22 Aug My Top 10 Albums From The 1970′s

Posted at 12:32h in Richie's Posts by

Having been born in the early 1960′s (either Baby Boomer or Gen X – experts can’t make up their minds), I remember the 1st record my Mum bought me – a 45 (that’s a small black round thing with a whole in the middle of it for all the youngsters) with 4 Beatles Songs on it. Since then I have been hooked on music. Everybody has their list of 10 albums that they would take to a deserted island. My list is too long so I have split it up by decades, starting with the 70′s.

For those of you who can remember the 70′s music was only played on AM stations & in Adelaide we had only 2 decent ones – 5AD (pop) & 5KA (pop/rock), which both recycled the same 20 songs. On top of this the only other exposure was the annual all night music clip marathon or Countdown on ABC at 6.00 pm on Sunday nights. The albums I have chosen here are either ones that I was influenced by at the time, all time classics or ones that I have grown to love over the years. I will give you some insights & also some tracks to listen to that you won’t hear on any radio station today

Rolling Stones – Sticky Fingers

Most people consider Exile their classic, but to me this is a better & tighter album with better tracks. This was an album of 1st’s for the Stones – 1st album without Brian Jones (errr…. well he passed away in 1969), 1st with Mick Taylor permanently in the band (best guitar player ever in the Stones), 1st record Mick Jagger played guitar on, 1st album without Allan Klein being their manager, 1st album released under their own label & 1st album cover of theirs to have Warhol designed art & 1st time you saw the now distinctive lips & tongue logo used. In 2003, the TV network VH1 named Sticky Fingers the “No. 1 Greatest Album Cover” of all time.

The record covered the gamut of musical influences the Stones were exposed to – Rock, Soul, Blues, Country, Jazz & even a bit of gospel

Little known fact – Pete Townsend (The ‘Oo) & Ronnie Lane (The Faces) sang back up vocals on Sway

Tracks you should listen to that nobody will play on the radio: –

Can You Hear Me Knocking – a tour deforce with both Mick Taylor & then Bobby Keys on Tenor Sax really making this song. This song has a real jazzy feel to it. The Stones actually dug this one up for their 2003 Australian Tour where it became a focal point for Ronnie Wood each night.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z3cOyW0TPbI

Sister Morphine – credited to Jagger/Richards/Marianne Faithful.  Originally released by Marianne Faithfull as a single in 1969. It was originally credited to Jagger/Richards, but after a legal battle, Faithfull has been credited as co-writer.

This is a haunting song – you can imagine the furore if a song like this was released today. Check out some of the lyrics

Here I lie in my hospital bed
Tell me, sister morphine, when are you coming round again? 
Oh, I don’t think I can wait that long
Oh, you see that Im not that strong

Sweet cousin cocaine, lay your cool cool hand on my head
Ah, come on, sister morphine, you better make up my bed
Cause you know and I know in the morning I’ll be dead
Yeah, and you can sit around, yeah and you can watch all the
Clean white sheets stained red

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3mb-aDH0Og0&feature=player_embedded

Sex Pistols – Never Mind The Bollocks, Here’s The Sex Pistols

So it is late 1976. Imagine you are a precocious 13 year old who has just completed 1st year high. Radio is dominated by Abba (Fernando, Dancing Queen), Chicago (If You Leave me Now). Pussyfoot (It’s Not The Way That You Do It). About 20 minutes past 6 on a Sunday night on Countdown came thundering out of our Black & White TV – “I am an Anti-Christ, I am an Anarchist”. I could not believe what I was hearing.

Never Mind The Bollocks came the following October in 77 (just before Saturday Night Fever). The Pistols by that stage had been booted out by 2 record companies – EMI & A&M Records, before finally settling on Virgin. The Album includes all of their singles (although I can never remember hearing any of them on radio at the time) & still sounds as fresh today as it did in 1977. Producer Chris Thomas took a different approach. Instead of capturing a “raw” or “live” sound, Thomas achieved a very clear, broad, and layered sound via multiple guitar overdubs. Anarchy in the UK has something like a dozen guitars on it; double-tracking some takes & separating the parts & adding them. The album’s anger and energy are considered to have been trailblazing precedents for what then became the punk rock movement.

Greater outrage was created by lyrics of “God Save the Queen” and “Anarchy in the UK“, Both were perceived as depraved musical assaults on British society & the monarchy, its institutions, social order, general morality and common decency. In particular, “God Save the Queen” was viewed as a direct personal attack on Queen Elizabeth II. Steve Jones & Johnny Rotten, have both insisted that it was the UK government in general that their anger was vented against. Didn’t matter as the notoriety did little to harm the record’s sales or their popularity with British youth.

