The Shelly Awards

(Trophies Always Have To Be Supremely Ugly)

There was a time when I watched award shows religiously. I'm not sure why ~ perhaps to confirm that my favorites had the proper cachet and to bitch about the wrong choices the so-called judges made. Of course, that was long before I understood that awards are bought and paid for and perpetually political (I actually prefer the naive me.) 

I generally was lost with the Oscars, since I'd managed to see approximately one of the nominated films, and the flick I caught never won anything. The Grammys were kind of a high-brow joke (even to the naive me) because inevitably the winners would be the industry-coronated choices (as opposed to anything any sane person would actually listen to.) "The Girl From Ipanema" beat out "I Want To Hold Your Hand" for record of the year; and you know how often we hum the melody of "Girl From Ipanema".

The Emmys were more my speed because I definitely knew how to watch TV and I was familiar with most of the nominees. The CMA Awards, however, was my show of choice. I did know my country music and frankly, my taste was eminently superior to most. Plus I was a Country Music Association member and thus got to pencil in my choices on the paper ballot. 

I like to flip on the TV at night before bedtime because the hypnotic rays tend to lull me to sleep, so I tuned into the first five minutes of the Grammys last Sunday night. I will admit, I was confused. Some gal was inhabiting different rooms of a home and brushing her hair and bouncing on the bed with a stuffed bunny; and then someone I thought was Justin Timberlake (who I later learned was Ricky Martin ~ I wasn't wearing my glasses) joined her in the number and someone I was supposed to know played the trumpet. And then some other guy piped in. 

Nevertheless I kept watching. The evening's host, Alicia Keys, soon showed up with four gals, only one of whom I recognized (granted, Jennifer Lopez was hidden behind a humongous broad-brimmed hat). The one I knew was Michelle Obama, and I thought, okay ~ she's a music icon. I did see Dolly Parton in the audience; the only person I actually recognized. And then I flipped the TV off.

So I can now say I watched the 2019 Grammys.

I've now decided to create my own awards, The Shellys. The categories are completely capricious, based on whatever the hell I feel like bestowing.

Thus:

Best Roots Recording

Nominees:

Buddy Holly ~ Rave On

Jerry Lee Lewis ~ Breathless

Eddie Cochran ~ Summertime Blues

Chuck Berry ~ Roll Over Beethoven

The Everly Brothers ~ Bye Bye Love

The Winner:

Best Rock Song From the Year I Graduated High School:

Nominees:

Drift Away ~ Dobie Gray

Goodbye Yellow Brick Road ~ Elton John

Stuck In The Middle With You ~ Stealers Wheel

Loves Me Like A Rock ~ Paul Simon

Reelin' In The Years ~ Steely Dan

The Winner:

Best Song My Big Brother Told Me I Should Like:

 Nominees:

The Rain, The Park, and Other Things ~ Cowsills
Rainy Day Woman #12 and 35 ~ Bob Dylan
Another Saturday Night ~ Sam Cooke
Telstar ~ The Tornados
Where Have All The Flowers Gone ~ Johnny Rivers

And the award goes to:

 Best Beatles Song:

The Nominees:

I'm Only Sleeping
You Won't See Me
You're Gonna Lose That Girl
Good Day Sunshine 
We Can Work It Out

There is no live video to be found of the winner. However, the first runner-up (Ringo) will accept the award (I have a sneaking suspicion all the Beatles videos have been removed from YouTube. Thanks. Paul.):

Best Hit From 1965:

Nominees:

California Girls ~ The Beach Boys

I Can't Help Myself ~ The Four Tops

Ticket To Ride ~ The Beatles

Baby, The Rain Must Fall ~ Glenn Yarbrough

My Girl ~ The Temptations

The winner (not even close):

Best Music Video of the '80's:

Nominees:

Raspberry Beret ~ Prince
Take On Me ~ a-ha
Sledgehammer ~ Peter Gabriel
Money For Nothing ~ Dire Straits
Nothing Compares 2U  ~ Sinead O'Connor

The Shelly goes to:

My Favorite '80's Act:

Hall and Oates
Huey Lewis and The News
Prince
Phil Collins
Elton John

This was so close:

Best Upbeat Song:

Walkin' On Sunshine ~ Katrina and The Waves

Morning Train ~ Sheena Easton

Happy Together ~ The Turtles

Beautiful Day ~ U2

I Wanna Dance With Somebody ~ Whitney Houston

Of course, the winner is this:

Song That Scared The Crap Out Of Me (or at least befuddled me) As A Kid:

  

They're Coming To Take Me Away ~ Napoleon XIV

Fire ~ The Crazy World of Arthur Brown

Running Bear ~ Johnny Preston

Last Kiss ~ J Frank Wilson

Devil Or Angel ~ Bobby Vee 

Hands down:

Best Dion and The Belmonts Song:

The Wanderer

Ruby Baby

I Wonder Why

Lovers Who Wander

Runaround Sue

Again, a tight competition, but Dion DiMucci doesn't care, because he's a winner, regardless:

Best Hair Band:

Van Halen

Bon Jovi

Whitesnake

Guns 'n Roses

Def Leppard

I'm not a big fan of hair, except for:

Cheesiest '70's Song:

Loving You ~ Minnie Riperton

Billy, Don't Be A Hero ~ Bo Donaldson and The Heywoods

Seasons In The Sun ~  Terry Jacks

Muskrat Love ~ The Captain and Tenille

Havin' My Baby ~ Paul Anka

You Light Up My Life ~ Debby Boone

Afternoon Delight ~ Starland Vocal Band 

Yes, there are seven nominees, because it's impossible to narrow this category down to five.

This one wins only because I can't bear to post any of the others:

Hey, look at the time! Well, the show has run far over its designated time, so tune in again next year for more Shelly Awards!

And all you forgotten acts, you're welcome! It's time you got your due!

 

 

Everything Old...

(It didn't do anything else. It was just a radio.)

At my 5:00 a.m. daily stop at the convenience store yesterday, the piped-in music was playing a song from 1976. I thought, well, that's interesting. Are they trying to bring 40-year-old music back? I can't blame them, really. Number one, it's good to keep in mind the clientele. Who else is stopping in for a $1.49 styrofoam cup of coffee but doddering oldsters? Additionally, is there actually any real current music?

The song playing took me back ~ back to my poor times, when all I had was (essentially) the radio pictured here. It was on my bedside table, and I left it on all night, which made for some odd dreams at times, but it was my conduit to the outside world. I didn't have a TV in the bedroom (who owned more than one TV?) and wouldn't have had a place to put one if I had it.

I was newly pregnant and alone in my euphoria, with no one to confide in who'd understand. My little sister was fourteen and my mom was dealing with issues of her own (Dad). That portable radio was my lifeline. My husband was working the night shift, so it was just me alone in a little trailer that suddenly seemed cavernous and eerily dark. The DJ would announce around midnight that radar indicated a strong thunderstorm was rumbling across the prairie, and I'd shift my body to a more baby-pleasing position and try to remain awake in case I'd need to flee, but would ultimately drift off, with no ultimate harm done.

Remembering that time, I don't recall feeling lonely or afraid. In hindsight, it was a trailer park, with its requisite miscreants; but we had a stable couple living on one side who were clearly biding their time until they could move on out...and up. It would take me nine more years to move on. The neighbors on the other side liked to crank up AC/DC 'round midnight and guffaw and shout a lot through their open windows.  No wonder I shoved up the volume on my bedside AM radio. My pitiful "partying" days had ended long before I found I was pregnant. I'd attend my husband's company Christmas party and down two glasses of champagne and stagger out of the Elks Club dizzy and nauseous. I also may have danced.

But I was more than ready to get on with life. I wanted a baby. That tiny trailer had a second bedroom that I constantly fussed with, hauling home pieces of baby furniture; attaching a musical clown mobile to the crib rail, installing a rocker in the corner; tacking cheap art to the faux-wood paneled walls.

And the radio was a constant backdrop for my contemplations.

