Anyone know where I can locate a music library of top 100 songs of each year from 1972-1976 possibly from some company that deals with this. I knew the names of some from a few years ago but cannot remember them now to save my life. Gotta be a DJ for a class reunion group. [If this isn't allowed, admins can take it down and just slap me back to June of last year.....when it was warm.]
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Music library
- Thread starter Yabadabado1
- Start date
K.M. Richards
Program Director, The Eighties Channel™
I don't know if he will sell tracks to DJs unaffiliated with radio stations, but I use Al Pikula's Cellar Music Productions in Wisconsin when I need songs for a client station.
There are a number of CDs out there that have releases covering each year. "Only Rock 'n Roll", The "Billboard Top Pop" series, one of the best is the "AM Gold" series which has lots of tracks on each release, The Time/Life series which is another with lots of songs available per release. Might be able to get some cheap from used CD/record stores.
K.M. Richards
Program Director, The Eighties Channel™
"Might" being the operative word. Those CDs -- the series by Time-Life, Rhino, JCI, and others that you didn't mention -- get snapped up pretty quickly at the used resellers (because obviously people want as many of the songs they remember on any CD they purchase).
I'd look on eBay, where (for example) a set of five of the JCI "Only Rock & Roll" CDs covering 1955 through 1979 is presently listed for $40 with free shipping. (But that's actually a lot lower per disc than most sellers are asking in other listings of individual CDs.)
The Time-Life series you mentioned has similar high priced listings on eBay, but one listing (23 CDs from the series for $199.99 plus $11.22 shipping) works out to a little over $9.00/CD so it's all pretty much the same if you ignore the sellers who think $15 for one CD is an attractive asking price.
My biggest gripe about eBay in recent
I’d look in thrift stores or on thrift store auction sites, Goodwill and Salvation Army both run their own auction sites.
As a former radio DJ, and 30 year full-time wedding and event DJ, it might be a whole lot cheaper to just purchase each track at around 1.29 a song though Qobuz or iTunes. That's what I have done for years to supplement the current music I get from Promo Only POOL (PrimeCuts and Top Hits U.S.A. before that.)
There is no one-size-fits-all collection, but www.top40musiconcd.com will help you find CDs containing Top 40 hits from the 1950s to 2000s. Their database lists which CDs have the single version, album version, or an edit of the album version that was made to approximate the single version (as TM Century's GoldDiscs often did). On their forum they also often have instructions for how to make the correct single edit from the album version, if it is possible to do so.
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I've been a member of Top 40 Music On CD since 2007. It's a great discussion forum and an even better database. Aaron Kannowski now runs the site after Pat Downey retired last year. One of the first things Aaron did was update the software and the look to the site.
Great. Guess I'll start my own station then.
Thanks everyone. I've got most of the top 20 from each of those years but gotta get some that didn't make it up the chart very far, ones that will have that "Oh, wow! I haven't heard that in decades!" vibe. I'm probably going to end up with about 5-600 tunes to play. And if anyone can name some local bands that had records out around those years, Michael Stanley Band already accounted for. Just drawing a blank on some others right now.
The "Super Hits of the 70s - Have A Nice Day" CDs might have some of what you are looking for.
Super Hits Of The 70's: Have A Nice Day Volume 1 - 25 (1996) 13 CD SET -
Super Hits Of The 70's: Have A Nice Day Volume 1 - 25 (1996) 13 CD SET -
Four hour gig means about 60-75 songs will be played.
Your 500 song library might a bit overwhelming for your audience.
That "Oh, wow!" song you thought was great might not be for many that are listening to your selections.
@John Gallagher might have some additional insight for you on this.
Your 500 song library might a bit overwhelming for your audience.
That "Oh, wow!" song you thought was great might not be for many that are listening to your selections.
@John Gallagher might have some additional insight for you on this.
Nice to have enough available in case there are requests.
Already have them.
Of course they're not going to all be played. They haven't decided yet if they want it to be more like "background noise" to be played constantly or requests or whatever. The goal is to play music from their high schools years that they may not have heard in decades. Don't want to play just the Top 20 or so from each year because you can still pretty much hear that everywhere today. It's more of doing a "deep dive" every now and again for stuff that rarely gets heard anymore. Of course when it's time to wrap it up and they want people out I can always start playing songs like "Shannon" by Henry Gross, "Wildfire" by Michael Martin Murphy, "Playground In My Mind" by Clint Holmes. I might be risking bodily harm by doing so, but so be it.
You might consider playing one or two, what I call "CKLW specials"... songs that mostly, or only, CKLW AM800 played due to them being a Canadian licensed station and their proximity to Detroit, Michigan. Kids used to listen to CKLW in the Cleveland, Ohio area as much as they did to WIXY, so much so that I remember hearing a few ads for Cleveland businesses on AM 800.
THE DETROIT EMERALDS "You Want It, You Got It" or "Baby, Let Me Take You (In My Arms)" (their biggest U.S. hit).
CHESTER "Make My Life A Little Bit Brighter"
CAROL DOUGLAS "Doctor's Orders"
THE CRUSADERS "Put It Where You Want It"
THE DETROIT EMERALDS "You Want It, You Got It" or "Baby, Let Me Take You (In My Arms)" (their biggest U.S. hit).
CHESTER "Make My Life A Little Bit Brighter"
CAROL DOUGLAS "Doctor's Orders"
THE CRUSADERS "Put It Where You Want It"
I have one of them, volume 12, which I found at Goodwill many years ago. Like most box sets and packaged volume series, I only find one or two of the discs second hand. Either someone grabs the others before I do, or the previous owner holds on to certain ones and offloads the rest.
Just beware cheap compilation CDs, as they're often full of re-recordings.
Did everybody stop living after high school graduation? Does "Playground in My Mind" pack the dance floor?
The problem with the Time-Life series in my experience, is that a lot of songs are often reused in other TL collections, which probably comes down to licensing agreements. If I were to replace every duplicate and unwanted song from the ones that I own, I would probably have most of what I want.
Yep. I can find several sellers selling something for under $10, and some crazy person thinks they can get over $100 for the same used item.
I've been looking for that site as of recently. Though it was shut down.
Fun fact: Aaron was a DJ (along with other duties) at Radio Disney back in the day, under the name Aaron K. There are some posts on that forum where he mentions that.