Easy Listening
Basically, this is my singers and songwriters section. “Singers and Songwriters” was actually a category at one time (believe it or not). It usually consisted of huge artists who wrote and performed their own music. However, today I think it’s safe to say that “Easy Listening” took its place as most artists that were in the old category were mostly folk, ballads, and sometimes light jazz performers. Enjoy sifting through my light music selections.
Song: I’ll Never Fall In Love Again
Artist: Burt Bacharach
Album: Make It Easy On Yourself (1969)
Genre: Easy Listening
I know for most of my readers, they’ve never heard of this man, and I think his music is worth remembering and celebrating. Burt Bacharach is genius musical composer (and occasionally, singer), who produced some of the most popular hits of his time. He started on his path to success writing hits in the fifties all the way through the 80s. He has done everything from pop music to huge movie scores & movie themes.
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I’m going to make an assumption that, those that do remember Bacharach, probably remember him because of his association with Dionne Warwick. Burt has written some of Dionne’s biggest hits, including “I’ll Never Fall In Love Again,” “What The World Needs Now,” “Do You Know The Way To San Jose,” and “Walk On By.” As I delved more in to Bacharach’s work, I discovered something I didn’t know. Burt produced the famous cult classic “Rain Drops Keep Falling On My Head,” which was performed by B.J. Thomas.
Now, I have to be honest, although Bacharach has produced a ton of hits; I think the musical styles of many of his hits are just way too broad; meaning, many of them have not reached mainstream despite being cult classics. Having said that, I don’t think there’s enough of his music that reached mainstream to warrant creating a playlist. Maybe I’m wrong, but that’s how I feel at the moment. So rather than putting together a playlist, I’ll just focus on his most popular music in hopes you’ll likely remember them. In addition to the songs I’ve shared in the last paragraph, also check out the following: “The Look Of Love,” “Always Something There To Remind Me,” “I Say A Little Prayer,” “Arthur’s Theme (The Best That You Can Do),” “They Long To Be) Close To You,” “Alfie,” “Any Day Now,” and “One Less Bell To Answer.”
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Song: Being With You
Artist: Smokey Robinson
Album: Being With You (1981)
Genre: Easy Listening
Even at this age, in my opinion, Smokey Robinson looked pretty damn fine if you ask me. Based on when this album was released, I estimate he was about 41-42 years of age. I love me some Smokey, but as far as I can remember, the song “Being With You” is my only top favorite, after his reign with “The Miracles.” The song peaked #2 on the Top 100 Chart. Oh, wait!! I just remembered! A second top favorite of his, after The Miracles, is called “Just To See Her (1987).” The song peaked at #8 on the Top 100. They just don’t make legendary music like this anymore. I can just cry. If I had a time machine, I would go back and just stay there. Or every time the year hits 1990, I’d jump back in to my time machine and dial it back to 1970s! ? Can’t go wrong with listening to Smokey! His smooth silky voice will put a smile on your face every time!!
Yesterday, I found one of my old favorite Barry Manilow cassettes. Yay!!! You know, I can’t imagine anyone walking around with a cassette player these days; if someone did, I’m pretty sure that most people around them would be in shocked and puzzled ?. I consider Barry Manilow the king of love ballads! This little Jewish guy was a hit machine in his prime. However, he really hasn’t made any big hits since the 80s. Tho, it’s wonderful to see that there are millions that still love him and remember him. I decided to create a 19 song playlist of my most favorite hits!
What’s in my new Barry playlist? How about his massive 1978, 12 inch disco hit “Copacabana!” How about his ballad “I’ve Made It Through The Rain (1980),” I loved this song!! That song was like my late grandfather’s personal anthem, he used to hmm this song ALL the time ?. Another great song he produced was a song called “Bandstand Boogie,” which later on became the theme song to Dick Clark’s show “American Bandstand” some in c. 1976 I believe. Many more memorable songs this awesome playlist.