Convenience Store Song:

This song sort of took me back to my two-glass champagne days, because it was so vomit-inducing. It was a hit during the summer of '76. I was on a fishing trip to (aptly-named) Fish Creek and clearly baby-bumped, enough so that I had to accede to maternity wear. I was wearing a lime green eyelet-trimmed tunic and the radio was playing, as it always was, and this is what came out:

1976 was the nadir of Wings. John Lennon was hiding somewhere in LA, so I was left with a bunch of silly love songs. I was torn. It was like a lullaby from the womb, hearing Paul's voice; yet the songs were lacking. Nevertheless:

I sort of dismissed this at the time, but I was wrong. I know about Dan Seals; have no idea what became of John Ford Coley. I think this song may have been too "soft rock" for me at age twenty-one. But it was everywhere ~ and deserved to be:

I still maintained a friendship with Alice II. After we resigned from the State Health Department simultaneously, she got a job...somewhere...I can't remember...and I scurried back home to work for Mom and Dad. Alice II had gotten married a couple of months after me and our lives sort of paralleled one another. She was the first to become pregnant and was living in a mobile home in the country (mobile homes weren't looked down upon in the mid-seventies), on a ranch where her new husband worked. As I always had, I took my cues from her. I admired all her baby paraphernalia and immediately went to the mall to purchase the exact same items. Neither of us knew what sex our babies would be ~ technology hadn't advanced that far ~ but both of us gave birth to boys.

Meanwhile, music was changing imperceptibly.  Neither Alice II nor I knew that something that will forever live in the annals of infamy would rear its ugly head, but it started then, in 1976:

If you listen to, God forbid, classic rock radio, you'll eventually hear this song. It's not because it's by The Who or Aerosmith, but because the song is great. It's, in fact, one of the best things, musically, to come out of the mid-seventies:

But let's get real. This is the song that's powered so many commercials for forty years and the one that screams "1976" (sorry for the poor quality, but this is the only version I could find that doesn't feature seventy-year-old Orleans hawking their greatest hit in 2013):

Work friendships ultimately don't last, because the ties that connect you only exist in the work world. I'm not sure which friendships last; maybe high school bonds. I didn't have that luxury, because Alice One's life and mine had diverged so jaggedly. Alice II and her husband and baby eventually moved about a hundred miles away, and I visited her one more time, in '77. We cooed over each other's baby boys and laughed and drank iced tea, and then she was gone.

But we'd always have Elton John:

Other artists took their bow that year:  Chicago, featuring that new lead singer who'd anchor every soundtrack of every single eighties movie, Peter Cetera; Hall and Oates, who would explode in the following decade. Who could forget Barry Manilow (even if they tried)? Some band called "The Eagles" crept up. Boz Skaggs hadn't yet hit his stride as a balladeer, but would soon. Some dude named Peter Frampton was coming alive for kids like my little sister. A band called KISS wanted to rock and roll all night (right after they removed their makeup).

There was goofy shit, like "Convoy" and "Disco Duck" ~ nothing like the seventies for crappy novelty hits. John Travolta was everywhere, especially on ABC TV, where my lovely John Sebastian was now shilling for sitcoms:

1976 was still mining the fifties (yes), with a remake of an Everly Brothers song:

This song encapsulates music in 1976:

Looking back, that year was rather frenetic, musically.

But meanwhile, come November, I had my baby boy.

November 4, 1976

1976 was a fun year in pop culture, if fun means cringingly awful. In fashion, women wore patchwork denim ensembles -- pantsuits, vests with skirts (what I will call the Little House on the Prairie look) -- while polyester leisure suits were de rigueur for men, complete with heavy gold chains (or "necklaces") and slippery patterned shirts with deep v-necks; visible chest hair required.

The top movies of the year included Rocky, One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest, All The President's Men, and Taxi Driver; only two of which I've ever seen, and one I only managed to catch for the first time sometime in 2016 (I won't say which one, but are you talkin' to me? You talkin' to me?)