Little known fact – The original UK album had only 11 songs, before the group changed their mind and decided to include “Submission”.However, Virgin had already by early October 1977 made 1,000 copies. Rather than scrap these, Virgin released them anyway, initially as promos, then commercially (imagine what one of these LP’s would be worth today !!!), as an attempt to counteract a sudden flood of imports from France, where a twelve-track version of the album (including “Submission”) had been released in mid-October by Barclay Records.

2nd little know fact – my youngest brother & I saw the Pistols on their “Filthy Lucre” Tour in 1996 at the Thebarton Theatre (Support Band – Skunk Anansie & Goldfinger)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xmABOjcaQ0I

Songs you won’t hear on the radio – Liar & EMI

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YZoBNNC_Jq0&feature=fvst

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vu8i311dCAQ

Paul McCartney & Wings – Band On The Run

One Of The 1st records I bought. I went down to Target at Fulham Gardens with pocket money burning a hole in my pocket. I was going to get an album that I can’t remember now & that they didn’t have in any case, so I came home with BOTR as well as Quatro – by Suzi Quatro.

This is McCartney’s opus – there is not 1 bum or filler track on this LP. A contemporary review by Jon Landau in Rolling Stone described the album as “with the possible exception of John Lennon’s Plastic Ono Band, the finest record yet released by any of the four musicians who were once called The Beatles.” (I disagree – George’s “All Things Must Pass” Is The best – although more about that later)

Bored with recording in the United Kingdom, they wanted to go to an exotic locale. After asking EMI to send him a listing of all their international recording studios, Paul happened upon Lagos in Nigeria and was instantly taken with the idea of recording in Africa.

Alongside the McCartneys, guitarist and pianist Denny Laine, lead guitarist Henry McCullough and drummer Denny Seiwell also were set to go. However, a few weeks before departing in August, McCullough quit Wings in Scotland; Seiwell followed suit the night before the 8 August 1973 departure for Nigeria. This left just the core of the band – Paul, Linda and Denny Laine – to venture to Lagos, along with former Beatles engineer Geoff Emerick.

Upon arriving in Lagos, the band discovered a country in stark contrast from their visions of paradise. The country was run by a military government, with corruption and disease running rampant. The studio, located on Wharf Road in the suburb of Apapa, was ramshackle and underequipped. The control desk was faulty and there was only one tape machine, a Studer 8-track. The band rented houses near the airport in Ikeja, an hour away from the studio. Paul, Linda and their three children stayed in one while Denny Laine, Geoff Emerick and Wings’ two roadies stayed in another. It is actually a miracle that this record was made at all

More incidents would plague Wings’ Lagos stay. While out walking one night against advice, Paul and Linda were robbed at knifepoint. The assailants made away with all of their valuables and even stole a bag containing a notebook full of handwritten lyrics and songs, and cassettes containing demos for songs to be recorded

Little know facts – the band Jet (RIP) are named after the song on this LP. The cover photo depicts the now iconic view of Paul, Linda and Denny plus six other well-known people dressed as convicts caught in the spotlight of a prison searchlight. They are:

Songs to listen to

Band On The Run

Nineteen Hundred & Eight Five

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KBX2dySWGew

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oCG-4vi7M1Y

Van Halen – Van Halen

Another Countdown moment – blasting out of the family TV You Really Got Me. Long Hair, Big Guitars & David Lee Roth’s Swivelling hips – 1977′s version of Elvis. Remember we are in the middle of disco era here, so at the time this had a major impact on me

Van Halen sold over ten million copies in the US alone, becoming one of the most successful debuts by a rock band. Along with 1984, it gives Van Halen two original albums with diamond status in sales.

The album cover was shot at the Whisky a Go Go. The guitar pictured on the cover of the album is Edward Van Halen‘s famous Frankenstrat Guitar, made from a neck purchased from Boogie Bodies and a Stratocaster style body custom made by Wayne Charvel in California and assembled in his parents’ garage.

