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 On 07/06/2017 at 10:47 PM by KnightDriver See More From This User » |
Let me explain. I have this long running music listening project I started this year. I’ve been focusing on a single year in music every month starting with my birth year, 1967. Well, I’m up to 1973 this July, and I thought I’d review what I added to my playlists, and then mention video gaming, because. . . well. . . why not.
Mostly I’m ripping vinyl I got months ago like Tower of Power’s self-titled album and War’s The World is a Ghetto, just to name a few, but I created another playlist to highlight hit songs in case Mark and I go on a road trip. I have the top 30 songs from Billboard’s Hot 100, which I collected way back in the early 2000s. Some favorites of mine (not all in the top 30) are songs like: Edgar Winter’s “Frankensten” and “Free Ride”, The Ojays’ “Love Train”, Stevie Wonder’s “Superstition” and “Higher Ground”, Paul McCartney’s Bond song “Live and Let Die”, The Ohio Players “Funky Worm”, Curtis Mayfield’s “Superfly”, Deep Purple’s “Smoke on the Water”, Dr. Hook & The Medicine Show’s “Cover of The Rolling Stone”, Steely Dan’s “Reelin’ in the Years” (greatest guitar solo ever), and War’s “Cisco Kid”.
Of course, I couldn’t stop there and looked up 1973 films for their soundtracks. I just stuck to top box office hits that interested me, for the sake of time. Enter the Dragon was a big hit worldwide, and the Clint Eastwood film Magnum Force was in the top ten in the U.S. . Both soundtracks are composed by Lalo Schifrin funny enough. American Graffiti is a good soundtrack of 50s music I used to have and have to go get again. I am currently eyeing a certain library near me.
Then I looked up music from TV shows. I stuck to shows that debuted in ’73. Favorites of mine I got the theme to were: Schoolhouse Rock, The Six Million Dollar Man, Super Friends (DC’s Justice League), Starlost (a Canadian Scifi I never heard of but want to watch now because Harlan Ellison wrote it), and Ultraman Taro released only in Japan. There seemed to be a new Ultraman show released in Japan every year in the 70s. Some of them managed to make it to the U.S. but years later.
In writing this, I couldn’t resist looking up video games even though there’s no music of any kind other than bleeps and bloops. But some significant beginnings happened in the wake of Atari’s Pong in '72. Sega, Midway and Williams Electronics all begin making video games with pong clones. Konami is created. Hudson Soft is created but as a radio shop and would not make video games until the late 70s. Taito makes its first video game, possibly Speed Race, which came to the U.S. in ’74. Finally for you PC gaming fans, the BASIC Computer Games book is published containing 101 games you could type into your early build-yourself microcomputer kit.
In '73 I was five years old and not aware of music, but I did play Pong on my TV and watch Schoolhouse Rock, Six Million Dollar Man, and Super Friends.
Back when I was a little kid, after the Saturday morning cartoons were over, there was a station that would usually show a Japanese monster movie in the late morning/early afternoon. Like Godzilla and stuff. Sometimes they would show Ultraman, too.
They played School House Rock well into the 80's when I was a kid. When my brother Jeff was very little, we had some School House Rocks VHS tapes and I would play them for him at night to help him fall asleep.
Yea! I remember the Japanese monster movies around that time. I probably saw some Ultraman too. I loved those tiny model stage sets they did. The ones Godzilla destroyed during the movie. I wanted to make those.
There's a correction I'd like to make: Marty Friedman's guitar solo in "Tornado of Souls," is, in fact, the greatest solo of all time. No guitar before or after it has or will ever rival it. It has also defeated itself and the existence of the universe at the time of its recording. That solo called upon the Cthulu and the Cthulu did ravage mankind, for the sake of mankind's sanity, so that it did not have to live in the disappointing world that existed after the greatest solo of all time had already been performed, thus rendering all subsequent forms of art and joy obsolete and meaningless. We have been living in a post-"Torando of Souls"-guitar-solo simulation for some time now, as humanity did not need to exist in the real world any more, its greatest possible accomplishment already achieved.
The Super Friends' Aquaman proves this fact, as it is an unintentional relic of our simulation appearing only after its supposed inception in the 70s. In actual fact, the Super Friends Aquaman you are experiencing is an illusion of modern times.
That is a good one. There are actually a lot of guitar solos I like a lot. I made a mix of them at one time. I'm glad I said "of all time" though and got you to defend Tornado. There's nothing like a good musical face off. I'll add another one. Rush's Roll the Bones. The song is not so great, but that solo is one of my favorites. Also, Far Behind by Candlebox.
Lol truth be told I'm not necessarily sure Tornado is nut personal favorite, though it's up there. I was trying to emulate an onion article they share periodically titled, "People still making art despite Rust in Peace being greatest work of all time," or something to that effect.
I've always liked far behind, but can't remember its solo atm. I'll have to check out that rush song.
I relistened to both the Rush and Candlebox solos and I think thery are not as impressive as I once thought. I don't know what is a good solo anymore. I only know I heard some funk this week and Tower of Power's "Soul Vaccination" is great.
And actually, I've been listening ton this acoustic guitar solo since this version was posted yesterday.
i spent a lot of time fucking with basic when I was a kid, on multiple computers. Fun stuff, but eventually it wasn't my thing and my brain didn't get it. I still work on game development now but still it's a big stretch for my brain.
I remember the old languages, but didn't get into any of them. Seemed like a science thing to do, and I was not a math person.
Ha! I hadn't seen that one. For years, my favorite year in music was '74, mainly because I was a prog rock fan and felt all my favorite groups peaked that year.
The beginning of Reeling in the Years always reminds me of San Diego. One of the local radio sports shows would always use it coming out of a commercial. I used to have that collection of Billboard's Top 100, and you can't go wrong with Tower of Power.
I used to watch reruns of Super Friends and I always thought it was funny that Wonder Woman's invisible jet was just an outline you saw Wonder Woman sitting.
There's a lot of funny stuff in Super Friends. I want to watch it again for all that. Legion of Doom was cool.
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