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Post by chrislc on Jan 18, 2023 17:45:44 GMT -5
]That Johnny Carson album was something I wasn’t aware of until seeing your post. I found it on YouTube and began listening to it expecting a train wreck. But it’s actually really funny, or at least the first part is. I guess the issue was more about shipping too many copies than it was about the album being bad. I remember in 1971 for some strange reason I bought a Flip Wilson Show album, it was nothing more than the audio of one episode. This Carson album, at least the part I heard, is way better. Ed McMahon was on both the flip and Johnny albums. I wonder if there was a star search album. Maybe it turns out that Ed was an even bigger superstar than Andy Williams. Yes, overproduction of the LP is what got then-small Casablanca into financial trouble. As I said, luckily for them Kiss and Donna Summer both started selling lots of records not too long afterwards, which helped the label immensely. You'd think the label would have learned a lesson, but four years later they would find themselves again in the same situation by overshipping the four Kiss 'solo' albums. As the joke at the time went, those four albums both shipped and returned 'platinum'. Just like RSO with the 'Sgt. Pepper' soundtrack. As for TV audio albums, in the early '70s I owned both of the 'All In the Family' albums. The first one, released in late '71, did quite well, went 'gold' and reached #8. The second one a year later, with clips from the show's second (and first full) season, did not, only reaching #129. Obviously this type of album went extinct less than a decade later once VCRs became cheap and popular. Oh yeah, just remembered, I also once owned the 1976 'Saturday Night Live' album. Another audio TV LP, it reached #35 in early '77. Looking at the 'Television' section in my Whitburn Top LPs book, I see three other TV audio clip albums that charted: Batman ('66-both audio clips and music), and two Laugh-In albums from '68 and '69. The Batman LP peaked at 112, the two Laugh-Ins at 105 and 88. Your Flip Wilson LP did not chart. I may have conflated my memory of that album. It was released in 1970 and I can't find an episode with Ed McMahon in 1970 that sounds familiar. Or - maybe it was in fact a collection of audio from multiple Flip Wilson Shows. I think it's amazing how forgotten he and that show are, considering what a huge hit that show was the first two seasons. Season #1 it was second only to Marcus Welby, M.D. (speaking of forgotten hit shows), and Season #2 it was second only to All In The Family. That set sure looked like the same studio that was used for the Elvis Comeback Special. If I Can Dream. Wow what a moment that was! EDIT oh look the Flip TV album is on YouTube. What a wonderful time we live in.
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Post by slf on Jan 19, 2023 6:39:03 GMT -5
On Billboard, the album spent 7 weeks on the Top 200 Albums chart, charting on 11/02/74 and peaking at #130. So it was already gone from that chart by the time this show aired in early January. Reminds me of the "Tonight Show" 2-LP set that charted around the same time (12/21/74) and nearly sank the young Casablanca Records before Kiss and Donna Summer saved the label. But at least that album did make it uo to #30 in early '75. That Johnny Carson album was something I wasn’t aware of until seeing your post. I found it on YouTube and began listening to it expecting a train wreck. But it’s actually really funny, or at least the first part is. I guess the issue was more about shipping too many copies than it was about the album being bad. I remember in 1971 for some strange reason I bought a Flip Wilson Show album, it was nothing more than the audio of one episode. This Carson album, at least the part I heard, is way better. Ed McMahon was on both the flip and Johnny albums. I wonder if there was a star search album. Maybe it turns out that Ed was an even bigger superstar than Andy Williams. I think that book you mentioned, or one like it, was where Peter Paul and Mary were just crucified for I dig rock and roll music. The author was clearly not a PPM fan. You are correct; the authors of the book I mentioned ranked "I Dig Rock And Roll Music" among the top ten worst songs. (I think at #5.) In a nutshell, they played up the fact that PPM wrote and recorded the song as a jab and a protest towards all the folk artists (Donovan and the Mamas and Papas in particular) who "sold out" for the big bucks of pop stardom, as if that were an unpardonable sin. At the conclusion of the section dealing with this song, the authors end with this biting comment: "By 1967, they [Peter, Paul, and Mary] sounded like parents".