Key tracks – You Really Got Me, Running With The Devil & Ice Cream Man

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0YRqkRmRocQ

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lb40FtK316s

Skyhooks – Living In The 70′s

This is an Australian seminal classic. Every house should have a copy of this record & everybody should play it to their kids (just a guess – your kids will probably say like mine – this is boring Dad). The Skyhooks were the right band for the right time in Australia – breaking out of the conservative with flamboyance – they were just soooo different & perfect for Countdown. Although Skyhooks were not the first Australian rock band to write songs in a local setting— they were the first to become commercially successful doing so. Skyhooks songs addressed teenage issues (not that I understood any of them at the time) including buying drugs (“Carlton (Lygon Street Limbo)”), suburban sex (“Balwyn Calling”), the gay scene (“Toorak Cowboy”) and loss of girlfriends (“Somewhere in Sydney”) by namechecking Australian locales.

Living in the 70′s initially charted only in Melbourne in 1974, but by early 1975 the rest of the nation began to catch on (spurred on by Countdown). It spent 16 weeks at the top of the Australian album charts and became the highest-selling album by an Australian act in Australia up until that time. Adopting elements of glam rock in their presentation, and lyrics that presented frank depictions of the social life of young Australia in the 1970s, the band shocked conservative middle Australia with their outrageous (for the time) costumes, make-up, lyrics, and on-stage activities (and thrilled teenagers like me)

Six of the ten tracks on their debut album, Living in the 70′s, were banned by  Australian Commercial Broadcasters for their sex and drug references,”Toorak Cowboy”, “Whatever Happened to the Revolution?”, “You Just Like Me Cos I’m Good in Bed”, “Hey What’s the Matter”, “Motorcycle Bitch” and “Smut. However in defiance of this, the ABC’s new youth station in Sydney, 2JJ, (Now Triple J) played the track “You Just Like Me ‘Cos I’m Good in Bed” as their first ever song when they began broadcasting in January 1975

Little Known Fact – Silvia & I had front row seats to the 1st Skyhooks reformation concert at Thebarton Theatre in 1983. I also have the 10 year anniversary gold version of the LP (never been played)

Key Tracks – Horror Movie, Smut (Every Teenage Boys dream), You Just Like Me Cos I’m Good In Bed

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o7l8rlnMpCI

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zE7kY6uQHAA

https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=endscreen&v=khD606416Qc&NR=1

RIP Shirley

Bruce Springsteen – Born To Run

Bruce Is The Boss the press screamed & this time they were right for once. I saw & heard Springsteen for the 1st time on the late Saturday Night TV Show Nightmoves (Hosted by Lee Simon who had great hair & a voice to match) – where they played a live version of Rosalita & I was hooked.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CYHGh6lmSbo

The cover art of Born to Run is one of rock music’s most popular and iconic images. The photo shows Springsteen holding a Fender Telecaster while leaning against saxophonist Clarence Clemons.

In 1987, Born to Run was ranked #8 by Rolling Stone in its “100 Best Albums of the Last Twenty Years” and in 2003, in its “The 500 Greatest Albums of All Time” ranked Born to Run at number 18. In 2001, the TV network VH1 named it the 27th-greatest album of all time and in 2003, it was ranked as the most popular album in the first Zagat Survey Music Guide

Little known fact – I have the 30 year anniversary version as well as the original vinyl copy. 2nd little known fact – The Springsteen and Clemons cover pose has been imitated often, most famously by Bert and the Cookie Monster on the cover of the Sesame Street album Born to Add

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aqqWjpHrpo0

Key tracks – Born To Run, Thunder Road, Backstreets

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KngiJUNdsu0

George Harrison – All Things Must Pass

What a beautiful beautiful beautiful record (well the 1st 2 LP’s – you can forget the 3rd one). The original vinyl release featured two LPs of rock songs as well as Apple Jam, a third disc of informal jams. This is rock‘s first triple album. In regards to the LP’s size, Harrison stated: “I didn’t have many tunes on Beatles records, so doing an album like All Things Must Pass was like going to the bathroom and letting it out.” The album was critically acclaimed and, with long stays at number 1 in both the US and the UK, commercially successful. It was certified 6x platinum by the Recording Industry Association of America in 2001. George had actually been “stock piling” songs since 1966 many of which made it onto this album

Bob Dylan close friend of Harrison, co-wrote “I’d Have You Anytime” with him, while Harrison covered Dylan’s “If Not For You”, which would also be released on Dylan’s concurrent album, New Morning

Little known fact – Musicians involved in the recording were numerous and the precise line-up is still the subject of much conjecture. They included Eric Clapton, Bobby Whitlock, Jim Gordon and Carl Radle, all of whom had recently toured with Delaney & Bonnie and would shortly morph into the short-lived Derek and the Dominos during these sessions. Clapton’s close friendship with George Harrison brought him into contact with Harrison’s wife, Pattie Boyd, with whom he became deeply infatuated. When she spurned his advances, Clapton’s unrequited affections prompted most of the material for the Dominos’ album, Layla and Other Assorted Love Songs (1970)

