Springsteen's new CD is taboo on Clr. Ch. because the artist is "too old"

[Starbucks]

Re: Springsteen's new CD is taboo on Clr. Ch. because the artist is "too old"

Top 40 had to play alot more conservative after the payola **** hit the fan. Along with Jerry Lee Lewis, Little Richards situations that didn't help. So that was one of the reasons that Lawrence, Bert, Steve & Eydie were getting good exposure to the charts. Era 60-63 until the Beatles changed that. It was Rock N' Roll radio with your heads laying low.

 

[firepoint525]

Re: Springsteen's new CD is taboo on Clr. Ch. because the artist is "too old"

Top 40 had to play alot more conservative after the payola **** hit the fan. Along with Jerry Lee Lewis, Little Richards situations that didn't help. So that was one of the reasons that Lawrence, Bert, Steve & Eydie were getting good exposure to the charts. Era 60-63 until the Beatles changed that. It was Rock N' Roll radio with your heads laying low.

I had never heard of payola being used as an explanation for what happened on radio between 1960-63, but that certainly seems like a plausible explanation.

You mentioned Jerry Lee Lewis and Little Richard, but the following were what I had always heard as factors for the 1960-63 music situation:

• Buddy Holly had died.
• Chuck Berry was in jail.
• Elvis was out of the Army, he had mellowed out quite a bit, and his first generation of fans had grown up right along with him, and their tastes had mellowed somewhat, too.
• "The Twist" and all the other dance crazes of the early '60s were less offensive to the older generation than Elvis shaking his pelvis on TV.

Of course, all of this left a void, and set the stage for the Beatles to come in and take over in 1964. But I can't help but notice that the Four Seasons, the biggest group of the early '60s before the Beatles came in and stole their thunder, continued to have success right on in to the mid and even late '60s. "Rag Doll" was replaced at #1 by "A Hard Day's Night," and "Let's Hang On" was top 3 in 1965.

But I suppose my real question is, what happened in the mid '70s that enabled the likes of Paul Anka and Neil Sedaka to have such successful comebacks about that time? Granted they were both still fairly young about that time (30s), but nearly everyone else whose career was interrupted by the British invasion (Connie Francis, Pat Boone, Chubby Checker, the Shirelles) were never even able to hit the top 20 again! And Elvis had to reinvent himself (the '68 comeback special) to get back on top again.

 

[Starbucks]

Re: Springsteen's new CD is taboo on Clr. Ch. because the artist is "too old"

But I suppose my real question is, what happened in the mid '70s that enabled the likes of Paul Anka and Neil Sedaka to have such successful comebacks about that time? Granted they were both still fairly young about that time (30s), but nearly everyone else whose career was interrupted by the British invasion (Connie Francis, Pat Boone, Chubby Checker, the Shirelles) were never even able to hit the top 20 again! And Elvis had to reinvent himself (the '68 comeback).

>>>> By then The British Invasion was long gone, and without the Beatles, the trend of music was heading toward a modern AC sound. (Even before the format was formed). Neil Sedeka and Paul Anka were never really gone...they were writing and performing steadily up until there comebacks. "Laughter in the Rain" was the right timing as that song was even getting some Country airplay. And that song had a slow start climbing the charts. Then came "Bad Blood" which was a 90 degree angle from his 60's stuff, It even received Album Rock airplay at that time. It was great long come back. Shirelles and Chubby...those names alone even back in 1974 was outdated as well as their sound. Connie's audience was too old by then. (Can you see her doing disco?) And even the greatest go cold for awhile....which means if Elvis can do great stuff like "Burning Love".....it doesn't get discriminated airplay like Bruce Springsteen today.

 

[firepoint525]

Re: Springsteen's new CD is taboo on Clr. Ch. because the artist is "too old"

>>>> By then The British Invasion was long gone, and without the Beatles, the trend of music was heading toward a modern AC sound. (Even before the format was formed). Neil Sedeka and Paul Anka were never really gone...they were writing and performing steadily up until there comebacks. "Laughter in the Rain" was the right timing as that song was even getting some Country airplay. And that song had a slow start climbing the charts. Then came "Bad Blood" which was a 90 degree angle from his 60's stuff, It even received Album Rock airplay at that time. It was great long come back. Shirelles and Chubby...those names alone even back in 1974 was outdated as well as their sound. Connie's audience was too old by then. (Can you see her doing disco?) And even the greatest go cold for awhile....which means if Elvis can do great stuff like "Burning Love".....it doesn't get discriminated airplay like Bruce Springsteen today.

Interesting. I had never thought of "Laughter in the Rain" as being even remotely country. I will have to look that one up and see if I can find out anything about that slow climb up the charts. I am aware that he was active in the U.K. in the early '70s, and that his Hungry Years album was made up of tracks taken from two British albums. I was about 10-11-12 years old about this time, so I remember Sedaka's and Anka's second careers, but their first careers were well before I was born. It wouldn't surprise me that "Bad Blood" got album rock airplay. It had Elton John on it, and that was right at the very peak of Elton's career. (Rock 103 in Memphis (and this was the "old" Rock 103, before the failed "Z-103" experiment, in case anyone in Memphis is reading this) used to play Michael Jackson's "Beat It," because it had Eddie Van Halen's guitar solo in it, but I doubt they would touch it now.) My mother is a Neil Sedaka fan, and she gave me all of her and my dad's old albums and 45s, because they have nothing to play them on now. There is a Neil Sedaka Hungry Years album in there among all the rest of the records they gave me, so I will have to play it and transport myself back to 1974 sometime soon. There is also some Pat Boone, Paul Anka, and even one Connie Francis 45 in there. I am also aware that Connie Francis was raped sometime in the '70s, so I'm sure that that, too, negatively impacted any ability on her part to make a successful comeback.