Music from the 70's

Where Joe Simpson's "Woo hoo" surely comes from.
[video=youtube;v78-ftcqpNw]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v78-ftcqpNw[/video]
 
50PoundHead said:
Here's a lost nugget from a British soul group. Reached #1 in the UK and #14 on the Billboard Top 100.

[video=youtube;788BOtx_-Nw]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=788BOtx_-Nw[/video]
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Question, as someone who's seen a lot, how was music by black musicians/groups perceived by white America?

Were the Temptations popular only amongst the black community, or were radio stations a bit more segregated?
 
Forever Fredi said:
Question, as someone who's seen a lot, how was music by black musicians/groups perceived by white America?

Were the Temptations popular only amongst the black community, or were radio stations a bit more segregated?
Click to expand...

Growing up in the 1960s with a transistor radio always close to my ear, black music was viewed very positively by white audiences. There were differences between the heavily-produced (whiter) black music (Supremes, Temptations, Smokey Robinson) coming out of Motown and the harder-edged sound coming out of Memphis (Wilson Pickett, Otis Redding, Booker T. and the MGs). If you look at the Billboard charts from that era, there were always black artists at or near the top and they wouldn't have been there without whites being tuned into the music. Trends among white artists changed dramatically in the 1960s--late doo-wop to the plethora of guitar-based bands in the wake of the Beatles to Bubble Gum music to the Summer of Love stuff--but black music remained consistent pretty much throughout and held its place in the public.

Things started to change a bit with Sly and the Family Stone who fused genres and popularized a style of funk was really cutting edge. That started to spell the end of the classic Motown sound. Otis Redding's tragic death also changed black music. He was just getting popular when his plane went down. One of the eerie marketing ploys of music goes back to what Elvis' manager--Colonel Tom Parker--supposedly said when he discovered Elvis. I paraphrase, but it went something like "If I can find a white man who sounds like a black man, I'm going to make a lot of money." It was the obverse with Otis Redding, whose managers were trying to make him "whiter" (for lack of a better term) to get him before a mass audience. The thing that is surprising about the era is that even with civil rights issues and riots, black music remained popular with white audiences.
 
50PoundHead said:
Growing up in the 1960s with a transistor radio always close to my ear, black music was viewed very positively by white audiences. There were differences between the heavily-produced (whiter) black music (Supremes, Temptations, Smokey Robinson) coming out of Motown and the harder-edged sound coming out of Memphis (Wilson Pickett, Otis Redding, Booker T. and the MGs). If you look at the Billboard charts from that era, there were always black artists at or near the top and they wouldn't have been there without whites being tuned into the music. Trends among white artists changed dramatically in the 1960s--late doo-wop to the plethora of guitar-based bands in the wake of the Beatles to Bubble Gum music to the Summer of Love stuff--but black music remained consistent pretty much throughout and held its place in the public.

Things started to change a bit with Sly and the Family Stone who fused genres and popularized a style of funk was really cutting edge. That started to spell the end of the classic Motown sound. Otis Redding's tragic death also changed black music. He was just getting popular when his plane went down. One of the eerie marketing ploys of music goes back to what Elvis' manager--Colonel Tom Parker--supposedly said when he discovered Elvis. I paraphrase, but it went something like "If I can find a white man who sounds like a black man, I'm going to make a lot of money." It was the obverse with Otis Redding, whose managers were trying to make him "whiter" (for lack of a better term) to get him before a mass audience. The thing that is surprising about the era is that even with civil rights issues and riots, black music remained popular with white audiences.
Click to expand...

Thanks, I grew up in the 90's when Rap, Hip Hop, and R&B were almost exclusively listened to by "black kids". Then in the mid 2000's (especially after Eminem), white youth began embracing those genres more and more. Today, I feel like almost every white high school kid knows who Kendrick Lamar, Kanye, or J Cole is and listens to them. On the flipside, I think most black youth know or even listen to names like Taylor Swift, Adele, etc. If this were 20 years ago, things were much more segregated in music. I'm also not sure, because I know music has become more mainstream and the styles are a lot more integrated. Underground hip hop and rap are a bit more different than mainstream compared to 15-20 years ago.

I was just interested to know, because that was during the time of civil rights and after, if music was "segregated" and only blacks listened to people like Temptations, Manhattans, Harold Melvin & the Blue Notes. Wasn't sure if white america had appreciated the music for music, or if there was animus of who the artists/groups were.
 
