The Forgotten Artists of AOR Radio Poll

This would make an AWESOME ILM thread.

Half of these get frequent classic rock airplay in Canada.

Half of these get frequent classic rock airplay in Canada.

aka "forgotten"

(though haha yes I opened this thread looking for Saga)

Actually, this list doesn't even make sense, looking at it closely. Those Colin James songs are all late 80s or early 90s. Surely Honeymoon Suite, Helix, and Kim Mitchell are post-81 too. All of them are surely easily available on major label releases. "When I'm With You" didn't even become a big hit until 1989 (and it was/is huge)...

xpost haha

David & David - "Welcome to the Boomtown"

One of these things is not like the others.

Damn. Mods, please move to ILM. My clicking skills have deteriorated by to the strong odor of ROCK at my desk.

I don't think Kix is forgotten on ILM.

As for the timeline, Wikipedia lists artists like the Black Crowes, who didn't debut until 1990, as artists broken by the AOR format. I guess AOR covers everything up to around grunge, when stations turned into either Classic Rock or Adult Album Alternative formats.

Oh maybe I misunderstood the post. I interpreted it at first as saying that these are all artists/songs from the days before Billboard started tracking AOR play (81).

You might be right, actually. The Ottawa station was still album-oriented until the early 90s.

Lots of great bands here (I might even take Angel City over Kix these days), and lots of them have been written about on ILM in the past, for instance here:

Where is the love for HOUNDS and STREETHEART and SHOOTING STAR and PRISM?

There are actually a few bands I've never heard of on the list above, which makes me curious about them. But of the ones I know, almost all of them were from the '80s, not '70s; Climax Blues Band's "Couldn't Get It Right" (a big pop hit in 1977) is one obvious exception. The Caravan and Pavlov's Dog records I know are from the '70s, too. (Caravan are probably the most prog band up there.) Jackyl didn't hit until the '90s, I don't think. (Van Zant have actually had country hits in the '00s! Not sure if the lineup is similar.)

Are the tracks listed above suppposed to have been the ones that received actual AOR play? Weird, if so; there's definitely a whole bunch that never got airplay in Detroit. Probably some of the airplay for a lot of the acts was regional, though...

Well, yeah, some of the song picks are a little weird too. Those Chilliwack songs but not "Fly at Night"??

Song Dance by Pavlov's Dog would've been the better choice.

I had forgotten about Best AOR Albums Of All Time POLL until this one reminded me

Those Chilliwack songs but not "Fly at Night"??

Ha ha, you really are Canadian, aren't you, Sundar? "My Girl (Gone Gone Gone)" was by far their biggest hit in the states (No. 22 pop). Don't know if I ever heard "Fly At Night" (which went to No. 75, apprently) on the radio (and I was in Detroit, where that Kim Mitchell "Go For A Soda" song actually got Windsor-spillover airplay! And my younger sister even bought a Helix tape once.)

I wrote about reissue CDs by Zebra, 707, and Starz on the Rolling Metal thread last year; can cut and paste if anybody's particularly curious.

And Helix actually have a rocking new album this year!:

http://blog.rhapsody.com/2008/05/hair-metal-pion.html

Bands I've never knowingly heard:

Axe - "Rock And Roll Party In The Streets"
Tony Carey - "I Won't Be Home Tonight", "A Fine Fine Day", "First Day Of Summer"
Doucette - "Mama Let Him Play", "Down the Road"
Glass Moon - "Killer at 25"
Giuffria - "Call To The Heart", "Lonely In Love", "I Must Be Dreaming"
Gypsy - "Gypsy Queen", "Dead and Gone."
Headpins - "Just One More Time", "Breakin' Down", "Winnin'"
Heads Hands and Feet - "Country Boy"
Heartsfield - "Music Eyes", "Another Man Down", "Shine On"
Colin James - "Voodoo Thing", "Why'd You Lie", "Five Long Years"
Kayak - "I Want You To Be Mine", "Starlight Dancer"
Mason Proffit - "Two Hangmen", "Last Night I Had The Strangest Dream", "Better Find Jesus"
Orion The Hunter- "So You Ran"
Planet P Project - "Why Me", "Power Tools"
Rare Bird - "Sympathy", "Hey Man", "Epic Forest"
Russ Ballard - "On The Rebound", "Voices", "The Fire Still Burns"
Sherbs - "I Have The Skill", "No Turning Back", "We Ride Tonight"
Silver Condor - "For The Sake Of Survival", "Holdin' on Barely"
Steel Breeze - "You Don't Want Me Anymore", "Dreamin' Is Easy"
Streets - "If Love Should Go", "One Way Street", "Gun Runner"
Taxxi - "I'm Leaving", "The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter", "Still In Love"

