To my mind, simply another great pop song from my childhood. And, like the 4 Tops number prior to this, a song that I thought of as a "favorite song" whenever it came on the radio...
One of a Kind Love Affair by the Spinners, an apologies in advance for the visuals that accompany the music...
IBL:mm
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I understand that the Spinners are from Detroit but they will always represent LA to me. Weekend trips to my father's house, driving from the South Bay up to Altadena, "Could It Be I'm Falling in Love" and "I'll Be Around" on the radio in my dad's chocolate brown Firebird, down the 405 to the Harbor to the Pasadena. My friend Kirk Okimoto's older brother took us to see the Spinners live at the Pantages Theater in 1977. For the encore they all came out in a giant rubber band. I'm sure they played your song that night.
ReplyDeleteRemember this of course. Had completely forgotten that floor tom intro though. You know the 70s may be remembered as THE period of varied and creative instrumentation in popular music. When I go back and listen to things that had been in the "schlock" category of my brain since childhood, I am without fail amazed by the touches here in there in the percussion, that third guitar way in the back there, etc.
ReplyDeleteDavid - thanks so much for that memory. As much as I like the Spinners' song I shared, I also love the other two you mention and could have picked them to represent, as well, except that this one was first for me. And wasn't there another one? A duet, Then Came You? "I never knew love before, then came you." Not with Gloria Gaynor, but with...? Natalie Cole, maybe?
ReplyDeleteGeorge - and now, for me, as I listen to almost only country music, specifically a station called Outlaw Country, the 70s bring around the birth of that movement as well - Waylon, Willie, Shaver, Coe, etc. Though I reckon Johnny was always an outlaw of sorts.
ReplyDeleteWow,here is an extensive subject, the outlaw tradition in Country Music. There is something about Country's early relationship with Gospel that almost guaranteed that this darker side would come out. You can certainly hear this in folks like Hank Snow and Patsy Cline, which take us to Buck Owens and Loretta Lynn and that insistence on trying to be good when no one is buying it, very apparent in say George Jones. And Big Pappy Scary Monster Hank Williams yodeling dysfunctionally over the top of everything, "I'm so lonesome I could cry (die)" coming straight out of the songster blues tradition of people like Leadbelly and Bessie Smith and Mississippi John Hurt, Manse Lipscomb and Pink Anderson. All that Goodnight Irene kind of stuff. But of course the white version of the loser, prison con kind of line comes a little later with Merle Haggard and Johnny Cash, though as I say it had been there in undercurrent a long while. As I recall Johnny Cash was one of the original acts signed by Sun Records, so his comteporaries there were Elvis Presley, Jerry Lee Lewis and Carl Perkins. Fascinating to me, because I heard had always heard it but never recognized it, was Elton John's homage, on one of those Elvis Costello shows, to what he recalled as his single most important influence both as a singer and as a piano player: Leon Russell. As a kind of postscript, I was also very gratified to see on that Elvis Costello show a two part interview that confirmed that Bruce Springsteen is every bit as smart and as sincere about what he does as we had always suspected he was.
ReplyDeleteGeorge, a few thoughts on your last -
ReplyDeleteThe Outlaw Country station hails Hank as their patron saint, and also Jimmie Rogers as a huge influence.
Gospel and the Dark Side - I immediately think of the Louvins.
Johnny was on Sun records - I believe there is a Broadway musical out there now about a day in Sun Studios when those four got together and the producer, Cowboy Jack Clement, pressed play. The Million Dollar Quartet, I think it's called.
Regarding Elton - He just did a record with Leon. You know, I saw that show but forgot that part of the interview; then I heard some Leon a few weeks ago and thought "whoa, this is who Elton was listening to". But apparently that was in my brain subconsciously already.
Regarding Bruce - I have not seen that episode but will track it down. But I believe it to be true about Bruce, I do.
By the way, unbeknownst to most of us, Jimmie Rogers had a HUGE influence on Carribean music. I know Rastas from Providence Island all the way to Jamaica that will suddenly start belting out Jimmie Rogers when they get a lonesome hankering whether while playing a classic Western swing acoustic guitar or a reggaed up electric band sound. Also amazing how close hawaiian slack key guitar and bluegrass guitar sound sometimes.
ReplyDeleteAlso, George, bringing this full circle - Miami Steve owns the Outlaw Country station.
ReplyDeleteGreat information on the Jimmie Rogers; I had no idea...
I WAS hip to the Hawaiian and bluegrass similarity, though. There was a bartender in San Francisco at the Bigfoot Tavern on Polk before it went bad that played music like this all the time.