You know, at first impression, looking at a photo of these two guys I’d bet most people don’t think much. You’d probably think that these were the typical 70s men who loved to go to bars and drink all night. However, England Dan & John Ford Coley are musicians who managed to produce one of the most popular romantic songs of the 70s! I can’t exactly call them a “one hit wonder,” but, unfortunately, there was only one song I liked, and it became one of my most favorite easy listening songs!
That song was called “I’d Really Love To See You Tonight (1976),” which shot up to #2 on the Top 100 Charts. Now, as I’ve said, they’ve managed to produce several other hits such as, “We’ll Never Have To Say Goodbye Again (1978),” and “Love Is The Answer (1979).” But, hands don’t “I’d Really Love To See You Tonight,” is what they’re remembered for (at least those of us who are old enough to remember). England Dan passed away at the age of 61.
Pure Silk Contour 6 Premium Disposable Razor Value Pack Bundle (3 Packs/9 Total Razors)I totally and completely forgotten about this group! WOOOOOOOOW!! Does anybody even remembers an old Spanish group called Mocedades? This is one Spanish group that should not be forgotten! Why is that you ask? Well, allow me to give you a quick synopsis. Mocedades entered some sort of song contest in Spain. The song that was chosen is called “Eres Tu (1974).” After the song won second place in the contest, it was then released as a single. What’s important to note is that the group sang the entire song in their native language. To date, it is the only Spanish song that peaked #9 on the American Billboard. I remember hearing this song all the time, I expected this to be #1 on the Top 100 Charts. Actually, it peaked #3 on the Easy Listening category. I didn’t even remember we had an Easy Listening scoreboard back in the day. Now, to be honest, I don’t know how popular this group is in Spain, because obviously their music ecosystem is different from ours. But one thing I can obviously tell, Eres Tu was their money maker. Every greatest hits album they produced, Eres Tu, was either near or on top of the list. ? ? Wow, this song really took me back to my childhood. Eventually, the song was translated into several languages.
Unfortunately, although Richard Marx is an incredible performer and talented songwriter, I only really loved one song he recorded (so far in his career). Not that Richard didn’t have hits, he had many. I just only connected with one song. Now, before I reveal my favorite song, allow me to share with you some of his accomplishments. Richard started his career in the early eighties, and performs adult contemporary and pop music for the most part.
Marx collaborated with many artists, including NSYNC and the late Luther Vandross. I haven’t heard anything new by him in like over 2 decades, but homeboy has a lot of faithful fans. I’m pleased to discover that he’s still performing. In fact, he’s playing in Carnegie Hall next week. If he managed to fill-up Carnegie Hall, homeboy has got it goin’ on!
His first self-titled album, released in 1987 I believe, yielded about 3 hits. “Don’t Mean Nothing,” “Endless Summer Nights,” “Hold On To The Nights,” and oh yeah, I guess there was a forth one called “Should’ve Known Better.” Despite these hits, I still wasn’t particularly drawn to his music, until I hard a song from his 1989 “Repeat Offender,” and the song was called “Right Here Waiting.” “Right Here Waiting” is a very romantic soft rock song that hit #1 on the Top 100 Charts, and has been used on many movies and television shows, such as “The Good Place (2018),” and “The Bachelorette (2018).”
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You know, Barbra Streisand is one of the very few celebrities where, the mere mention of her name gets a wide variety of responses (depending on the group you’re in). In the gay community, I think it’s safe to say that a significant number of LGBT people (particularly the older group) loves Barbra. However, outside of the gay community is when the responses get really negative.
You Either Hate Her Guts, Or Love Her To Death!
