RECORD MIRROR singles reviews, 15th October 1976

Kevin Coyne-goes-disco is something probably best forgotten.

Oh I don't know. It is pretty hard to imagine Kevin Coyne getting on down on TOTP though.

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

THE GREAT:

Lew Lewis And His Band - Boogie On The Street
(Recorded while Lewis was still playing harp for Eddie & The Hot Rods, recorded in Canvey Island, and backed by three-quarters of Doctor Feelgood amongst others. At the time of its release, I was fanatically obsessed with Eddie & The Hot Rods, owned all three of their singles (Lewis plays on the first two), and I was also enjoying Dr Feelgood's Stupidity, so this couldn't fail to delight. It was my Big Autumn Of Pub Rock, which filled in the time nicely before the punk singles started dropping, and this one was made cooler by being on Stiff - I actually bought it on the same day as The Damned's "New Rose", along with two other Stiff releases, Nick Lowe's "So It Goes" and the Tyla Gang's "Styrofoam". Oh what a day that was.)

Steve Miller Band - Rock 'N' Me
(One of these days, I really need to take a deep dive into Miller's back catalogue, as I really like everything I've heard. "Macho City"! Surprisingly big in the UK Disco chart, but the UK Disco chart didn't become fully "disco" until early 1978.)

Aswad - Three Babylon
(Their second single, following up "Back To Africa", is an intricately intoxicating reminder of how great Aswad were, before they went all showbiz in the late Eighties. 1976 was a landmark year for roots reggae, which built up a widening base of support in the UK: championed in the rock press, played by Peel, loved by your OG punk rockers, and pushed further that autumn by Virgin, who signed a bunch of Jamaican artists en masse and put out a cheap sampler LP called The Front Line, as well as by Island, who collaborated with Melody Maker in the release of another cheap sampler, one side of which was wholly roots. Or at least that's how it looked from where I was sitting.)

Tamiko Jones - Reachin' Out For Your Love
(She's back, hurrah! The lead track from her self-produced 1975 LP Love Trip, written by Johnny Bristol, it gets slinky-n-seductive just right, for once.)

Bobbie Melody - Jah Bring I Joy
(A Joe Gibbs/Errol Thompson production, and as such right up my street. I like all the ah-ah-ing.)

THE GOOD:

Leo Sayer - You Make Me Feel Like Dancing
(As Sue Byrom in RM points out, this was a radical departure for Leo Sayer, which could well have been inspired by The Bee Gees' similar and successful recent shift, with "Jive Talkin" and "You Should Be Dancing". In other words, Sayer saw which way the wind was blowing, and adapted his own falsetto to pop-funk. It's very well done, bringing him massive international success, but I don't detect anything near the same residual love for the track, which you never hear revived. In this respect, perhaps Sayer's calamitous, comeback-scuppering appearance on Celebrity Big Brother should also be factored in.)

Steve Harley & Cockney Rebel - (I Believe) Love's A Prima Donna
(Cockney Rebel were never the same after the original band ditched their leader and the hired hands stepped in, but this is a well-executed piece of work from the final album to bear their name. There are slight echoes of "Make Me Smile" in the guitar break, which is no bad thing.)

Gary Wright - Love Is Alive
(The second of his two huge US hits, following "Dream Weaver" earlier in the year, but in the UK he remained largely unknown. It doesn't move me, but I can acknowledge its merit; there are some pleasing touches in the arrangement.)

Diana Ross - One Love In My Lifetime
(The forgotten single from the self-titled album that had brought us "Do You Know Where You're Going To" and "Love Hangover". It's got an Ashford & Simpson feel, and they did indeed a write a song for the same album, but it wasn't this one. A grower, and very nearly Great.)

Equators - Father Oh Father
(A sought-after hundred quid job on Discogs, and I'm guessing this is of Jamaican origin, i.e. not the work of the UK reggae band who signed to Stiff. All the elements work together really well, and its relative sparseness feels like a balm after wading through so much over-arranged dreariness elsewhere.)

THE OK:

Moon - Day Dreamin'
(Adequate journeyman soft rock, and as such, thoroughly typical of 1976.)

