May he rest in peace.

I think we all can feel just like his closing line of the show, “as always in parting, we wish you love, peace and soul!”

Nick Ashford has pass away after a battling throat cancer. He was 70.

The songwriting team of Ashford and Simpson are Nickolas Ashford and Valerie Simpson. They meet in 1963 and recorded as a duo before writing songs together. In 1966 shortly before joining Motown Records they had their first chart song, “Let’s Go Get Stoned” by Ray Charles.

It was at Motown that many of their most known songs were recorded, including “Ain’t No Mountain High Enough”, “Ain’t Nothing Like the Real Thing” and many others.

In 1974 the two were married and shortly afterwards recorded a string of hits, although their most popular “Solid” wasn’t recorded until 1984.

They are one of the biggest composers of the soundtrack of the 1970s and their songs will be long remembered.

Thank You Nick Ashford and my you rest in peace.

Most of my music experience was from Movie Musicals, Saturday Morning Cartoons, (The Archies, The Beatles cartoon, etc), and other TV shows. Of course the biggest of these were the Monkees and the brand new series, The Partridge Family.

Christmas of 1970 brought presents that would be the beginning of the creation of this Music Fan.

For it was on that Christmas morning I opened my very first record player. Looking back 40 years ago with how easy it is to have a constant source of music, having your own record player may not be a big deal. But for this 12 year old boy it was. I’m sure it would be to anyone living it that generation. A generation where entertainment in the house usually was focused in one room of the house. A TV set, and it may not have been a color one, and music console were all together.

My record player wasn’t simply a small one. It resembled a medium sized trunk. Nor was it mono, as many were in 1970. It was a stereo. It also have a Bass and Treble control. I don’t know how expensive it may have been, but I’m sure for our family it was quite expensive.

On top of that I received three albums. Amazingly these are still in my collection. Those albums were The Beatles, Yesterday and Today, Elvis Presley, From Memphis to Vegas and the first album from what was my favorite music group, The Partridge Family.

I’m sure that there are many, men and women, my age who still think back to the Christmas of 1970 as the beginning of their musical journey. And while they may not admit that the Partridge Family, The Jackson Five and the Osmonds were some of their earliest favorites, like mine they probably were.

Wishing everyone a Merry Christmas and a Very Happy 1971

The show, based loosely on the family group the Cowsills, was to show the adventures of a family who came together to be pop stars. Shirley Jones was the Mom of the group and the songs that were to be used were developed and recorded by a group of studio and session musicians.

It wasn’t until after the cast was finalized and filming began that it was discovered that David Cassidy was a musician as well as an actor. The first couple of episodes featured songs recorded by the studio group and not with Cassidy singing lead. But it wasn’t long before that changed.

The only cast members of the television show to actually participate in the recordings of the songs on the show were David Cassidy and Shirley Jones. Studio musicians such as Hal Blaine, Larry Knechtel, Joe Osborne, Louie Shelton, Tommy Tedesco, and others was the ones behind the music.

When I Think I Love You, the first single release, reached Number 1 on the Billboard Charts they became the third third fictional artist to have a #1 hit. The first was The Chipmunks with The Archies reaching number 1 with Sugar Sugar in 1969.

-**-**-

10 – Pink Floyd – Dark Side of the Moon (22)
9 – Led Zeppelin – Physical Graffiti (20)
8 – The Beatles – 1967-1970 (The Blue Album) (19)
7 – Elton John – Elton John – Greatest Hits (18)
6 – Eagles – Hotel California (17)
5 – Boston – Boston (13)
4 – Fleetwood Mac – Rumours (9)
3 – Led Zeppelin – Led Zeppelin IV (aka ZOSO) (4)
2 – Pink Floyd – The Wall (3)
1 – Eagles – Eagles – Their Greatest Hits 1971-1975 (1)

() = All Time

In this first year there has been 100 posts or one just about every third day. Not too bad considering.

Thank you all for taking a view at this site and we hope to keep the information and the memories of the songs of the 70s coming.

