Thirty of the songs we were listening to in 1989.
Your (Almost) Daily Playlist: 1-6-23
In his excellent autobiography Le Freak, Chic’s Nile Rodgers writes how his group’s record label wanted to capture the magic Rodgers and his music partner Bernard Edwards brought to their group to other acts on the Atlantic Records roster, such as The Rolling Stones and Bette Midler. Nile turned down the acts that were firmly established, as with them less attention would be paid to the song’s writers and producers. He wanted to work with a lesser known act. Atlantic Records president Jerry Greenberg suggested a group of sisters who “stick together like birds of a feather,” and so it came to be that Rodgers and Edwards wrote and produced the We Are Family album for Sister Sledge. I think you know what happened next.
Today’s playlist celebrates the birthday of Sister Sledge lead vocalist Kathy Sledge by including several tracks from that classic album.
Throwback Thursday: 1973
I didn’t appreciate how much great music hit in 1973 until I compiled this playlist. Take a listen to the classic tunes that were unleashed in that year. Dag yo.
The Spotify embed feature isn’t working again, so here is the link: https://open.spotify.com/embed/playlist/77FwxEBSB575UVrsGKmOSv
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Throwback Thursday: 1999
The music of 1999 shows the century coming to a close in grand style, as if to say the next year the party will be over, oops, out of time, so this year we better party. Latinx artists were crossing over to the mainstream pop chart. Cher and Santana, who first charted in the 1960s, scored the biggest hits of their careers. Artists who made their chart debuts include Eminem and Britney Spears. Pure pop exploded, though the charts made room for country, hip hop, electronica, and big beat. As one who values diversity, I loved hearing all these different genres and styles bump up against each other on the radio. Here are 30 prime examples of the music that hit in 1999.
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Throwback Thursday: 1971
I recently read a book about the music of 1971. It was pretty bad. I should have been clued off seeing that the book derived its title from the name of a Rod Stewart album that came out in…1972. The author and I agree that 1971 was a great year for music, though he focused mainly on white acts. Marvin Gaye’s What’s Going On, recently named the number one album of all-time in Rolling Stone, was dismissed as being overrated due to white guilt, something the author clearly doesn’t feel. I humbly suggest that the playlist below shows more of the greatness (and diversity) of 1971’s music than this book.
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Your (Almost) Daily Playlist (12-11-20)
Inspired by the season and the December 11 birthdays of Jermaine Jackson, Brenda Lee, Mos Def, Bread’s David Gates, Perez Prado, Big Mama Thornton, J. Frank Wilson and Jon Brion.
Your (Almost) Daily Playlist (11-2-20)
Inspired by the November 2 birthdays of k.d. lang, Nelly, Maxine Nightingale, The Cadillacs’ Earl Carroll, Mobb Deep’s Prodigy, J.D. Souther, Keith Emerson and Jay & the Americans’ Jay Black.
Your (Almost) Daily Playlist (11-1-20)
Inspired by the November 1 birthdays of Red Hot Chili Peppers’ Anthony Kiedis, Stereolab’s Mary Hansen, Lyle Lovett, The Clovers’ Billy Mitchell, Geto Boys’ Willie D, The Five Satins’ Bill Baker, The Feelies’ Glenn Mercer, Sophie B. Hawkins, Ssgt. Barry Sadler, Tina Arena, Big & Rich’s Big Kenny and Beat Happening’s Calvin Johnson.
Your (Almost) Daily Playlist (9-19-20)
Inspired by the September 19 birthdays of Chic’s Nile Rodgers, Pulp’s Jarvis Cocker, Tegan and Sara, Mama Cass Elliot, The Righteous Brothers’ Bill Medley, Teddybears’ Patrik Arve, Skepta, Rex Smith, The Springfields’ Mike Hurst, Brook Benton, Lol Crème, Austin Roberts, Eamon, Marshall Jefferson, Adam West and Frances Farmer.