Super Hits of The 70s: Have A Nice Day, Vol. 1

Youtube playlist: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HRNPppaIW6I&list=PLL1NQSkQU5Ldrjcv6YfOxpTHF_WyC8U6O

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HRNPppaIW6I&list=PLL1NQSkQU5Ldrjcv6YfOxpTHF_WyC8U6O

Meet me where I come from...

1. "Smile a Little Smile for Me"
2. "Come Saturday Morning"
3. "More Today Than Yesterday"

Would be okay with never hearing "Venus" or the sports-arena song again.

I know two of these, "Venus" and "Na Na Hey Hey (Kiss Him Goodbye)". Voting "Venus".

I'm sure said this before on here but the US and UK charts used to be so different.

Will try to listen to all of these before voting, but I legit love “Arizona.”

"Tracy" (which I thought I didn't know until I youtube'd it and was like, "Oh, that song!") into "Mississippi Queen" is some hilarious whiplash programming.

Also didn't know until doing this that Donnie Iris was also the Jaggerz guy.

Also, unless anyone else was planning on it, I’d be ok with putting together Spotify playlists for each of these. Cool?

And finally for the umpteenth time on here I shall bring up the fact that my parents saw Smith live in 1970-1, and the opening act was ZZ Top, whose debut album they claim they bought at the merch stand.

cryptosicko: Do The Spotify!

Also for those not into the whole spotify thing, if you search youtube, the correct playlist is the one with the Spiral Starecase lp art as the cover vid. There's another list up that is 1/4 dead videos.

Here it is!

https://open.spotify.com/user/cryptosicko/playlist/7prxir3wb4GwI3NkRJQg3S?si=V0LNMbQOS5Kyd5DllqxhXg

no contest, this is Mississippi Queen

Hard to hear without thinking of Homer Simpson.

the kick drum action on "more today than yesterday" is fucking crazy

beyond that it's one of my favorite songs of all time since i was a kid

Great series, got that original batch pretty much out of the gate and played these quite often -- good education, really, had only heard a few of these songs before then. Going to have to give this a relisten but I kinda love the Sandpipers's full cheese.

For those of us who weren’t around for these songs at the time, its kind of interesting to map out how we first encountered them. For me,

“More Today Than Yesterday” - my sister’s endless rewatchings of the Macauley Culkin sap-fest My Girl.

“Na Na Na Hey Hey Hey” - baseball games, undoubtedly; also, didn’t someone cover this in the 80s?

“Venus” - Bananarama. I’m sure my parents informed me at some point that it was a cover.

“Mississippi Queen” - Homer rockin’ out.

I can’t remember where I first heard “Smile a Little Smile For Me” (probably oldies radio), “Baby It’s You” I probably know from some other version, and “Arizona” was a random discovery for me a few years back. The other’s aren’t sounding familiar.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L3zLfjwzpnA

OMG this is so great. I love this stuff.
Leaning 'More Today Than Yesterday'.

Going over the playlist, the only one I'm sure I haven't heard before was "Early In The Morning". I do know the other Vanity Fare hit, which we'll get to in a subsequent volume.

Strike the Flying Machine as another "Oh, that song!".

First heard "Mississippi Queen" in a beer ad: https://youtu.be/WNoK-m7_-IE

Everything else via oldies radio and/or grocery store muzaks, except maybe the Sandpipers, which I picked up from the movie.

What movie is the Sandpipers song from?

The Sterile Cuckoo.

https://dyn1.heritagestatic.com/lf?set=path%5B1%2F1%2F7%2F1%2F3%2F11713035%5D%2Csizedata%5B850x600%5D&call=url%5Bfile%3Aproduct.chain%5D

Fun Fact: Wendell Burton ended up working for Joel Osteen as a Drama Director for Lakewood Church.

I'm kind of surprised that "Mississippi Queen" clocks in at only 2:31, as it always struck me as one of those quintessentially 7+ minute 70s cock-rock epics (I even looked it up on Wiki to make sure that Rhino wasn't just using a radio edit).

Anyway, voting for "Arizona" because I feel like it'll receive a lot less love than "More Today Than Yesterday," but it really is a toss-up.

Neither of those Youtubes @ the top of the page work in the UK btw.

They're not working here either, at least as links. Search this album on YouTube and it might come up. However, there may be blocked videos.