In TV, we were diligent about not missing M*A*S*H and the Bob Newhart Show. ABC had a hit comedy that featured a real cutie. His character's name was Vinnie Barbarino. I wonder whatever happened to that actor. Fonzie was still saying, "Aaaayyyy" and weren't weren't yet sick of it. Most of the so-called comedies had terrible writing, but what were we gonna do? Sit in the dark and listen to Captain and Tennille on the radio? At least Johnny Carson showcased some new comics once in a while. George Carlin, of course, was my favorite, but I also loved Robert Klein and David Steinberg. And there was no one bigger than David Brenner (oddly).

We were desperate for laughs in 1976, because, well....

On Tuesday, November 2, I waddled into the Jeannette Myhre gymnasium, nine months pregnant, to cast my very first vote for President of the United States. I wasn't in love with Gerald Ford -- he was kind of hapless, really; but shoot, that peanut farmer? That grinning sanctimonious schoolmaster? No thanks. I had a bad feeling about that guy, and I, of course, turned out to be right. I would have to endure four years of economic hell before somebody special came along and saved the country. I don't think I've yet fully recovered from the financial setback Mr. Peanut thrust upon me.

On the late morning of Thursday, November 4, I came home from work (yes, I started work early and got off early), made myself my usual tomato sandwich on toast, sliced a couple strips of Colby cheese and settled at the spindly kitchen table to enjoy my lunch. I'd eaten exactly the same lunch for nine months. Pregnant women get a free pass for weird food cravings. Today I have no excuse, but I really don't need one. I'd informed Mom and Dad that since I was pregnant, I would no longer be their room-cleaning mule, and I demanded a front office job. It was the very first (and only) time they were taken aback by a demand from me, but to be honest, I'd never before made any demands -- I was too conditioned and too frightened.

I settled in to watch Days of Our Lives. Doug and Julie continued to be in love; and, of course, Dr. Marlena Evans was my very favorite.

Around 1:30 I felt a pinch in my tummy. I'd felt phantom twinges before; but then again, I was three days overdue...

By the time water gushed out of embarrassing places, I figured things were happening. I hesitated to call my doctor, because I really didn't want to trouble him for a false alarm, and frankly, I had no clue how this whole dance was supposed to go.

I didn't call anybody. I didn't call my husband. I sure didn't call my mom. Now, in 2017, I'm better about asking for help; but I was a balled-up mess in 1976; afraid to let people know what I didn't know. That came from no one ever wanting to help and everybody expecting me to just "handle things". It came from being the grownup to a couple of "parents" who forgot to grow up.

But I digress.

By the time my husband showed up around 5:00 p.m., I said "maybe we should think about going to the hospital"; hoping I wasn't about to inconvenience any of the hospital staff with a false alarm. Shoot, I could have had my baby at home, in my bed, if I hadn't summoned the courage to take a chance that maybe this was the real thing.

Baby Christopher was born at 10:19 that night. A seven-pound-six ounce baby boy with a full head of blonde hair.

And everything changed.

I don't know if my mom ever thought about the music on her radio in 1955. I doubt it. But I'm a music geek, so I was thinking today about the songs that came out of my home speakers and my car radio that year.

So, here you go, Chris:

(Sorry):

This band should have a coffeehouse named after them:

Randy Meisner, what the heck happened to you? I don't care. This is the most enduring song from 1976:

Sorry, you don't get away from your mom's country that easily:

Oh, look! Vinnie Barbarino has made another appearance! Chris, if you want to know anything about the seventies, you need to know about the Bee Gees:

Someone Should Invent...

...a software program that analyzes one's musical collection, and tells them which era contained the best music.

I'm guessing, for most people, it's not the seventies.

I uploaded all my music onto Google Music, once, on a whim, because I thought it would be cool to be able to listen to my music anytime, anywhere.

Well, I never used it until yesterday, at work. I was tired of all the talk radio blah, blah, blah, so I thought, in order to get through that last day of the week, I'd queue up my Google Music and listen to that for a change.

I set it for "shuffle".

