Let's Talk About Great Music

You know, I like to think that the music I love as I came of age in the late 60's and early 70's can't be topped by what has come since. Those of us of that generation (aka "geezers") sometimes act as though there wasn't much other than Elvis, Chuck Berry, and Buddy Holly prior to the whirlwind that was the Beatles and certainly very little since that time that can measure up to that golden age of "classic rock" (more about that in future blogs). Well, while flipping stations the other night, I came upon a Time-Life Music informercial hosted by....

BOBBY GOLDSBORO!

This poor guy has been botoxed and lasered (with bad rug added) until he is nearly unrecognizable from the 60's pop singer who performed such hits as Honey (an uplifting song about his dead love), See the Funny Little Clown, and Watching Scotty Grow. The royalties must be running out or he has another laser/botox treatment coming up cause why else would he do something like this.

Bobby then

Anyhow, it got me thinking that while I will extoll the greatness of such bands, artists, and songwriters like The Beatles, The Who, Creedence Clearwater Revival, Bob Dylan, Neil Young, etc. ...We had our share of stinkers as well. I mean really, can my generation be proud of allowing a band called the 1910 Fruitgum Company have hits with songs like Yummy, Yummy, Yummy (I Got Love In My Tummy) and Goody, Goody, Gumdrops?

Yeah, no doubt the 80's and the 90's and the 21st century doesn't have the monopoly of shitty music. Heck, let's talk about those manufactured groups that recording companies and talent agents pasted together as machines to sell pre-packaged pop slop to the upcoming and impressionable pre-teens
and teen sheep with money in their pockets. Sure, we've seen the New Kids on the Block, and the Spice Girls and groups of their ilk over the last couple of decades. And yes their music was highly forgettable. Well everyone, let's not forget that back in the day, my generation had

The Archies! The Archies were quite the little enigma. These cartoon characters had the biggest hit of 1969 with the mega hit Sugar, Sugar! We never really had any human faces to associate with this bunch. Let's also throw the Partridge family into this waste basket of a catagory. Keith actually sang and Shirley had starred on both Broadway and in Hollywood musicals but did anyone believe that the rest of the fam could read a note of music? We also gotta put the Monkees into this catagory since they were put together to star in a TV series. The thing with the Monkees is that they either were or became musicians during the course of the show and they also had the privlege of performing songs written by people like Neil Diamond, and Boyce and Hart.

For heaven's sake, even the great Johnny Cash had to go through the embarrassment of singing

...A Boy Named Sue. For the love of God! the Man In Black! The badass of Ring of Fire and Folsom Prison Blues recorded this silly song?

So let me be clear, no matter what musical generation you have hitched yourself to. No matter where your musical loyalties lie, you can be sure that there was plenty of crappy music available during that time as well. If you want further proof, spend some time watching Bobby Goldboro host Time/Life's infomercial, Pop Memories of the 60's. Once you get past Bobby's very odd helmet like hair, you'll see that the beloved 60's produced a decent number of lousy artists doing bad music and even some great artists producing lousy music.