The Bee Gees had the year’s number 5 most popular song with How Can You Mend a Broken Heart. In some way 1971 could be marked as the end of one part of their career since after 1971 their popularity decreased until the rise of Disco a few years later.

Even though to some the Osmonds seemed like the white Jackson 5, the brothers had been singing together for over 10 years when they recorded their self-named album and reached the top with their most popular song One Bad Apple. Many loved it since it was the number 4 song of the year.

Tapestry was Carole King’s second solo album and it became one of the biggest selling albums of all time. The release of It’s Too Late and I Feel The Earth Move on the same single record gave disc jockeys a hard choice on which to play. While I liked both songs, my favorite side was I Feel The Earth Move.

Rod Stewart also had a two sided hit record with Maggie May and Reason to Believe. This release helped him to establish himself as s solo star and was the number 2 bestselling record of the year. My feeling is that the best song done by Stewart in 1971 was with him as the singer of Faces and their song Stay With Me.

When I first saw the song Joy to the World by Three Dog Night listed on a chart, it was listed on a top 40 chart published by a newspaper before I heard the song, I was wondering why 1) a Christmas song was doing on the charts and 2) why it was still therw in April? Since then I’ve enjoyed plenty of wine (figurately) with my friend the Bull Frog, Jeremiah.

And this list doesn’t include a couple of album tracks that not only are a couple of my favorite songs, they are favorites of many others. Led Zeppelin’s Stairway to Heaven or any other song from that album and The Who’s Won’t get Fooled Again. And even though it was recorded in 1970 and released that same year, it was in 1971 that my all time favorite song was released as single record. Chicago’s Colour My World.

Originally appeared on 6ThingsToConsider.com. Many thanks to Steven G. Atkinson for allowing this reprint.

Michael Joseph Jackson * August 29, 1958 – June 25, 2009

One thing for sure this musical did help usher in the 1970s. Four of the songs of the musical were top 5 hits of 1969. And without it, I’m not sure that there could have been a Woodstock.

The title song was recorded by a most unlikely group, the Cowsills. It did become their biggest single reaching Number 2 on the Billboard charts in the summer of 1969.

The Cowsills is a family group made up of brothers and in the 1960′s early 70′s their mother and little sister was also a part of the group. If they look familiar to fans of the 70′s, the idea of the family group The Partridge Family is said to have come from their success.

Oliver was a little known singer before his recording of Good Morning Starshine
. The song would become a Number 3 song in the summer of 1969.

In the musical the song is generally sung by a girl.

Easy to be Hard was the first single from Three Dog Night’s second album Suitable for Framing. It was their 4th single and their 3rd to reach the Top 40. Reaching Number 4, it was their biggest song at the time. But they still had many more songs to record and were one of the big acts of the early 1970s

Aquarius/Let the Sunshine In is a medley of two songs from the musical, Aquarius and The Flesh Failures (Let The Sunshine In). The song was one of the biggest hits of 1969 reaching Number 1 on the charts for six weeks.

It was the only single, other than Hair by the Cowsills released by a group that at the time could be considered established. The 5th Dimension had already had number of chart singles, although this one would become their biggest.

Many artists of the 1970s were influenced by the Beatles. By the beginning of 1970 they were no longer performing as a group, but they sure should be seen as part of the decade of the 70s.

The rooftop concert was held on January 30, 1969. This was their last public performance together as a group. These performances were part of the 1970 film Let It Be.

The entire concert was 42 minutes and during it they played played five songs. Many of them more than once. The songs were “Get Back”, “Don’t Let Me Down”, “I’ve Got a Feeling”, “One After 909″, and “Dig a Pony”. As a tune-up they also played parts of the British national anthem, “God Save the Queen” and a brief section of “I Want You (She’s So Heavy)”, a song John Lennon was working on and released on Abbey Road.

The concert ended when police arrived to stop it. The last song played was “Get Back. This was the third time the band played the song, the only one that was played more than twice. While the police was trying to stop the concert Paul slightly changed the lyrics singing, “You’ve been playing on the roofs again, and you know your Momma doesn’t like it, she’s gonna have you arrested!”