But he sold a lot more records. Achy Breaky Heart sold 9 million albums, while You Light Up My Life just went platinum.
Even with all of that, and all of the recent attention with Old Town Road, he can't get any airplay for Achy Breaky.
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K-Earth at 6.5, August 2020
- Thread starter oldies76
- Start date
But he sold a lot more records. Achy Breaky Heart sold 9 million albums, while You Light Up My Life just went platinum.
Even with all of that, and all of the recent attention with Old Town Road, he can't get any airplay for Achy Breaky.
Indeed, that is pretty amazing. "You Light Up My Life" may be the the biggest hit NOT played on the radio after it was a hit. How successful was "Feelings" by Morris Albert? That song gets dissed almost as much as Debbie Boone's. "Disco Duck" by Rick Dees, too?
As for LeBlanc & Carr's "Fallin", I always liked that song. I think of that as a decent AC hit back in the day; dunno that it was much of a Top 40 hit though.
"Falling" hit #13 on the Hot 100 but #79 on the year-end chart!
Remember, stations that play gold select the songs based on research today which plays a snippet of the song and then asks "how much would you like to hear that song on the radio today?"
So songs that were initially not very big hits can become huge gold-based station songs. Think "Brown Eyed Girl", the most played "oldie" of all.
The Boone and the Morris Albert songs are embarrassing to hear today for most people. They get the "how could I have possibly liked that" response. Same with Bobby Goldsboro's "Honey". And any novelty song. "Disco Duck" or "My Ding-a-Ling". Just songs folks don't want to think about any more. In fact, you can tell a very bad radio station because they still play them.
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It was one of the most played songs in 1977...staying on the charts for over 6 months.
Also, a TON of people got married to that song in 1977.
"Falling" spent 28 weeks on the American charts. On the Cash Box chart, the song reached number 11. "Falling" also hit number 11 on the Adult Contemporary chart as well as the Canadian Pop Singles chart.[1] -Wikipedia
Actually I can tell how bad a station is by whether or not they play Cardi B.
Yep. It was 43 years ago. Imagine hearing pop hits from the 1920s on KHJ in 1968.
Interesting trivia: Although Debby Boone had a HUGE hit with YLUML, that version was not used in the 1977 movie of the same name from which the song was derived. In the film, Didi Conn's singing voice was dubbed by Kvitka "Kasey" Cisyk, whose version also appeared on the soundtrack album. The two incarnations of the song are similarly orchestrated, and it is easy to confuse the two. Many consider Cisyk's version the superior of the two, and I agree.
Much of Cisyk's work was as a background session singer, but she was better known for singing commercial jingles. "Have you driven a Ford lately?" is her best known. She also recorded several albums of Ukrainian music.
Sadly, Cisyk died of breast cancer just before her 45th birthday in 1998.
I had to google that one to jog my memory. Ah, yes, big hit in its day, and still a nice tune. Doesn't fit any current radio listening patterns, but I think I have heard it on Sirius XM a time or two.
Oldies station vs. a contemporary one?
Did oldies stations in the 60s play songs from the 1920s?
Depends on who's 'oldies' they were playing. ;-)
Prior to the 1970s, any old recordings would be limited to those recorded after 1948. Otherwise, everything would sound like an old 78rpm! They played newer recordings of old songs.
Like Rhapsody In Blue... ;-)
God, I hate being old enough to answer this question with first-hand knowledge...
Nobody, that I'm aware of, played 40-year-old records on a regular basis on the radio in 1960's Los Angeles. The closest to it would have been Chuck Cecil at KFI, who based his entire show on swing music, but he didn't really go back much before 1935. Dick Whittinghill might have played one 1940s-era side a day---and both KMPC and KFI had turntables in the building that could handle 78s.
But---and this is based not only on memory, but on airchecks---for the most part, 1960s and 1970s radio stations rarely went back all that far with their gold. Most of the oldies on a Top 40 station were 10 years old, max. Three to five years was more common. MOR stations only played one or two oldies an hour---and ten years was about as far back (apart from guys like Chuck or Dick) as they'd go. Oldies stations, like the early K-EARTH, were limited by the advent of rock and roll. It had only been 16 years since Elvis when KRTH first went all-oldies.