The very first song that queued up was "Play That Funky Music", from the seventies, as you know.

But the funny thing is, I never once, in the course of approximately six hours, heard another song from the seventies.

The seventies was not the epitome of good music.

Oh sure, you can quibble about it; point out the big hits from that decade. Anyone can do that with any decade; just pick out the best songs.

But, let's be honest. It was a lost decade of music, overall. Not just in rock, but in country as well.

I don't know...what I remember about country music during that time period is Charley Pride rehashing songs that were semi-hits in the rock genre. Dave & Sugar ~ remember them? Eddie Rabbitt ~ okay, I like Eddie Rabbitt.

Yes, you had your "After The Fire Is Gone", by Conway and Loretta. And you had your "Behind Closed Doors".

But you also had a whole lot of John Denver. And while I appreciate John Denver more today, that stuff was pure poison when it was happening.

And rock?

Well, sure, we had the Eagles.

And we had "Bridge Over Troubled Waters" and "Let's Get It On".

But let's be real.

THAT'S not what we remember from the seventies.

THIS is what we remember:



Along with any number of songs by Billy Joel, this goes down in history as most likely my LEAST favorite song of all time.

Sure, feel free to listen to all seven and whatever number of minutes of this song. I got the gist basically from the first verse and chorus. Talk about self-indulgent. You know, the Beatles rarely did songs that were even THREE minutes long. And look where that got them.

And, while we're on the subject of annoying songs, how about this one? Don't even tell me that you LIKE this. How could that be? It's repetitive and boring. And mundane. Additionally, it is non-sensical. Although I suppose that never stopped anyone before. I won't listen to it, but here it is, for the 1% of persons alive who have never heard this song before:



You probably won't believe this, but this song was HUGE in the seventies. Yes, really:



But thinking about it, it kind of fits with this song:



Still lovin' those seventies?

How about this?



Remember the Starland Vocal Band? Of course not! But lead singer, Alan Colmes, had a huge, and I mean HUGE, hit with this song:



And speaking of John Denver, apparently he was easy to please. Just give him some sunshine on his "shoulders". Not on his hands. Not on his face. No, on his shoulders:



And who can forget Kenny Nolan? Apparently me, because who the heck? Yet, this was a big hit in that seventies pantheon. And who doesn't love harp music?



And don't even tell me that when you hear this song:



You don't think of Eddie Murphy. Because I do. And I never hesitate to sing along:

Unce, tice
Fee tines a may-dee

Sure, reunited and it feels so good. To them, maybe:



I sincerely love how Terry Jacks performs this song with so much emotion. As if it really means something (which it doesn't):



And, of course, there are times when a woman has to say what's on her mind, but I'm thinking this is NOT the time:



I really love Glen Campbell, but that doesn't blind me to his missteps. And here's one, albeit another big hit:



So, don't go all nostalgic on me, pining for those lost days of the seventies. The seventies were crap.

I'll grant you, there were some good songs (none of them featured here, obviously). But those good songs were few and far between.

As much as you may want to re-write history, well, here it is.

I may be magnanimous and feature the GOOD songs of the seventies at some point, but really, the good songs aren't what we remember. We remember the crap.

I'm thinking that's why my Google Music selections have so few offerings from that decade. Google (and I) would prefer to just pretend it never happened.

More Seventies! The Number Ones!

Here we are, back to revisit the seventies. I had so much fun with the last post, I decided to keep going! Now, don't get me wrong. I'll admit to a bit of cynicism regarding this decade, but in my last post, I found a bunch of keepers. HOWEVER, as I'm browsing the list of number one songs tonight, I'm beginning to revert back to my original opinion. Interestingly, there are not a lot of number one songs for each year, because, you see, the songs that did reach number one tended to hang on to that spot for several weeks, usually. For example, in 1970, there were only 21 number one songs.

So, to totally drive this topic into the ground, I thought I would choose one number one song from each year. (My standard proviso remains: This is dependent upon what I can find on YouTube.)