I'm kind of surprised that "Mississippi Queen" clocks in at only 2:31, as it always struck me as one of those quintessentially 7+ minute 70s cock-rock epics

Same here. It's when you listen that you realize it's basically a Hard Rock Bubblegum song, and the length and chart placement make perfect sense.

I love this series so much.

This one will be a tough choice but not as tough as it'll get with some of the subsequent volumes. 'Mississippi Queen' and the Smith tune are solid jams but feel a little out of sync of what I think of as the AM gold sound. Might have to go Starecase.

i actually own the 7 disc box set called Have A Nice Decade and ran that poll on ILM in the past. glad that C. Grisso/McCain is taking on the full series as this should be a lot of fun. none of these above songs are on that box set and will have to listen to that Spotify playlist before voting. i only know three of these.

Ahhhh I love these cd’s, I have the whole series.

Smile A Little Smile For Me - pure gem, def my #1 pick. Arizona also great, Mississippi Queen total classic

Cherry Hill Park has that gr8 horn section that i love, kinda like a really dope old Chicago track

Am i the only one who didnt know til today that Venus was sung by a woman? i always thought it was a dude! https://youtu.be/aPEhQugz-Ew

Whoa, I didn't know that, either!

I'm...startled you all didn't know that. (I guess I thought Shocking Blue was more well known not merely for that but for "Love Buzz" thanks to Nirvana.)

Anyway, relistening to this disc now. Yup, good stuff! "Arizona" is so amazingly ridiculous.

I think also the thing about this series/collection is that it aesthetically beat Tarantino to the punch in my mind; this was a couple of years before Reservoir Dogs and all.

shocking blue had some pretty good lesser-known cuts - i'm not super into dutch rock but "send me a postcard" and "long and lonesome road" are both jams, though i won't go as far as to say any of their albums are worth listening to. anyway voting "venus".

Venus was sung by a woman

...and what a woman!

https://i.pinimg.com/originals/4b/2e/a3/4b2ea38aa82ce103ffc51cb90ec16b9b.jpg

She looks like the venn diagram overlap of Liza Minnelli & Cher <3

venus is a def love/hate song for me

"send me a postcard" and "long and lonesome road" are both jams

Cosign.

first of all thanks for doing this

secondly all these songs are bangers and I think picking volume to volume will be harder than Just Can't Get Enough. The extra 10+ years removed really culls the herd.

also:

"'Mississippi Queen' and the Smith tune are solid jams but feel a little out of sync of what I think of as the AM gold sound. Might have to go Starecase.

― I really like the acting, dialogue and especially the scenes (Old Lunch)"

^ this is a great point and will probably use this mindset when picking. Mississippi Queen is an all time riff AFAIC and Na Na Hey Hey is the best not Stevie Wonder song but "Arizona" is probably closest to AM Gold/Have a Nice Day. There's a certain camp value to these that I really enjoy.

http://https%3A//img.discogs.com/HO2_ja6nsMOmY6Oc7ngU8pHIfUY%3D/fit-in/600x600/filters%3Astrip_icc%28%29%3Aformat%28jpeg%29%3Amode_rgb%28%29%3Aquality%2890%29/discogs-images/R-3310495-1367840738-8835.jpeg.jpg

What is wrong with this man

http://https%3A//cdn-s3.allmusic.com/release-covers/500/0002/090/0002090345.jpg

whatever the man is here:

https://cdn-s3.allmusic.com/release-covers/500/0002/090/0002090345.jpg

I love all of these but between Venus and Baby It’s You. Probably Venus today.

I love all of these but between Venus and Baby It’s You. Probably Venus today.

I love how Lindsay decided to step away from the Paul Revere image and go full sleaze. Appropriate for a song that pure WTF lyrically:

She must belong to San Francisco
She must have lost her way
Postin' a poster of Poncho and Cisco
One California day
She said she believes in Robin Hood and brotherhood
And colours of green and grey
And all you can do is laugh at her
Doesn't anybody know how to pray?