Though actually, I probably did hear some of those (like Colin James and the Sherbs and Giuffria and Russ Ballard's solo stuff for instance), and just didn't know what it was.

Pretty sure George and Scott are big Headpins fans.

pashmina posted some youtube clips of a few of these bands on Best AOR Albums Of All Time POLL

Giuffria - Call To The Heart

You might like "Just One More Time", xhuxk:

You probably heard Colin James if you were near the border in the late 80s/early 90s. Bluesy pop/rock, not particularly remarkable IMO.

"Fly At Night" kicks "Gone Gone Gone"'s ass.

I used to have a great Rare Bird album--As Your Mind Flies By. But none of those singles were on it.

Doucette- "Mama Let Him Play"

<object width="425" height="344"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/xCQQL1cJ07Q&hl=en&fs=1";></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/xCQQL1cJ07Q&hl=en&fs=1"; type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowfullscreen="true" width="425" height="344"></embed></object>

You don't need to use the embed code -- just copy/paste the basic URL.

Planet P Project- Why Me? (kind of awesome)

xpost Thanks Ned

Taxxi- Still in Love

chuck loves Kix!

Orion the Hunter- So You Ran

Guitarist from Boston.

707- I Could Be Good For You

Glass Moon- Killer at 25

Silver Condor- You Could Take My Heart Away
(Apparantly their biggest hit. Informative Solid Gold intro.)

The Streets- If Love Should Go

Steel Breeze- You Don't Want Me Anymore

Actually, I'm a little surprised xhuxk never heard Doucette either. They still play "Mama Let Him Play". I usually enjoy it, kind of.

Sherbs- I Have the Skill

Sherbs- We Ride Tonight

Russ Ballard- Voices (classic)

Axe- Rock & Roll Party in the Streets

^^^Kind of somber given the title.

Gypsy- Dead & Gone

Headpins- Just One More Time

(this is great)

ttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3C0ZDAc5ga4

Let's try this again

Heads Hands & Feet- Country Boy

Collin James- Voodoo Thing

Kayak- I Want You To Be Mine

(I already posted Headpins! And, yes, it's great.)

Incredible how few of these I have even heard of. Voted David + David though - that album was great.

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

Since this isn't on here:

... I'll have to vote for Zebra. On my eighth grade bus ride, Otto kept the radio tuned to an AOR station that played this song every morning for two months.

god this thread is awesome. still gotta vote for Kix, though, I saw them live last week and they were killer.

Mason Proffit, from Chicago, is a head scratcher. They were broken up by '73 or '74. Their brand of country-rock influenced the Eagles. I'm voting for them, because they actually rule. I love the Proffit, just found their last record, in fact.

I used to have a great Rare Bird album--As Your Mind Flies By. But none of those singles were on it.

― President Keyes, Saturday, 20 September 2008 22:35 (5 days ago) Bookmark

"Sympathy" is off Rare Bird's first s/t album, "Epic Forest" is the tiutle track from I think their third one. I dunno about the other track. I used to have a Japanese CD of "As Your Mind Flies By", I wish I still had it. I don't think "Epic Forest" ever came out on CD, it's a fine album.

Chilliwack! The Firm!

Ohmigod, this is like a trip back in time.

As much as I love David + David, I gotta go with the Firm, if only for Page's distinctly Dolphy-esque runs on "Radioactive."

And whither the Michael Stanley Band?

^^^^forgotten!

I still have an unhealthy amount of non-ironic affection for a huge swath of that list. Some bizarre inclusions, though. (Caravan?)

I vote for Prism - "See Forever Eyes" is teh awesome

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

rural Minnesotans love all of this stuff still. it's cool.