Casey Kasem American Top 40

[sundaygal]

But I HATE "We Built This City" (IMO, THE worst song of the 80s).

Why is it that everytime I hear this song, I can't bring myself to turn the dial?  I just sit there, transfixed and listen to the whole thing as if I were witnessing a horrible accident.  Do I secretly like it?  Do I need to seek help??

Oh, and it's not the worst song of the 80s.  Anything by Richard Marx is.   

[RGMike]

But I HATE "We Built This City" (IMO, THE worst song of the 80s).

Why is it that everytime I hear this song, I can't bring myself to turn the dial?  I just sit there, transfixed and listen to the whole thing as if I were witnessing a horrible accident.  Do I secretly like it?  Do I need to seek help??

Oh, and it's not the worst song of the 80s.  Anything by Richard Marx is.   

As I've said many times, I first heard "We Built This City" as a tourist in SF who dreamed of oneday living here -- it came on the radio as I was driving around the city, climbing hills and marvelling at scenic vistas -- which is a very different perspective, I suppose. Marconi played the mamba and I was caught up in the hoopla.

[sundaygal]

But I HATE "We Built This City" (IMO, THE worst song of the 80s).

Why is it that everytime I hear this song, I can't bring myself to turn the dial?  I just sit there, transfixed and listen to the whole thing as if I were witnessing a horrible accident.  Do I secretly like it?  Do I need to seek help??

Oh, and it's not the worst song of the 80s.  Anything by Richard Marx is.   

As I've said many times, I first heard "We Built This City" as a tourist in SF who dreamed of oneday living here -- it came on the radio as I was driving around the city, climbing hills and marvelling at scenic vistas -- which is a very different perspective, I suppose. Marconi played the mamba and I was caught up in the hoopla.

Actually, The theme from Mannequin Nothing's Gonna Stop Us Now is way, way worse.  It makes WBTC sound like Like A Rolling Stone.

[RGMike]

But I HATE "We Built This City" (IMO, THE worst song of the 80s).

Why is it that everytime I hear this song, I can't bring myself to turn the dial?  I just sit there, transfixed and listen to the whole thing as if I were witnessing a horrible accident.  Do I secretly like it?  Do I need to seek help??

Oh, and it's not the worst song of the 80s.  Anything by Richard Marx is.   

As I've said many times, I first heard "We Built This City" as a tourist in SF who dreamed of oneday living here -- it came on the radio as I was driving around the city, climbing hills and marvelling at scenic vistas -- which is a very different perspective, I suppose. Marconi played the mamba and I was caught up in the hoopla.

Actually, The theme from Mannequin Nothing's Gonna Stop Us Now is way, way worse.  It makes WBTC sound like Like A Rolling Stone.

Thank you -- that's always been my other argument, that they put out a half-dozen more-awful singles in that decade (JaneyjaneyjaneyJane, etc etc) so why does "WBTC" get all the hate? But whatevs. At least Mannequin had Kim Cattrall.

[SFGuy]

This weekend's shows:

Casey's 70s:

1/13/1973: http://www.charismusicgroup.com/Cue%20Sheets/01-13-73.pdf

Casey's 80s:

1/16/1982: http://www.charismusicgroup.com/Cue%20Sheets/01-16-82.pdf

[SFGuy]

But I HATE "We Built This City" (IMO, THE worst song of the 80s).

Why is it that everytime I hear this song, I can't bring myself to turn the dial?  I just sit there, transfixed and listen to the whole thing as if I were witnessing a horrible accident.  Do I secretly like it?  Do I need to seek help??

Oh, and it's not the worst song of the 80s.  Anything by Richard Marx is.   

As I've said many times, I first heard "We Built This City" as a tourist in SF who dreamed of oneday living here -- it came on the radio as I was driving around the city, climbing hills and marvelling at scenic vistas -- which is a very different perspective, I suppose. Marconi played the mamba and I was caught up in the hoopla.

Actually, The theme from Mannequin Nothing's Gonna Stop Us Now is way, way worse.  It makes WBTC sound like Like A Rolling Stone.