Key tracks – My Sweet Lord, If Not For You. What Is Life

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=or1MWWWQ-Uw

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9qdKZBXMX5E

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tctzUNMp5po

Alice Cooper – Welcome To My Nightmare

We’re the Department Of Youth ah ah – we’ve got the Power !!!. Again a Countdown song that boomed out of our little TV. All of my friends were KISS fans, but I was infatuated with Alice. This LP led me to become a lifelong fan & follow all of his career & travails with interest. Alice still puts on a great show & everyone should see him play next time he comes to town (if you don’t believe me, just ask my wife Silvia for verification !!!)

This was Alice Cooper’s first solo album (all previous Alice Cooper releases were band efforts with the Alice Cooper band). It is a concept album; the songs, heard in sequence, form a journey through the nightmares of a child named Steven. It inspired the Alice Cooper: The Nightmare TV special and a worldwide concert tour in 1975, and the Welcome To My Nightmare concert film in 1976. In 2011, the sequel Welcome 2 My Nightmare was released (although much to my dismay is a complete piece of rubbish).

WTMN included a spoken work introduction from classic horror actor Vincent Price to the song Black Widow (Michael Jackson would later use Price for his song Thriller). Alice toured Australia in 1977 & played at Football Park. As he played during the week & it was a school night my parents wouldn’t let me go to the concert.

Little known fact – I was however lucky enough to win a radio competition on 5KA & won a ticket to the TV Show Countdown that Alice was hosting in Adelaide with Glenn Shorrock at the local ABC studios at Collinswood in 1977

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IUVSFv8QN6Y

2nd little known fact – there is a current Adelaide connection to Alice Cooper – Orianthi plays guitar in his current touring band (again the MJ connection – Orianthi was to play guitar for Michael Jackson on his last tour before his unfortunate passing)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R1b2_DCIZMg&feature=relmfu

Key tracks – Only Women Bleed, Devil’s Food/Black Widow

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XYtmvZDRAOU

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hfs1QIN5MX4

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M5LCcRPTYIg&feature=related

David Bowie – The Rise & Fall Of Ziggy Stardust & The Spiders From Mars

I continue to switch between this LP & Aladdin Sane as my fave Bowie LP’s. In my humble opinion Bowie has to be the most influential artist from the 1970′s – he continued changing and evolving, music, hairstyles, image, etc. He remains today my lovely wife Silvia’s fave Rock Star

This LP represents loosely the story of a rock and roll character called “Ziggy Stardust” – who is the human version of an alien who is attempting to present humanity with a message of hope in the last 5 years of its existence. Ziggy is the definitive rock star: sexually promiscuous, wild in drug intake and with a message, ultimately, of peace and love; but he is destroyed both by his own excesses of drugs and sex, and by the fans he inspired – this almost became life imitating art as Bowie became a paranoid cocaine addict in the mid 70′s.

We have been lucky enough to see Bowie play twice – the 1st time at Adelaide Oval on his Serious Moonlight Tour & basically his farewell tour 3 or 4 years ago at the Entertainment Centre

Key Tracks – Rock N Roll Suicide, Starman, Ziggy Stardust

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WLZNBbxJ2xo

Elton John – Goodbye Yellow Brick Road

People don’t realise today how good Elton John was in the early to mid 1970′s Goodbye Yellow Brick Road is from 1973 & it has come to be regarded as his best and most popular album ( & my personal fave).

A double LP with all lyrics written by Bernie Taupin (sidenote – AC connection – Bernie write lyrics for Alice Cooper’s album From The Inside in the late 1970′s), the album contains the Marilyn Monroe tribute, “Candle in the Wind” (which we all know now also became a tribute to Princess Diana), as well as three successful singles: “Bennie and the Jets“, “Goodbye Yellow Brick Road“, and “Saturday Night’s Alright for Fighting“.

The album was ranked No. 91 on Rolling Stone magazine’s list of the 500 greatest albums of all time – To date the album has sold 31 million copies

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U7wwZVB4yMI

I have seen Elton quite a few times – the 1st being at Memorial Drive in the late 1970′s.

Key tracks – Candle In The Wind, Goodbye Yellow Brick Road, The Ballad Of Danny Bailey (1909 – 1934)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V0PKcKbjlKg

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3ys_cf6uPs0&feature=related