Waylon Jennings - Can't You See
(In the late 70s, C&W was massive in the North Notts village where I grew up, with regular and very well attended events in our memorial hall. Given that I couldn't wait to escape the place, I loathed almost all C&W records of that era, as a matter of principle, and I still struggle with the genre to this day. That said, at least this has a bit more grit and bite than Don Fucking Williams.)

Lou Rawls - From Now On
(Written and produced by Bunny Sigler, who worked on loads of great stuff, but wasn't the Philly formula flagging a bit by now? Still, with a better song, this would be up there with the Goods. I like the bits where the strings saw and stab, and Lou's in great voice.)

Sweet - Lost Angels
(Still big in Europe! Having ditched Chinnichap and assumed their longed-for creative control, they've clearly got their eyes set on Queen's crowd.)

Gene Pitney - Hold On
(A cover of Chris De Burgh's debut single, which I have part-played for comparative purposes. This is the better version, largely because it's Pitney - and arrangement-wise, if you're going to do a song like this, you might as well throw the kitchen sink it at, right?)

Tony Burrows - When My Little Girl Is Smiling
(Tony Burrows, Lew Warburton, Arnold/Martin/Morrow - it's like the 1970 hack-gang got back together again for one last shot, and it sounds as if they had fun doing it. There are some bizarre little details in here - the cheap-sounding and jarringly prominent electric piano, the kettledrums, the butch boy backing singers that pop up from nowhere and promptly disppear again - which make me warm to it more than I strictly should. I think I know what was going on here, and what was going on here was Brotherhood Of Man, who had just cleaned up with "Save Your Kisses For Me". Originally containing Burrows, who had sung on their first hit, "United We Stand", the 1976 line-up featured none of the original 1970 members, and Burrows may well have been looking on with envy. His natural response? A cover of a Goffin/King song that could be read as a straight-up love song, or as a doting father's ode to his infant child. Remind you of anything? And also, while I'm about it, when was the last hit song about parenthood? They were quite common in the 1970s, but has there even been one this millennium?)

Big Youth - What's Going On
(I had high hopes for this, but it falls somewhat short. It's an oddly jaunty, easy-going version of Gaye's protest song, and I don't feel as if Big Youth fully engages with it. Good bassline, though.)

Hudson-Ford - Sold On Love
(The game was pretty much up for these ex-Strawbs, who re-grouped in 1979 as The Monks. As an attempt to incorporate a bit of disco, or at least a bit of "December 1963", it's better than Kevin Coyne and The Hollies, but way short of Everybody Loves Leo.)

Jeanne Pruett - I've Taken
(The neat little twist at the end of the song makes you hear it in a different way thereafter, which is maybe why this minor US country hit was released in the UK. Yes, I'm speculating about the impact of "Save Your Kisses For Me" again.)

THE IFFY:

Brian & Brenda Russell - Gonna Do My Best To Love You
(Brenda went on to do loads of good stuff solo, starting with the wonderful "Way Back When" in 1979, but this earlier collab with her husband at the time, made with the help of Elton's gang and released on Rocket, is pretty sappy stuff.)

The Cubs - Do You Love Your Teddy Bear
(Seemingly a one-off project by Robin Millar, who went on to be a successful producer in the 1980s, most notably with Everything But The Girl and Sade. Perhaps this single helped to clarify his future direction; he's no singer and no songwriter.)

Don Covay - Travellin' In Heavy Traffic
(The players do their best, but the song is just... nothing. The first, drum-based, break is quite nifty, but the second sounds like someone forgot to turn the volume knob down on the fade.)

Guys 'N' Dolls - Stoney Ground
(Comparatively contemporary by their standards, in a Pilot/Jigsaw kind of way, i.e. still about 18 months out of date.)

Gary Benson - Sharing You
(Fun fact: Gary Benson has tried five times to field a UK Eurovsion entry, never making it beyond the national finals.)

Alan Tew Orchestra - The Sweeney
(The amazing original Harry South version had already been and gone in 1975, hence presumably the reason for this initially faithful but subsequently blanded-out cover.)

The Rowans - Ooh My Love
(If we're having workmanlike journeyman soft-rock, I'm sticking with Moon.)

Ruby James - You Burn A Hole In My Soul
(Having slogged through countless Biddu productions when listing the remnants of Jame Hamilton's collection for sale, I am left with little tolerance for this ersatz-Northern effort. As for Ruby James, who does sound like she's having fun, she did just fine as a session singer, particularly when the 1980s haircut bands came a-knockin'.)