Thank you -- that's always been my other argument, that they put out a half-dozen more-awful singles in that decade (JaneyjaneyjaneyJane, etc etc) so why does "WBTC" get all the hate? But whatevs. At least Mannequin had Kim Cattrall.

Starship as a whole in the 80s were pretty bad. I would rank just about all of them in the bottom 50 of the 80s.

[SFGuy]

Side note to all of this. It's time for a Bay Area FM station to carry both shows. The Band would be a good choice since they play music from both eras. Saturdays could be the 70s show and Sundays could be the 80s show.

[RGMike]

Side note to all of this. It's time for a Bay Area FM station to carry both shows. The Band would be a good choice since they play music from both eras. Saturdays could be the 70s show and Sundays could be the 80s show.

I agree -- I've wondered why KOIT never picked up the '80s version (lots of the stations that carry AT40:the '80s are "lite-rock" formats).

Looking forward to the Jan '73 show this week -- a very sledgehammery period of my life.  There was a show around that time in which Casey did a feature on the fact that "Me & Mrs Jones" quotes "Secret Love" during the intro; I'm wondering if this is that show.

[RGMike]

TANC: '73 begins with Bobby W's "Harry Hippie". And obscure Who at #39 with "The Relay".  Tempts are on the way down, dadgummit.

TANC2: Chuck Berry, gettin' some on his finger and wipin' it on the wall. Er, ewww. (ETA: we got the edited version that censored that line, tho' the whole song's pretty randy.)

VHM Austin Roberts when he was good. And -- awwww -- Jermaine has his first pop hit with "Daddy's Home" and its very of-the-moment mondegreen "Your best friend Rhoda told me"

Fogerty wants to go hog-wild and be gay-o. Oh?

BOS1 and proxy of Gaz, Lobo's "Don't Expect Me To Be Your Friend", sounding quite lovely this morning.

And OMG: uber-BOS2 Joni -- she' a radio, don'cha know. Can't tell you how much my young radio-geek self loved this one back then (and how thrilled it actually made the Top 40).  Ms Reddy is also going down -- ha! some feminist she is!

BOS3 John Denver in the Rockies; VHM Neil D walkin' on water.  Ain't it wondrous?

[RGMike]

This cover of "Smoke Gets In Your Eyes" is an odd grafting of British '50s nostalgia (which was rampant in the UK in '73) onto a Spinners-style arrangement -- I'd've loved to have heard a full-on Thom Bell production of the Spinners (or New York City, even) doing this.

Someone wrote a piece in the WSJ the other day about the new Elvis box with every track he ever recorded, and he talked about his mostly-sappy '70s output. He must've been thinking of the broken-home weeper "Separate Ways'. Too bad on his birthday.

Aaaaaack! WOS (one of the Worst. Records. Evah!) "Love Jones". Ah don't want to have a long irrevalent (sic) conversation, but... sheesh.

BOS4 Ms King's "Been to Canaan". Amusing to hear Casey call Steely Dan "a 6-man group".

Always a BOS for the mighty 'berries. Close your eyes and be still!

[Gazoo]

Lots that I loved in this set, most of all the sheer eclecticism.  WOS to "Funny Face," but I can live with that amid all these treasures.

[Gazoo]

BOS to "Been to Canaan" and "The World Is a Ghetto."  Is Canaan, then, a ghetto?

[Gazoo]

VHM to 3DN's sentimental ode to a dismemberment, "Pieces of April."

That's why there was a mourning in May, y'know.

[RGMike]

VHM to 3DN's sentimental ode to a dismemberment, "Pieces of April."

That's why there was a mourning in May, y'know.

bah-DUMP-tish!

lovely and (sadly) rarely-heard.

BOS6 Macca giving his fockin' little mama his sweet banana and gettin' Hi(gh). BOS7 Marvin in "Trouble", man. And still another BOS the Cat Man's "Sitting", one of the many sledgehammery reminders in this set of what was a rough month in my life.

[Wayback]

BOS Norman "Hurricane" Smith, an Abbey Road Studios engineer for the Beatles and Pink Floyd who scored his own hit with "Oh Babe, What Would You Say"