1970 - THE PARTRIDGE FAMILY - I THINK I LOVE YOU

Unfortunately, there's a bunch of (bad) acting before the song actually begins. But this was the best I could find. And gee, for a song that so many people hold dear, you'd think there'd be a better video available.

I never really got into the Partridge Family, I guess because I wasn't eleven at the time. I mean, c'mon, they're no Monkees. You know, if you're choosing a pre-fab band, the Monkees are way better. But who am I to stomp all over somebody's cheesy pre-teen memories?


1971 - THREE DOG NIGHT - JOY TO THE WORLD

Let me get this straight....Hoyt Axton threw a bunch of non sequiturs together, and made a "song" that someone actually recorded? Well, cool. Sign me up! I can do that. I mean, really, if you listen to the song, it makes absolutely no sense....I guess, unless you're stoned. And to this day, old Hoyt is sitting back, counting his money.

But I really, really do have to feel sorry for Three Dog Night. Can you imagine having to sing that song over and over and over and over for decades? Face it, the song gets tiresome real fast. I mean, I'm tired of it, and I haven't heard it in about 20 years.


1972 - AMERICA - A HORSE WITH NO NAME

"There were plants and birds and rocks and things". You know, those things. Not plants exactly. I guess, not birds. Or rocks. Hmm....what do you call those things?

"Cuz there ain't no one for to give you no pain". Ahhh. Truer words were never spoken.

America had better songs, but this is a nice folk-rocker, and props for sounding like Neil Young.

However, much like Hoyt Axton, people are going to become suspicious when you just string words together. I'm just saying.


1973 - JIM CROCE - BAD, BAD LEROY BROWN

Hey! Remember that show, "Midnight Special"? I do! You'd turn that on on Friday nights, after you got home from your drunken carousing. Ha Ha! That's not true!

Too bad that this is the song that most people remember Jim Croce for, because he had a whole bunch of really great songs. And, much like, "Joy To The World", this one gets tiresome pretty quickly. But search out Jim Croce videos on YouTube. You'll find some gems.


1974 - STEVE MILLER BAND - THE JOKER

One can never really forget the pompitous of love. If one knew what that meant. But this is one of those songs that never leaves you. I remember driving around, hearing this song on the radio. Cuz they played it every 5 minutes, I think. That's okay. I like it. And it really screams, "seventies"!


1975 - ELTON JOHN - PHILADELPHIA FREEDOM

You may or may not like this song. But I like it. Believe me, if you had been cleaning motel rooms, and pushing your maid's cart from one room to another in the hot sun, this was your only salvation. Thank God for the transistor radio. And you could boogie down as you were stripping sheets off the beds and cleaning toilets. Wow, those heady days of 1975. When I was making $1.25 an hour. Cleaning up after tourists. Ahh, the nostalgia. I can almost smell the Lysol now.


1976 - STARLAND VOCAL BAND - AFTERNOON DELIGHT

Well, I was pregnant when this song came out. And while I didn't have morning sickness, hearing this song could still make me puke.

Enough said. I'm feeling a little queasy just listening to it again.


1977 - ANDY GIBB - I JUST WANNA BE YOUR EVERYTHING

I picked this one because I really kinda like it. The Brothers Gibb also had a number one song that year, coincidentally ~ "How Deep Is Your Love". But I like this one. It's a nice pop song. RIP, Andy. Nice song.


1978 - WINGS - WITH A LITTLE LUCK

FYI ~ Perusing the number one songs from 1978, that year sucked! This is the best I could find. So, I'm nominating 1978 for "worst year ever". Sorry, Matt. I know you were born in 1978, but it's not your fault. But hey, doesn't Paul look young here? (I'm looking for something positive to say.)


1979 - THE EAGLES - HEARTACHE TONIGHT

Whew! I can end the seventies on a high note. I was worried! Thank you, Eagles, and thank you, Glenn Frey. Nice way to end this! And I didn't have to include even one Donna Summer song in this whole post! Lucky for me!

So, we bid a fond adieu to the seventies. Well, maybe not fond, per se. But we do bid ADIEU!

Look for more to come! The eighties are next!