Many people despise Barbra because of her personal political beliefs. Or perhaps more so because she’s a powerful Jewish woman with influence. She’s always been very political ever since I can remember. I guess now that she’s older and has lived an extremely successful career, her outspokenness has become more apparent. In fact, she’s been on Bill Maher’s HBO show called “Politically Incorrect” quite a few times. It shouldn’t be a surprise to people; especially since Barbra has an openly gay son; it’s even more of a reason to fight for equal rights. In fact, her latest album called “Walls (2018),” was inspired by what’s going on within the current Trump administration. As much as I love Barbra, I wasn’t particularly impressed with this album. And judging from the streams, a lot of her fans didn’t like it either.
Some people say she screws her fans, because she charges outrageous prices for her tickets. Well, that may be true. But at the same time, Barbra isn’t just a singer, she’s also a brand. So, if the price of her tickets are the current market value, then it is what it is. The other thing is, I can hear the unique quality of her voice; it’s like no other voice we’ve ever heard. Although I can’t afford her tickets myself, I know there is a value placed on that voice. Which is why she spent her entire life protecting it. Like it or not, she has the voice of a matured, and well trained vocal cords.
They Just Hated Her Music!
I used to hear so many people say, they couldn’t stand hearing Barbra’s music, and they think it’s the worse they’ve ever heard! I was usually taken back by this response/attitude, as if since they say “her music is awful,” then it’s true because it makes sense to them! ?
Well, the fact is whether they “know” Barbra’s music stinks, her fans gave her 2 movie Oscar Awards, 14 Academy nominations, 5 number one hits, and 12 Top Tens! It’s a hard pill to swallow when your opinions doesn’t align with true fans of Barbra’s work. My favorites songs are just too many to post them all on this article, so I’ll just give you a few. I loved “The Way We Were (1974),” although I wish the movie script could have been better. “You Don’t Bring Me Flowers (1978),” “Enough Is Enough (1979),” “Guilty (1981),” “The Main Event (1979),” “What Kind Of Fool (1981),” and finally “On A Clear Day (1961).”
Oleta has one of the most distinctive voices in music today. She is best known for the biggest song of her career called “Get Here,” released in 1990 under The Island Def Jam. The song was written by Brenda Russell, and produced by Roland Orzabal, and David Bascombe. “Get Here” reached the fifth position on the Top 100 Charts, and unfortunately, it appears to have been her one and only hit world wide. However, there was another great song on the same album that didn’t receive much traction. It was the first song on the album called “Rhythm Of Life.” Oleta, both singer and pianist, is now about 65 years of age and still performing.
It’s such a shame that Robbie Dupree became a one hit wonder. Robbie made it big with his smash hit called “Steal Away,” released in 1980. This was my favorite song, I used to play it all the time. The song has such a catchy tune, and he used an instrument that sounded like it came from India (I don’t know what it’s called), made the song even more interesting and unusual. The song hit #6 on the Hot 100 Charts; and that was pretty much it! Actually, on the same record, he had a song called Hot Rod Hearts, but it only reached #15. Now, 15 wasn’t a bad position at all, but I felt that this song was quite boring unfortunately. You know what? Depree released a song called “Brooklyn Girls” in 1981, It reached #54, yet I felt the song sounded waaaaaay better than “Hot Rod Hearts.” I guess there just wasn’t a market for Dupree’s kind of music. Dupree recorded many albums since then, but no more hits. Mr. Dupree is about 71 now, and still performs to my understanding.
Not for nothin’, but, James Taylor was very handsome when he first started back in the day. I’ve been a huge fan of his ever since I can remember. He’s kind of like a new age folk singer; almost like a Jim Croce upgrade 🙂 In my opinion, Taylor wrote and performed some of the best love songs of the seventies and eighties. He always seems to sing about the positive side of love and relationships. It was almost as though his music kept him young and in love with someone special. A perfect song that represented that is one of my many favorites he did called “Your Smiling Face,” released in 1977. Another sweet romantic favorite of mine is called “Handyman,” which was also released in 1977. James also worked with the amazingly talented Carole King for many years. It appeared that they had such a close relationship (both professionally and personally), I’m surprised they never married. I think you should check both of their greatest hits albums. They have some great stuff out there 🙂