Drummer Clyde Stubblefield was sampled a billion times and received nothing in terms of royalties. If you’re motivated, here are some other suggestions for a words-free playlist: By the time we got to the ’90s, Top 40 radio was almost devoid of wordless hits. Most were movie and TV themes like Vangelis’ Chariots of Fire (1980). When the 1980s hit, the interest in instrumentals began to wane with only a few managing to find purchase with the general public. How did the Canadian music industry do in 2022? The year-end stats are out Has there ever been another rock song with this much yodelling? I remember calling it up on a jukebox when one of the town bullies wandered over and snottily asked “Who picked this crap?” I kept very silent but still enjoyed the rest of the track. What the heck was that?Īround the same time, Focus, a band from The Netherlands, released one of the weirdest instrumentals of the decade in Hocus Pocus, a six-minute-plus track that was broken into two parts for release on 7-inch. When Winter and his band were seen playing it on TV, he had a keyboard slung around his neck. It wasn’t even supposed to be included on the They Only Come Out at Night album - Winter figured it was a B-side at best - and was only added when the label realized there was space. The Edgar Winter Group had an unlikely AM and FM hit in 1972 with Frankenstein, which was loaded with synth, guitar and percussion fireworks. Rock stations also had their share of instrumental hits. How many people were chased from Top 40 AM radio to FM by incessant plays of The Entertainer (1973, adopted from Scott Joplin’s ragtime original in 1904) from The Sting soundtrack? Or Franks Mills’ saccharine-sweet Music Box Dancer (1974)? And the less said about Chuck Maginone’s once ubiquitous flugelhorn hit, Feels So Good (1978), the better. Things could get very light and fluffy (read: annoying), too. Then came TSOP (“The Sounds of Philadelphia) via MFSB in 1974. I was introduced to the smooth Philly sound of the mid-’70s through Love’s Theme (1973), written by Barry White and issued under the name Love Unlimited Orchestra. When Star Wars hit in 1977, a group trading as Meco (actually American producer Domenico Monardo) reached the top of the Canadian charts with Star Wars Theme/Cantina Band. He’d have another massive hit with Cotton’s Theme (1973), better known as the title music for The Young and the Restless. When Romanian gymnast Nadia Comăneci captured the world’s attention at the Montreal Olympics, the piece was retitled Nadia’s Theme and became a top 10 hit in Canada and the U.S.įor a while, it seemed like every second song on AM radio was an instrumental. The Theme from S.W.AT., released in November of the same year and credited to Rhythm Heritage but was actually the work of composer Barry De Vorzon. The theme from The Rockford Files by Mike Post in May 1975. TV shows supplied many hit instrumentals. A few years later, Walter Murphy, now known as the composer of the themes for Family Guy and American Dad, scored by taking Beethoven’s Fifth and turning it into an early disco hit called A Fifth of Beethoven. In 973, Brazilian Eumir Deodato had a number three hit in Canada with his Fender Rhodes piano version of Richard Strauss’ Also Sprach Zarathustra (1886). Updates to classical compositions were quite the thing. Montreal-born makeup artist wins big at 95th Academy Awards.Drake tour with 21 Savage includes stops in Vancouver, Montreal Toronto dates to be announced later.Calgary dancer takes centre stage at Oscars during ‘Naatu Naatu’.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |