1973 – Year Four

January 2, 2025

jimpax@gmail.com

Gotta have that funk

May 13th, 1973, saw Tie a Yellow Ribbon ‘Round the Old Oak Tree, by Tony Orlando and Dawn finishing its fourth week at #1. See 70’s? This is why we can’t have nice things. At least it wasn’t the #1 for the day of my birth, right honey? Ooops. Sorry. [2024: The inside-iest of inside references. My lovely wife was born when this song first hit #1.] 1973 Also saw the completion of the Sears Tower in Chicago [2024: 2012 Jim could not have known that this next sentence would become necessary. It’s always going to be the Sears Tower.], the completion of Tower Two of The World Trade Center in New York, and the first two manned Skylab missions launch.

Kool and the Gang Wild and Peaceful album cover

Get down, get down

For songs, it’s time to get funky. What this mix needs is some classic Kool and the Gang. How about a little Jungle Boogie? Why yes, I think we shall. There’s not much to say except, “feel the funk ya’ll, let the boogie flow.” Folks of my age are much more familiar with the later, more disco-influenced tracks like Celebration, but this band started in the grand tradition of bass-forward, brass-laden funk.

Quincy Jones You've Got it Bad album cover

Were you not listening? I said it’s TIME TO GET FUNKY! Sanford and Son was one of those syndicated shows I watched while my mom wasn’t looking in the afternoon after school. What keeps me coming back to this track for more is the saxophone. And the whatever-the-hell-that-is creating the bass line. (Any instrumental specialists know what that kazoo sounding thing is?) Plus, it also led to this scene or this one from Scrubs, so, that happened. (I loves me some Scrubs.)

[2024: RIP to the greatest music producer of my (or any?) lifetime.]

Bwah bwah BWAH nah.

These songs are the antidote to the past drippy, syrupy crapola like Tony Orlando and Dawn, and to the shit-storm of disco that is about to swallow the music scene whole. I’m very pleased with my choices for this year, but this is the first year where there were a lot of options that I was sad to leave off. Frankenstein by The Edgar Winter Group would have been an excellent instrumental choice to rival The Streetbeater. (My lovely wife would disagree.) Drift Away by Dobie Gray might have been a good entry for a slow-ish dance number. Jesus Just Left Chicago by ZZ Top is a GREAT blues song. Also, it is so wrong for this mix, but I need to state for the record that American Tune by Paul Simon is possibly my favorite song ever. It’s at least in the team photo. 1973 was a surprisingly good year for a very narrow band of excellent music.

Nathan chose D’yer Maker by Led Zepplin and Kodachrome by Paul Simon. Both excellent choices, but I’ve already chosen a Led Zepplin song, and I’m saving Paul Simon for later. Actually, Kodachrome likely would have been my Paul Simon choice if Nathan hadn’t bogarted it out from under me. Dammit! (This will be a running theme.) [2024: There is no doubt that There Goes Rhymin’ Simon was his finest solo album prior to the release of Graceland. Hit after hit. In addition to Kodachrome, there was Something So Right, Loves Me Like a Rock, and the aforementioned American Tune.]

Tags:

40 for 40, Music

Comments

7 responses to “1973 – Year Four”

The Crank

January 2, 2025

Both of my picks for ’73 involve B.W. Stevenson, a name I didn’t even know until I went looking for the second song I am choosing here.

First off, Three Dog Night’s cover of Shambala. Returned beautifully to prominence in my musical memory by one particular episode of LOST. It was by far the best impact that show had on me, discounting the return of Vincent the dog in the finale.

In line with my “it must have been sung countless times as I showered” criterion, the runner-up is My Maria, by the aforementioned B.W. (which, for the sake of those who don’t read as much Wikipedia as I do stood for “buckwheat”) Stevenson, who also covered Shambala, but I never heard his version until this morning so it can go screw.

As further indication of my tastes in my senior year of junior high, I am still quite enthused when China Grove comes on Sirius-XM.

Reply
1. Nathan
  
  January 2, 2025
  
  I’m now listening to and digging My Maria, which I can’t say I remember. Good tune.
  
  I love Mama Told Me Not To Come from Three Dog Night, but if I ever hear Joy to the World again it will be too soon. I wasn’t sure I knew Shambala, and when I pulled it up for a listen I was thinking: “I do know this. But not this version. ” I didn’t know the B.W. Stevenson version either. Then I discovered that Rockapella covered it, and that’s the version I know.
  
  Reply
  1. The Crank
    
    January 4, 2025
    
    Now I have to go find the Rockapella version!
    
    Reply
    1. The Crank
      
      January 4, 2025
      
      Love it.
      
      Reply
  2. jimpax@gmail.com
    
    January 4, 2025
    
    This has caused me to go on a Rockapella journey. It irritates me that Do it A Capella (compiled from a Spike Lee TV special) is impossible to find on streaming audio. It contains my favorite Rockapella song, Zombie Jamboree. Guess I need to dig out the old CD collection.
    
    Reply
Nathan

January 2, 2025

1) Jim’s choices are excellent. I might not put two uptempo funk classics back to back, but can’t argue with either individually. I’d have chosen Celebration as my Kool & the Gang song for my *birthday playlist* but 1980 had two imperative choices so Kool & the Gang didn’t make the cut.

2) Didn’t we have this conversation 10 years ago when . . . when we had this conversation 10 years ago? I’m pretty sure the bass kazoo-sounding thing is a bass harmonica. Hmm. I feel like there were better bass harmonica videos on the web 10 years ago. These kids need to get off my lawn.

3) D’yer Maker has sometimes been criticized (even by their own members) as one of Zeppelin’s worst, and too dissimilar from the rest of their oeuvre to be a good Zeppelin song. I disagree. Led Zeppelin’s true strength was appropriating styles (or whole songs) and turning them into amazing new rock interpretations. D’yer Maker is an amazing reggae-not-reggae rock tune, and I love it. Good for a party playlist, too.

4) Jim, I didn’t bogart Kodachrome. You wrote: “I added a rule – that no song that appeared in Nathan’s list can appear in mine.” Its elimination from your list entirely is self-inflicted, or, in other words, a self-bogart. Don’t blame me. It *is* a good song though, and possibly his most rockin’ upbeat dance-friendly tune. I also love love love American Tune, and agree that it’s a terrible song for a party.

Reply
1. jimpax@gmail.com
  
  January 4, 2025
  
  In response:
  1) Thanks for the endorsement. A lot of my 70’s choices are less dance-able than I would strictly prefer, so that’s how I justified two up-tempo funk songs in a row.
  2) Very likely. But it’s proving extremely difficult to locate and parse the backups to the old comments section, so I haven’t come across that conversation yet.
  3) I’d not heard the criticisms of D’yer Maker, and like you, I disagree. Sounds like rock dude-bros who are afeared of change. I like this song at this spot.
  4) I can blame who I want. It’s more fun to point fingers for the vagaries of my made-up rules. 🙂
  
  Reply