I just Want to Celebrate by Rare Earth was a hit during the summer of 1971. It peaked at Number 7 and is now considered one of the most popular song from the 70s.

It has appeared in number of movie sound tracks as well TV Commercials.

Rare Earth was not only the name of the group, but it was also the name of the song’s record label. A subsidiary of Motown Records.

When I first heard the song in the summer of 1971, I was but a 12 year old boy, although I would turn 13 at the end of summer. I recall listening to the song sitting under a shade tree at my Grandparents. I knew of Rare Earth and had heard a couple of their previous hits, most notably Get Ready. For some reason I first thought that it was a old song not a new one.

It was one of my favorite songs that summer and remains a favorite.

The early ’70′s had some great instrumentals and one of the best came out in 1973 with the Edgar Winter Group and Frankenstein. Here is a nearly 9 minute live version of the song that may even be better than the album cut from They Only Come Out at Night.

Now you can hear a very short clip of it on the ATT commercial. Sit back and enjoy it in its entirety.

As you can see Edgar Winter has a strap over his neck to hold his keyboard similar to holding a guitar. He was the first to do this. His reason was that by sitting behind the keyboard he wasn’t able to interact with the audience like those on guitar.

The album version of the song was timed at 4:44. When released as a single it only had a running time of 3:28. In concert it wasn’t uncommon for them to jam for nearly 10 minutes or more.

Why the name Frankenstein? That comes from the fact that it’s actually a song that was pieced together from a number of different ‘jams’, just like Frankenstein’s monster was pieced together from parts from multiple bodies.

The song was on the charts in the spring of 1973 reaching the top spot in May. It didn’t do quite as well in the UK peaking at Number 18.

During 1971 everyone was singing the opening line, “Jeremiah was a Bullfrog” of this song. Three Dog Night doesn’t get the acknowledgment today that they deserve. From 1969 until 1974 they were one of the most popular bands around.

They performed this song at both the 1971 and 1972 Grammy Awards ceremony. Not too many, if any, can say they performed the same song in two different Grammy shows.

Set back and enjoy the words of Hoyt Axton with Chuck Negron belting them out.

A medley of Dawn’s first three releases. This was before it was Tony Orlando and Dawn as well as a time that Tony was clean shaven.

Songs:
Candida – Top 10 song from late 1970
Knock Three Times – Number 1, January 1971
What Are You Doing Sunday – Barely reached the Top 40

The song was written by Gene McLellan.

It almost reached the Top spot on the Billboard Charts topping at Number 2.

This was the only single released by Ocean which charted in the US. They had 5 other singles in Canada with their last being 1973.

The song also appeared on Anne Murray’s third Album, Honey, Wheat and Laughter, released only in Canada in 1970.

Grand Funk, the self proclaimed American Band, was pure rock band. In 1974 as they were working on their album Shinin’ On and was thinking that they may need one more song to complete it. Mark Farner as a lark began singing ‘Everybody’s doing a brand new dance now’, which with standard reaction other members of the band thought, ‘Yeah, Grand Funk doing the Locomotion’. After thought they said Why not and turned out this version of the ’60′s pop classic.

The Locomotion became the group’s 2nd Number 1 single and their biggest selling single.

The original version was done in 1962 by Little Eva, the 13 year old baby sitter of the song’s writers Carole King and Gerry Goffin.

In the 1980′s the song became a hit again this time by Australian Kylie Minogue.

Carole King has performed the song many time in her live shows. This version was from the Coming Home Concert in the early 1990′s.

Trumpeter Bill Chase form his band in 1970. They took the last name of their leader. Get it On was the hit from their first album. In all the group would release three albums. With a number of changes in the members of the band they were working on their 4th when Bill Chase and three other members died in a plane crash on August 9, 1974. This 1974 video of Chase was recorded a few months before the accident.

At the time that this song was on the charts in America, T-Rex had a European song that was also titled Get It On. When they released that song in America it was retitled, Bang-a-Gong (Get It On).

T-Rex led by Mac Bolan was a popular group in England, but relatively unknown in America. Bang a Gong was their only US hit. It did hit the Top 10, but just barely topping out at Number 10.

Under the title Get It On, it was a big hit in 1971 in England reaching the Number 1 spot there. The title was changed to Bang A Gong (Get It One) due to Chase’s song Get It On which was released in America during the summer of 1971.

In July of 1973 Grand Funk Railroad released their 7th album We’re An American Band.  This was also the first of three Albums where the group was simply call Grand Funk.  The first single released from the album was the title song We’re An American Band.

The song was their first Number 1 single.  It was written by Don Brewer and produced by Todd Rundgren  and brought the group to the larger, pop audience.  Prior to this the group was more Heavy Rock, the term Heavy Metal was not used until the 1980s.

Many of Grand Funk Railroad songs were sung by Mark Farner, but this one was sung by Brewer, the group drummer.

In the first pressing, all the copies of the 45 RPM records were pressed on gold vinyl.

In 1971 in Netherland the duo Mouth and MacNeal (Big Mouth (born Willem Duyn, March 31, 1937) and Maggie MacNeal (born Sjoukje van’t Spijker, May 5, 1950) came together. They recorded a few songs and were more popular in Europe, especially Germany, than they were in the United States. How Do You Do, released in 1972 was their biggest US hit, reaching as high as Number 8 in July. It’s reported that Willem Duyn died on December 4, 2004,