a blog for those who never gave up their turntables or records
’70s ROCK & ROLL includes articles about the blaxploitation movie soundtrack phenomenon, prog, glam, the singer-songwriter, reggae, disco, soft rock, arena rock, and punk, among other happenings.
Albums “shipped gold” and then went right to the cut-out bin, imports were readily available, quadraphonic sound came and went, and by the end of the decade, cassette tapes were outselling records. Discographies and price guides are included in some articles.
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IT WAS 1975, and I was out of my hippie wannabe stage. I was playing it straight; not out of choice, but necessity. (But that’s another story.) I was still as anti-authoritarian as all get-out—at least when it came to bosses who were really bullies with authority—taking crap from no one. [Continue reading]
THE ORIGINAL TITLE to this piece on David Bowie was “Damn That Damn Disco Music!” But that was really an inadequate opening for the tone of this ‘true story’ about conversion. Then I dallied with variations on “The Day I Came Out as a David Bowie Fan,” which was an allusion to his androgynous Ziggy Stardust period. [Continue reading]
MY APOLOGIES if you find yourself here looking for an article about the Beach Boys’ SURF’S UP album. The article is a work-in-progress and I accidentally pressed the Publish button instead of the Save Draft button.
I WOULD BE REMISS in my love for the Hollies if I did not mention the exploits of their on-again/off-again lead singer, Harold Allan Clarke. In his second (?) sojourn from the group he helped found in Manchester, England, in 1962, he took a rather different approach stylistically to the material with which his fans had come to associate with him. [Continue reading]
RELEASED IN 1975, Springsteen’s third album for Columbia, BORN TO RUN, was a virtual apotheosis of all that the rock musicians of the previous generation had hoped to achieve with the form. But that was not how the first two years as a recording artist went down. [Continue reading]
THE SINGLE RELEASE of Blinded By The Light / The Angel (Columbia 4-48405) may not have been a big hit in 1973 with record-buyers, but it has been a big deal with record-collectors ever since! It is among the rarest and most sought-after of Bruce’s collectable records and record-related artifacts. [Continue reading]
UNLESS YOU’RE OLD ENOUGH to have been there THEN (the early months of 1973) but weren’t paying attention or you were not a Springsteen fan (and who was back then outside of a small circle of friends near Asbury Park?) [Continue reading]
HERE ARE THE LYRICS to Bruce Springsteen’s original recording of Blinded By The Light as best that I can decipher them. I used a couple of lyrics sites and then listened to the recording repeatedly (and yes it’s “deuce” not “douche”) each time comparing the words I had typed with the words that I was hearing. [Continue reading]
IT’S 6:36 IN THE MORNING and I had just dropped Berni off at work. I turned on the radio to the oldies station and lo and behold, there was Bruce Springsteen’s ‘Blinded By The Light.’ Delighted I sat back and listened, then realized that I had never heard the record on the radio before! [Continue reading]