50 years ago today, irate Ann Arbor commuters, accused the Penn Central Railroad of trying to drive them away and kill the train service that ran from what is now the Gandy Dancer Restaurant to Detroit’s Michigan Central Depot. Two years later, Amtrak would take over national passenger rail service. Continuing to provide a ride to Detroit until January 6, 1988.
I bought my wife a year of Amazon Unlimited music for Christmas. It jogged some memories of what life was like in the era of Record Clubs, K-Tel and the cut-out bin.
Record clubs made their margins on “stiffs”, giving you a list of LPs to choose from each month that included a lot of stuff you didn’t necessarily want. Supply was limited. Demand was high. We often ended up with more than a few marginal albums among the more enduring selections in our collections.
And there was always the problem of getting stuck with a knock-off, a re-recorded version that was not at all like the tune we heard on the radio. The most excruciating for me was Free’s album version of “All Right Now“. The single mix (Hear it Here) was what we played on Top 40 Radio. It was totally different and light years better. You have to dig deep into the Amazon library to find it among the dozens of inferior album versions. It’s worth the work. If you liked the tune, you’ll know why the minute you hear it.
In the 1970s, Philip Kives‘ K-Tel label discovered that they could license oldies and create compilations of “20 Original Songs by 20 Original Artists” (Here’s a typical K-Tel Commercial from the late 70s). Even these collections included their share of duds and a few re-records, but they were a step closer to what we all wanted: To buy the music we wanted without having to listen to the junk that came with it.
When record stores still thrived, we would cruise the “Cut-Out” bins, where artists on the way down ended up. Occasionally, we’d find a gem amongst the trash.
Then came Napster. In the early days, before the RIAA woke up, it was a treasure trove of illegal content shared via peer-to-peer connections. With a little ingenuity, you could fill every hole in your collection. By 2001, file sharing was at its peak. The record companies at last took notice and lawyers only had to persecute a few grandmas who didn’t know their kids were using their PCs to steal music to make Napster reexamine it’s business model.
Today, if you are willing to do some detective work, you can find just about anything you want on YouTube. For some reason, the record companies haven’t shut down the plethora of private citizens who upload video versions of their faves, often augmenting pristine digital audio with synced up video from a performance on Shindig, Hullabaloo our Ed Sullivan.
Perhaps it’s because tech has made us an increasingly lazy people. Record companies and middle men like Apple, Amazon and Spotify, have made it much easier to create playlists of our favorite tunes. And the dollars added up. That’s turned out to be the ticket. It was just like buying 45s at Harmony House (a Detroit record store favorite for my fellow Motowners).
No Record Club rules. No K-Tel knock-offs. No filler cuts we didn’t really want.
Sounds like it could be a radio station tag line.
As Generation Z comes into its prime, memories of how we consumed music will be things scholars read about in history books. Everything from Super Bowl commercials to the latest hits will be available, often before they appear on traditional linear networks. The market will more fully control what becomes a hit. And artists will have to become much more savvy in promoting their artistry.
Wistful memories of gaming the record clubs and scanning Napster will recede. And the hits will just “keep on comin'”.
Tomorrow we’ll talk about the popular social hashtag #Adulting, where youngsters share their most embarrasing “fails” as they try to navigate being grown-ups. You will identify with many of them.
And coming Saturday, our Weekend Essay asking the musical question, “Why are so many of the commercials we endure so bad?” Stay tuned!
Quick Takes:
Smart Speaker Penetration is up to 66 Million Units In U.S.
Coming soon: ?Netflix “Remastered”. Essential viewing for enthusiasts who want to understand the complex elements that make up our imperfect musical heroes. Here’s some great writing about the program from Rolling Stone.
People under age 30 don’t know a world without The Simpsons in it. The cartoon series that started as a feature on the Tracy Ullman show was just re-upped for two more years. It passed Gunsmoke last year as the longest running TV series in history.
For the Boomer generation, the 1964 New York World’s Fair opened our eyes to the future. Disney played a huge role providing attractions at 4 of the pavilions. “It’s a Small World” still draws visitors in Disney parks today, 54 years after Pepsi presented the original. The tune is said to be the most often played in history. The Fair proved to be a money loser, returning only 19 cents on the dollar to bond holders. Here’s a sanguine documentary, that reflects so many of our memories about the experience. (Thanks Jeff!)
This Day In History:
1940, Walt Disney’s second feature length movie, “Pinocchio” premieres.
1959, Buddy Holly was buried in Lubbock, Texas. His tombstone reads “Holley”, the correct spelling of his given surname and includes pictures of a guitar.
1963, The first Beatles single ‘Please Please Me‘ was released in the US on the Vee Jay label. Capitol Records, EMI’s United States label, were offered the right to release the single in the US, but turned it down. Dick Biondi, a disc jockey on WLS in Chicago and a friend of Vee-Jay executive Ewart Abner, played the song on the radio today in 1963, becoming the first radio announcer to play a Beatle record in the United States.
1964, Pan Am flight 101 was greeted by over 5,000 Beatles fans as it arrived at New York’s JFK airport, bringing the band to the US for the first time. WINS DJ “Murray The K” Kauffman alerted the faithful to the flight number.
1969, Doors singer Jim Morrison was arrested for drunk driving and driving with no license in Los Angeles, California. Less than two years later, he would die of heart failure in Paris, two years to the day after the death of the Rolling Stones guitarist Brian Jones, and approximately nine months after the deaths of Jimi Hendrix and Janis Joplin.
1970, “Hollywood Palace” airs it’s last episode on ABC TV. Among the performers and hosts on the show were Bing Crosby. He made the first and the most appearances as guest host: 31 in all, including his family in several of the annual Christmas shows. The program premiered on January 4, 1964, as a midseason replacement for short lived The Jerry Lewis Show.
1974, Mel Brooks’ film “Blazing Saddles” opens in movie theaters starring Cleavon Little and Gene Wilder. “How bout some more beans, Mr. Taggart?” (Video)
1979, Stephen Stills became the first rock performer to record on digital equipment in Los Angeles’ Record Plant Studio.
1979 Fred Silverman’s “Supertrain” TV Anthology debuts on NBC. It’s considered a “superbomb”, one of the worst shows of the year. (Video)
Much More Music:
1969, The Who recorded ‘Pinball Wizard’ at Morgan Studios in London on this date. The track is featured on their 1969 rock opera album Tommy & was released as a single in 1969. It reached No. 4 in the UK charts and No. 19 in the US. . (Video)
1970, Led Zeppelin scored their first No.1 album with Led Zeppelin II. It was released in November 1969, and featured the No. 4 single ‘Whole Lotta Love’. (Video)
1970, One Hit Wonders Shocking Blue went to No.1 with ‘Venus’ on this date, making them the first Dutch act to top the US charts. Bananarama covered the tune 16 later. (Video)
1976, Paul Simon started a three week run at No.1 on the US singles chart with ’50 Ways To Leave Your Lover’, the singers first solo US No. (Video)
Today’s Quote Worth Re-Quoting: “Remember when people had diaries and got mad when someone read them? Now they put everything online and get mad when people don’t.”
We leave you with Billboard’s number one from this week in 1983. “Africa” was a one week chart topper for Toto, but the tune has a hook that is still instantly recognizable 36 years 17 albums and over 40 million records later.