Arizona, take off your rainbow shades
Arizona, have another look at the world
My myyy
Arizona, cut off your Indian braids
Arizona, hey won'tcha go my way

Mmmm strip off your pride you're acting like a teeny-bopper run away child
And scrape off the paint from the face of a little town saint
Arizona, take off your hobo shoes
Arizona, hey won'tcha go my way

Follow me up to San Francisco
I will be guide your way
I'll be the Count of Monte Cristo
You'll be the Countess May
And you can believe in Robin Hood and brotherhood and rolling the ball in the hay
And I will be reading you an Aesop's fable
Anything to make you stay-ay-ay

More Today Than Yesterday

Runners-up: Cherry Hill Park, Early in the Morning, Arizona

The Rapper - Fun but stupid
Na Na Hey Hey - At least a minute too long
Mississippi Queen - Feels out of place
Tracy - Generic example of smooth bubblegum, outclassed by at least 2 songs on Super Hits Vol. 2 (My Baby Loves Lovin', Hitchin' a Ride)
Come Saturday Morning - It would win if this were a compilation of the "Beautiful Music" easy listening radio format of the '60s/'70s

xpost "Oh hippie child, please stop looking like trash so I can take you to the Bay Area anyway and fuck you."

i mean it doesn't make a lick of sense on ANY level!

Oh for sure, re: the vast diversity of '70s pop hits. I love that so many varied things coexisted alongside one another on the radio at the time. It just feels to me like the HAND comps are largely concerned with the soft focus warm n' fuzzy MOR tunes without much edge, so songs that actually rock feel a little misplaced in this particular context.

The now-defunct oldies station here used to play More Today Than Yesterday at least once a day. While not a favorite, the fact that it never made me scramble for the dial a la other good-but-overplayed oldies (looking at you, Looking Glass), is some kind of testament. Never bothered to check if Spiral Starecase was actually a real group or just session musicians a la Steam.

Smile a Little Smile for Me - I always liked this song, but I remember reading Rosemary's Baby as a kid, and being freaked out at the end when there's a Japanese (of course) tourist taking pictures of the hellspawn, and Rosemary's all like "Smile for the camera! One little smile!" I think those are in fact the final lines. Coincidence? The book came out 2 years before.

I'm not ashamed to admit that "Doesn't anyone know how to pray" always chokes me up a bit.

I guess my vote is most likely to go to Cherry Hill Park. Love the sleaze of the lyrics, and the music always sounded menacing. I also love this YouTube comment "Was Mary Hill the only woman in town? Cherry Hill Park kinda closed down when she left".

"whiplash programming"

this child of the 70's agrees-super otm.

I knew this was going to happen ... yesterday I woke up with a couple of lines of "Smile a Little Smile" in my head, where they lingered for hours; today it was "Early in the Morning"

maybe I'm just prone to earworms, but I think these particular hooks were set deep in my tender brain by the ultra-repetitive style of Top 40 programming and the limited range of music then available to kiddie consumers ... these days I can appreciate how well most of these tunes were written, arranged, performed, and recorded, but the certainty that some of them will trigger savagely persistent mental loops makes the prospect of listening to 24 more compilations an Imp of the Perverse situation

Voted « Arizona » before reading the thread, happy to see « appreciation » of its charms. It was a mystery song for me before the internet ; I heard it once in college but didn’t catch the artist, and then it stuck with me, taking on its own lyrics in my mind (something about dancing shoes). As ever I like my version more than the actual one I eventually found online, but it’s still catchy camp.

I always lump it together in my head with a handful of other Super Hits which address a lady by name ('Amie', 'My Maria') and which collectively would make for a solid, loosely-themed comp.

Super Seventies Chicks: Have A Nice Dame

I always lump it together in my head with a handful of other Super Hits which address a lady by name ('Amie', 'My Maria') and which collectively would make for a solid, loosely-themed comp.

(Dammit, I was just about to go to bed...)

Amie
Arial
Big City Miss Ruth Ann
Black Betty
Brandy (You're a Fine Girl)
Clair
Emma
Hey Deanie
I'm Not Lisa
Jackie Blue
Jimmy Loves Mary-Anne
Judy Mae
Julie, Do Ya Love Me?
Living Next Door to Alice
Love Grows (Where My Rosemary Goes)
Ma Belle Amie
My Maria
My Sharona
Shannon
Sweet Mary
Sylvia's Mother
Tracy

(First person who says "But Shannon is about a dog!" gets a reminder of what Clair is really about.)

omg I fucking hate Shannon.
I hate it almost as much as I hate Honey.

Shannon by Henry Gross? but that's a wonderful song?

Fuckin' 'Honey'! So glad that creepfest isn't on any of these comps.