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Post by mga707 on Jan 19, 2023 10:33:56 GMT -5
That Johnny Carson album was something I wasn’t aware of until seeing your post. I found it on YouTube and began listening to it expecting a train wreck. But it’s actually really funny, or at least the first part is. I guess the issue was more about shipping too many copies than it was about the album being bad. I remember in 1971 for some strange reason I bought a Flip Wilson Show album, it was nothing more than the audio of one episode. This Carson album, at least the part I heard, is way better. Ed McMahon was on both the flip and Johnny albums. I wonder if there was a star search album. Maybe it turns out that Ed was an even bigger superstar than Andy Williams. I think that book you mentioned, or one like it, was where Peter Paul and Mary were just crucified for I dig rock and roll music. The author was clearly not a PPM fan. You are correct; the authors of the book I mentioned ranked "I Dig Rock And Roll Music" among the top ten worst songs. (I think at #5.) In a nutshell, they played up the fact that PPM wrote and recorded the song as a jab and a protest towards all the folk artists (Donovan and the Mamas and Papas in particular) who "sold out" for the big bucks of pop stardom, as if that were an unpardonable sin. At the conclusion of the section dealing with this song, the authors end with this biting comment: "By 1967, they [Peter, Paul, and Mary] sounded like parents". Even at age nine I sort of 'got' that from that smug song. Why I've never liked it.
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Post by mrjukebox on Jan 19, 2023 10:47:47 GMT -5
I too owned both "All In The Family" & "Laugh-In" albums-I now have both shows on DVD.
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Post by dth1971 on Jan 21, 2023 9:49:53 GMT -5
On AT40: The 70's Casey did an update on whatever happened to the Kalin Twins who were the only twin duo to hit the top 40 as Casey mentioned, but it would be 11 years later when there was another twin duo hitting the AT40 chart - Nelson (Matthew and Gunnar, the sons of Ricky Nelson).
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Post by lasvegaskid on Jan 22, 2023 12:45:16 GMT -5
In a reverse jinx, on this week's 1977 show Casey said watch phenomenal ABBA take debuting Dancing Queen to #1.
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Post by mrjukebox on Jan 22, 2023 12:57:48 GMT -5
Hi,dth1971,I think you meant to say that Gunnar & Matthew Nelson are the sons of Rick Nelson-You said songs.
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Post by mkarns on Jan 22, 2023 15:45:01 GMT -5
That Johnny Carson album was something I wasn’t aware of until seeing your post. I found it on YouTube and began listening to it expecting a train wreck. But it’s actually really funny, or at least the first part is. I guess the issue was more about shipping too many copies than it was about the album being bad. I remember in 1971 for some strange reason I bought a Flip Wilson Show album, it was nothing more than the audio of one episode. This Carson album, at least the part I heard, is way better. Ed McMahon was on both the flip and Johnny albums. I wonder if there was a star search album. Maybe it turns out that Ed was an even bigger superstar than Andy Williams. I think that book you mentioned, or one like it, was where Peter Paul and Mary were just crucified for I dig rock and roll music. The author was clearly not a PPM fan. You are correct; the authors of the book I mentioned ranked "I Dig Rock And Roll Music" among the top ten worst songs. (I think at #5.) In a nutshell, they played up the fact that PPM wrote and recorded the song as a jab and a protest towards all the folk artists (Donovan and the Mamas and Papas in particular) who "sold out" for the big bucks of pop stardom, as if that were an unpardonable sin. At the conclusion of the section dealing with this song, the authors end with this biting comment: "By 1967, they [Peter, Paul, and Mary] sounded like parents". They did give Peter, Paul, and Mary a backhanded compliment, though, saying that "Sometimes a useful movement needs a bland face to push it into the consciousness of mainstream America", and the trio did that for Bob Dylan and 60s folk music. The authors continued with "If there was anything provocative or probing about 'Blowin' In the Wind' or 'Don't Think Twice, It's All Right' you'd never know it from [PPM's] homogenized versions".
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Post by dth1971 on Jan 22, 2023 16:53:02 GMT -5
Hi,dth1971,I think you meant to say that Gunnar & Matthew Nelson are the sons of Rick Nelson-You said songs. Just fixed the misspelling.
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Post by mkarns on Jan 28, 2023 20:48:28 GMT -5
On 1/31/81 Casey answered a listener question about which artists had top 40 hits in the most consecutive years. One of them was Paul McCartney, from 1964-80, and Casey said "McCartney's streak is still alive". 1981 would break the streak.
And in the same show Casey recounted Andy Gibb's chart career while noting that his then-current hit "Time Is Time" seemed likely to break a streak of top 10 hits, but "the charts are unpredictable, so we'll just keep watching". "Time Is Time" dropped from #15 (its peak) to #31 the following week and Andy only had one future top 40 hit, and that only barely: "Me (Without You)" spent one week at #40 in April 1981. (If we don't limit it to solo hits, Andy's top 10 streak was broken, though not by much, by "I Can't Help It", a duet with Olivia Newton-John which peaked at #12 in May 1980.)
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Post by chrislc on Jan 29, 2023 12:02:28 GMT -5
You are correct; the authors of the book I mentioned ranked "I Dig Rock And Roll Music" among the top ten worst songs. (I think at #5.) In a nutshell, they played up the fact that PPM wrote and recorded the song as a jab and a protest towards all the folk artists (Donovan and the Mamas and Papas in particular) who "sold out" for the big bucks of pop stardom, as if that were an unpardonable sin. At the conclusion of the section dealing with this song, the authors end with this biting comment: "By 1967, they [Peter, Paul, and Mary] sounded like parents". They did give Peter, Paul, and Mary a backhanded compliment, though, saying that "Sometimes a useful movement needs a bland face to push it into the consciousness of mainstream America", and the trio did that for Bob Dylan and 60s folk music. The authors continued with "If there was anything provocative or probing about 'Blowin' In the Wind' or 'Don't Think Twice, It's All Right' you'd never know it from [PPM's] homogenized versions". Comments like that don't age well. Not that the comment is wrong - or right - since it was only his opinion, but time just makes it seem more bitter than insightful. I guess the whole book was like that, and there was an audience for it, including me. LBJ and Nixon really did a number on our generation.
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Post by mga707 on Jan 29, 2023 13:17:17 GMT -5
And in the same show Casey recounted Andy Gibb's chart career while noting that his then-current hit "Time Is Time" seemed likely to break a streak of top 10 hits, but "the charts are unpredictable, so we'll just keep watching". "Time Is Time" dropped from #15 (its peak) to #31 the following week and Andy only had one future top 40 hit, and that only barely: "Me (Without You)" spent one week at #40 in April 1981. (If we don't limit it to solo hits, Andy's top 10 streak was broken, though not by much, by "I Can't Help It", a duet with Olivia Newton-John which peaked at #12 in May 1980.) Sadly, Andy's '80s decline was not all that hard to predict. Years of substance abuse (mainly cocaine) contributed to his death five days after after his 30th birthday in 1988. He was exactly one month older than I.
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Post by mrjukebox on Jan 29, 2023 13:25:31 GMT -5
Andy Gibb was dating actress Victoria Principal at the time & their subsequent breakup sent him into an emotional tailspin.
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Post by lasvegaskid on Jan 30, 2023 14:00:40 GMT -5
In a reverse jinx on last week's 1981 show Casey said Clive would never return to Columbia. In the 00s he did return, in a way, when he joined parent company Sony.
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Post by lasvegaskid on Jan 30, 2023 17:46:17 GMT -5
On last week's 1981 show Casey said ABBA was in the business of making big hits and weren't gonna stop. After countdown 'Winner they'd never have another top tenner and would soon take a 40 year break.
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