, as far as religious songs in his repertoire. Greenbaum had three albums in all (plus a cash-in compilation of early sides); the songs were mostly secular.
The ironic part is that, of the three vocalists, Danny got the least leads. Can anyone tell me which hits he sang lead on?
Hayes hadn't quite had his big hit yet, had he? And this was a very different application of wah wah (or whatever) on "If". Closer I suppose to whatever the heck was going on on "Crimson And Clover", but less druggy and more, well, mellow...
