FURTHERMORE
By Gerry Moran
It’s music, music all the way this week but not just any old music although the music is old, 50 years old to be precise and yet it all sounds fresh to me, as if they were hits from yesterday – not from 1976. A tribute to the quality of the songs. Here are some of those hits from 1976.
*Silly Love Songs, Paul McCartney’s Wings. This song topped the US charts for five weeks, longer than any other single in ’76. Paul is said to have written it in response to a quote from John Lennon saying McCartney only wrote silly love songs for The Beatles. Paul’s message to John was simple: “You may call them silly love songs but what’s wrong with that?” The song’s huge success was taken as a sign that the record-buying public agree.
*The Boys Are Back In Town, Thin Lizzy (who played several times in the Carlton Ballroom). Years since Lizzy’s hit debut single, Whiskey In The Jar, the song was written under pressure from management to produce another hit. They pulled it off. It reached Number 8 in the Charts and was NME’s (New Musical Express) Best Single of ’76. Phil Lynott died in 1986 aged 36 and is immortalised with a bronze statue outside his favourite Dublin pub, Bruxelles on Harry St, just off Grafton St.
*Bohemian Rhapsody, Queen. At nearly six minutes it was felt that Bohemian Rhapsody was too long to be played on radio but Freddy Mercury insisted that it either goes out in its entirety or it doesn’t go out at all. The famous video was created especially for Top Of The Pops and shot in three hours. It started at 7.30pm, finished at 10.30 pm and they were in the pub 15 minutes later. Freddy Mercury, born in Tanzania, died from Aids in 1991, aged 45.
*Save Your Kisses For Me, Brotherhood Of Man. This won the Eurovision Song Contest for Britain and became the UK’s best-selling single of 1976. In later years Brotherhood Of Man toured alongside fellow Eurovision winners Bucks Fizz ,secure in the knowledge that Save Your Kisses For Me remains the most successful Eurovision-winning song ever.
* Oh What A Night, the Four Seasons. The song’s full title is December 1966 (Oh, What a Night) originally the lyrics referenced 1933, the year Prohibition ended in America. Frankie Valli was the Seasons’s lead singer and most famous member. Formed in 1960, the Four Seasons performed for more than 60 years, helped by the fact that they’d had 30 different members over the decades.
*Lost In France, Bonnie Tyler. This was Bonnie Tyler’s first major chart success and kick-started five decades of music success. Radio 1’s Simon Bates declared at the time: “If this isn’t a hit I’ll scrub the steps of Broadcasting House with a toothbrush.” Luckily it reached Number 9 in the Charts. Welsh singer Bonnie Tyler, real name Gaynor Hopkins, died last July 8, aged 75.
*Forever And Ever, Demis Roussos. This song gave Egyptian-born Greek Roussos a Np. 1 hit in 1976. Over his lifetime he slod more than 60 million albums. He survived a hostage ordeal when terrorists hijacked a TWA flight in 1985 and in 2014 had a newly discovered asteroid called after him.
*Dancing Queen, Abba. Perhaps the band’s most enduring No. 1 (they also had a hit with Fernando in ’76) .Among the many artists who covered it are U2 who featured it in their 1992 ‘Zoo TV’ tour and were joined on stage by Benny and Bjorn when the show hit Stockholm. Before its UK release Abba performed it for a real Queen as part of Sweden’s national celebrations marking the wedding of their Queen Silvia to King Carl XV1 Gestaf.