The first stations to go way back were the "Music of Your Life" stations in the mid-late 70s. At that point, 40 years was possible. But it wasn't until we Boomers came along and got mired in the tar pits of the music of our youth that 40-year-old songs really became commonplace on successful radio stations (a reminder---40 years only takes us back to 1980).
Nobody, that I'm aware of, played 40-year-old records on a regular basis on the radio in 1960's Los Angeles. The closest to it would have been Chuck Cecil at KFI, who based his entire show on swing music, but he didn't really go back much before 1935. Dick Whittinghill might have played one 1940s-era side a day---and both KMPC and KFI had turntables in the building that could handle 78s.
But---and this is based not only on memory, but on airchecks---for the most part, 1960s and 1970s radio stations rarely went back all that far with their gold. Most of the oldies on a Top 40 station were 10 years old, max. Three to five years was more common. MOR stations only played one or two oldies an hour---and ten years was about as far back (apart from guys like Chuck or Dick) as they'd go. Oldies stations, like the early K-EARTH, were limited by the advent of rock and roll. It had only been 16 years since Elvis when KRTH first went all-oldies.
The first stations to go way back were the "Music of Your Life" stations in the mid-late 70s. At that point, 40 years was possible. But it wasn't until we Boomers came along and got mired in the tar pits of the music of our youth that 40-year-old songs really became commonplace on successful radio stations (a reminder---40 years only takes us back to 1980).
I would much rather hear Debbie or any song from 1977 over the Cyrus song.
All those sappy, love songs from the 70's and AC's from the early 80's are ignored to the moon, but yet, most get the "wow" factor once they are played. People like them and provide great youthful memories. "You're So Vain" was mentioned a few posts back, but I much prefer the 1977 smash, "Nobody Does it Better".
So........how are they "embarrassing"? Maybe to you. I'm not embarrassed by those songs at all. A ten week stay at #1 is a huge accomplishment (for those days anyways, unlike the ho-hum and hyped 10-19 weekers of recent years, thanks to unregulated streaming and other ridiculous chart factors) and should be noted as such today. Just because a song is inspirational or a love song, doesn't mean it should be ignored or embarrassed by them.
The only songs that embarrass me are the junk and vulgarity that's released today. Have you heard "WAP"? One of the worst, ever.
It's the direct opposite, ignoring all these top hits, nearly 90% of the top ten hits of the 1967-1984 period makes a radio station very bad and unlistenable.
Now, would I play Boone everyday? Hell no, but it shouldn't be ignored either. That's my point.
Thanks, but I listened to my re-broadcast of the L.A. #1 songs, that used to be played on K-Earth. I made it to September 1980. It was a total blast!!
This man has just won the Best Post Grand Prize. Johnny, please tell him what he has won.
I listened to ALL THREE songs David mentioned within the last two weeks and as usual, enjoyed them all. My Ding-a-Ling was Chuck Berry's only #1 hit coming at the end of his charting career, it is recorded live and you can tell the crowd is having a blast with it, and Disco Duck was absolute genius on Rick's part as he simultaneously makes a disco record that absolutely and comically mocks the very format. The record was so "bad" it essentially launched his entire career. I hadn't heard Goldboro's "Honey" in at least 20 years so had I had to youtube it and lo and behold, it has 13.7 MILLION views since in was posted in late 2012. That is a lot of people who have no embarrassment over the song.
I am embarrassed that we live in a world where a song like "WAP" could not only get made, but get played on the radio, net the artist millions of dollars, and be lauded by all of the "right thinking people" of which I am sure David considers himself one. A humble, simple, and yes, sappy song about a lost love like "Honey" is "embarrassing", Cardi B.'s twerking, "WAP" and all of the rest is just "new".
That's the point. If YOU like them, you have the opportunity and the ability to listen to those songs any time you want. That's not how radio formats work. A radio format is based on a rotation of a certain group of songs. To add these songs into that rotation would alienate a portion of the audience. That makes no sense. If the audience wants to hear Debbie Boone, the song is available on multiple streaming sites.
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