Forever Fredi said:
Thanks, I grew up in the 90's when Rap, Hip Hop, and R&B were almost exclusively listened to by "black kids". Then in the mid 2000's (especially after Eminem), white youth began embracing those genres more and more. Today, I feel like almost every white high school kid knows who Kendrick Lamar, Kanye, or J Cole is and listens to them. On the flipside, I think most black youth know or even listen to names like Taylor Swift, Adele, etc. If this were 20 years ago, things were much more segregated in music. I'm also not sure, because I know music has become more mainstream and the styles are a lot more integrated. Underground hip hop and rap are a bit more different than mainstream compared to 15-20 years ago.

I was just interested to know, because that was during the time of civil rights and after, if music was "segregated" and only blacks listened to people like Temptations, Manhattans, Harold Melvin & the Blue Notes. Wasn't sure if white america had appreciated the music for music, or if there was animus of who the artists/groups were.
Click to expand...

The split between the white and black audiences started in the 1970s. I think one thing people don't talk about a lot is the rise of FM stations that were album-oriented and veered white. Then there was the country/rock Eagles/Jackson Browne/Linda Ronstadt and Southern Rock (Allman Brothers, Molly Hatchet, .38 Special) effects that pushed things white. Black music went dance floor, which morphed into disco. Then in the late 1970s, the Sugar Hill Gang, Grandmaster Flash, Kurtis Blow and others showed up and rap took off. So things started to separate. Michael Jackson and Prince kind of brought things back together, but by then, the traditional version of Top 40 was pretty much dead.
 
This song has meant a lot to me through the years.

[video=youtube;YcqauC49Xmc]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YcqauC49Xmc[/video]
 
such a great album. Not a clunker on it.

And David Lindley showing off all over the place.

[video=youtube;VoBACfnp0RI]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VoBACfnp0RI[/video]
 
Runnin said:
such a great album. Not a clunker on it.

And David Lindley showing off all over the place.

[video=youtube;VoBACfnp0RI]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VoBACfnp0RI[/video]
Click to expand...

Lindley is still performing. Along with Ry Cooder, he ranks among the most interesting and innovative string players out there.
 
50PoundHead said:
Lindley is still performing. Along with Ry Cooder, he ranks among the most interesting and innovative string players out there.
Click to expand...
Absolutely. This album would not be the same without him. That high octane tone he got out of his little lap steel was so far ahead of it's time. And it sounded like he played all three parts on the tune "Cocaine". That has to be him on the fiddle and the National but maybe somebody else played the reg acoustic.
 
Runnin said:
Absolutely. This album would not be the same without him. That high octane tone he got out of his little lap steel was so far ahead of it's time. And it sounded like he played all three parts on the tune "Cocaine". That has to be him on the fiddle and the National but maybe somebody else played the reg acoustic.
Click to expand...

One of the best live shows I ever attended was a double-bill with Linda Ronstadt opening for Jackson Browne at a small venue (1,500 seat theater) in Minneapolis in 1973 or 1974. It was Browne's "For Everyman" tour and Ronstadt had released "Don't Cry Now" recently. Browne encored with about a fifteen-minute version of "Doctor My Eyes" and at least ten of those minutes featured Lindley just wailing on the lap steel. The band came out for a second encore and when there was a hush, someone in the crowd yelled, "Play that last song again!"
 
I love this thread guys, nice work.

I won't pretend to know much about 70's music. I can hear a tune and say, "oh yeah, I know that one," but if you asked me if I heard of the artist before that I wouldn't have a clue.

First heard this song in 2003. Life wasn't going as planned (as usual), wife had lost her job, I was working near minimum wage at Motel 6, and we lived in a tiny travel trailer on the back of my wife's property (might as well have been a van down by the river). The best part of any day was escaping to work, and the commute meant tunes. Back then there was really just an "oldies" station so I started discovering music like this. Definitely a switch from my 90s gangsta rap, alternative mainstream, or R&B I was so thick in.

I can hear this song and it takes me back to a time that wasn't as bad as I thought it was. If only I'd have appreciated the simplicity before the years of real stress hit.

[video=youtube;cqZc7ZQURMs]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cqZc7ZQURMs[/video]
 
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