Well done, Lump. You saved me from some inevitable obsessive listmaking of my own.

Henry Gross's "Shannon" is about a dog!

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/7/73/Shannon_-_Henry_Gross.jpg
:O

You know the whole thing about “Shannon” and Casey Kasem, right? And about the fact that it was about Carl Wilson’s dog, I think.

Used to hate it but eventually grew on me. “Honey” is pretty bad, as noted above.

And yes, thanks to Hideous Lump for preemptively creating that list so the rest of us don’t feel we have to.

my old boss knew how much I hated Shannon - every once in a while he’d wander by my desk singing the chorus in a high-pitched voice. the worst! RAGH

My friend and I were recently discussing this and started riffing on Steve Coogan and the other guy in The Trip imitating Michael Caine talking about this song “And when he sings high, he sings very high.”

You know the whole thing about “Shannon” and Casey Kasem, right?

Do tell...

Well, you see, Casey was alone with Shannon one day when he starts eying this jar of peanut butter...

Actually has nothing to do with “Shannon,” sorry.

Thanks to C.G/McC for starting this thread/series and to cryptosicko for the Spotify playlist.

This stuff is def. *my* music, although this particular Volume is variable in quality and full of things that made no impression whatsoever in the UK. Steam and Shocking Blue are the most familiar and deservedly so. "Tracy" too, from numerous bubblegum pop comps, but it doesn't quite fit in that company - or here either for that matter. The Flying Machine and Vanity Fare were actually Brits, so I know these too, but... meh (the latter have better songs as mentioned upthread).

Didn't know this Sandpipers tune but it's reliable easy listening. Of the unfamiliar acts, Spiral Staircase and The Jaggerz were the nicest surprises. Think I'll vote for the latter.

these comps do occasionally yield great non-US hits that I remember as a kid growing up in Australia, like Smokie, Brotherhood of Man, and my favorite: Sister Janet Mead’s version of The Lord’s Prayer :D

Eurovision content scattered throughout which is always good

How could it be anything else but "The Rapper"?

Eurovision content scattered throughout which is always good

Ignorant American here--which songs were from Eurovision?

Save Your Kisses for Me was one
I’ll have to look up the others as memory is failing me but there are a few in the compilation

Been obsessed with this series for the last few years. I've even replaced some of my cassette copies with CDs just to get some of the bonus tracks. "Come Saturday Morning" was also used to great creepy effect in the movie Clara's Ghost.

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

Get yer last votes in folks.

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

(...I kinda think 'Venus' is just okay. Sorry.)

Ha, "Venus" ended up w/my vote, although I was close to going with Mountain.

V2 tomorrow!

Kind of shocking that "MTTY" didn't do better, as it's pretty well-loved in general.

It got my vote.

It was probably my #3.

ilx needs to get down with the Flying Machine, clearly

Debated whether to vote for “Tracy,” Ron Dante stan that I am. Ended up missing the vote altogether. Ah well.

Listening to vol. 2 now. Such a great mix of finesse, clunk and horribleness.

James: have you heard this?

https://www.gilbertpodcast.com/ron-dante/

No, thanks!

Fear not "Tracy" fans, I'm considering running a "Spinsters" (tracks with no votes) poll in addition to the trad Bridesmaids and #1 polls run at the conclusion of the volume polls.

A lot of that will hinge on how many no-vote getters we'll have (remember this is a 25 volume series of 300 songs, so there could be >50 eligible at the end).

:D

Super Hits of The 70s: Have A Nice Day, Vol. 2

The Rapper has such a great chorus with the fuzz riff, cowbell and that little guitar lick.

Okay, jusr relistened and have to say I underestimated “The Rapper.”

Moves Like Jaggerz

so bummed i missed this, especially the extensive discussion of "Arizona." wasn't so long ago it felt like we "Arizona" lovers were a nearly extinct breed on this board.

Indeed. Probably haven’t thought about that song since it first came out and was a hit and don’t think I ever knew who the artist was.

Really digging the drums on “Tracy,” wondering which studio pro played them.

"Arizona" feels like the theme song for a reactionary grindhouse film where Charles Bronson travels from his small town to San Francisco to get revenge on the hippies that got his daughter addicted.

The narrator of "Cherry Hill Park" def a minor baddie who gets killed fifteen minutes into this film.

lol, yes to both.

Now do 'The Rapper'.

!