Tony Wilson - I Like Your Style
(A founder member of Hot Chocolate, who had left them in 1975, Wilson wrote or co-wrote most of the band's hits - including "You Sexy Thing" - but you wouldn't guess it from this generic bumper.)

Eastbound Expressway - Danger Zone
(Ian Levine proteges, who stuck with him into the Hi-NRG era and did OK with "Primitive Desire" in 1983. Levine does occasionally get it right, but not here. Decent strings, but the rest of it all sounds out of whack the and voices veer on the pitchy.)

THE GARBAGE:

Eric Clapton - Hello Old Friend
(We're only two months on from his notorious "Keep Britain White" rant, and basically he can just fuck off. Oh, the music? Pfffft.)

Sutherland Brothers & Quiver - Secrets
(NOBODY IS MAKING AN EFFORT. It makes me quite angry actually. Save us Johnny Rotten, etc.)

R & J Stone - Thrown It All Away
(In which the "We Do It" hit-makers did just that. Equal parts saccharin and syrup, which is never a healthy blend.)

The Hollies - Wiggle That Wotsit
(FFS, even Mud did a better opportunistic jump into disco with "Shake It Down". Still, big in New Zealand, we can't take that away from them.)

Rock Island Line - Ice Cream
(Rockabilly-tinged update of a 1956 Chris Barber trad jazz cut. Annoyingly whimsical.)

Paul Davis - Super Star
(No one retrospectively fat-shames Ronstadt on my watch.)

The Chanter Sisters - Just Your Fool
(My problem at the time with Rock Follies was that the band's music didn't sound anything like contemporary pop/rock. I was wrong. It sounded like The Chanter Sisters.)

Mike Lesley - My Mama Said
(He's no Gary Benson.)

Dennis Waterman - I Will Glide
(Really boring cover of Phillip Goodhand-Tait's almost-as-boring album track from earlier in the year.)

Survival - Sweet Music
(Their only single, a messy calypso/afrobeat/soca hodge-podge that's a UK cover of a vastly better Trinidadian original by Lord Shorty. It doesn't sound as if the band have any natural feel for what they're playing.)

Engelbert Humperdinck - After The Lovin'
(Still big in English-speaking nations outside the UK! When the pop-pickers of New Zealand weren't too busy wiggling their wotsits, they were a-smoochin' and a-canoodlin' to this astonishingly big hit, whose parent album of the same name was nominated for a Grammy. Who knew?)

Vernon Oxford - Redneck!
(I... just... can't.)

Anyhow, I voted Aswad, but it was the tightest shortlist yet.

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

Would have sworn I voted. Consider “Love’s a Prima Donna” tied with “Wiggle that Wotsit.”

https://media.gettyimages.com/photos/dave-spade-and-eric-clapton-during-the-concert-for-new-york-city-at-picture-id109530344?s=612x612

Claptooooon.....more like CRAPtooooon.....

That is... not the result I was expecting. Thought Steve Miller would win tbh.

Dennis Waterman was robbed.. oh wait

I didn't get to the playlist in time to vote. Catching up now and have been surprised at how it's nearly as bad as I thought – I actually found it more listenable on average than the 1966 one – until I just got to Sutherland Brothers & Quiver. Garbage indeed. Might skip the rest of this Sweet track too.

How it's not nearly as bad, that should read!

christ almighty

I'm going to have to listen to this Dennis Waterman thing amn't I?

Rock Island Line is reminding me of the shame of having 'Tie a Yellow Ribbon' as the No.1 of my birth. Is there a worse decade revival that the 70s one of the 50s?

Nice juxtaposition with Radioactivity coming next on the playlist. What a contrast.

Yeah, I originally thought this playlist would be almost unmitigated hell, but the balance of decent stuff vs duds turned out to be not so bad after all.

I'm going to have to listen to this Dennis Waterman thing amn't I?

― Starmer: "Let the children boogie, let all the children boogie." (Tom D.), Monday, 11 October 2021 11:28 (forty-eight minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

I thought you would have bought it when it came out.

RECORD MIRROR singles reviews, 17th October 1981