The Way-Back Machine Is Set For September 6, 1969

Every generation thinks that the music they grew up with was the greatest ever. I have some older neighbors who still enjoy their Benny Goodman, Stan Kenton, and Tommy Dorsey albums. And they're not wrong: The Big Band music of their youth was some of the greatest popular music ever made. 

And the same is true for music fans who grew up with jazz, punk rock, hard rock, classic rock, progressive rock, hip-hop, grunge, garage, rap, alternative, folk, country, Emo, roots, electronic dance music, and disco (well, OK, not disco). Over the last 75 years, and across all those genres, there have been countless great artists and outstanding albums that resonate strongly with Boomers and the various X, Y, and Z generations. 

As I wrote in a column a few years ago, nearly everyone identifies most closely with the music that was popular when they were 13-16 years old, i.e. the music we listened to during puberty. It is hard wired into our brains.

That being said, and with all due respect to everyone else's favorite music, the 1960s was the greatest, most influential decade in the history of modern popular music. Full stop.

This thought occurred to me recently when I was checking the "New Album Releases" in the September 6, 1969 issue of Billboard Magazine to try to confirm the reissue date for an LP I picked up called Guitars Galore (left), by the great jazz guitarist George Barnes, originally released in 1961. And, yes (thanks for asking), the Wing/Mercury reissue (SRW-16393) appears in a list of "New Releases" in the September 6, 1969 Billboard Magazine. Whew. [Brief aside: Guitars Galore is an interesting album that showcases an early use of multi-track recording technology to allow Barnes to overdub different guitar parts on each track, creating a sort of George Barnes guitar ensemble. The result is a bit too gimmicky, but it does feature some fine playing by Clark Terry and Al Cohn, so if you happen to see it in the wild for a few bucks, it's still worth picking up.]

As I continued to flip (online) through the September 6, 1969 copy of Billboard, I came to the list of the "Billboard Top LP's" for the week, better known in the industry as the "Hot 200" chart. 

Billboard began publishing a "Top Ten" chart (of the best-selling 78rpm singles) in 1936. The "Hot 100" album chart debuted in 1956, and morphed into the "Top LP's" in 1967, a ranking of the top 200 best-selling LPs for the week. 59 years later, Billboard continues to publish the Top 200 list.

It was interested to check the rankings for the best selling albums in the September 6, 1969 issue. As I've already asserted, the 60s were the pinnacle decade in the history of modern popular music. And 1969 may have been the zenith, culminating in Woodstock, the epic music festival that took place in August of that year, just a few of weeks before this issue of Billboard was released.

Given all that, I was still astounded by the list of chart topping albums for the week of September 6. [Although to be honest, I suspect there are very few weeks in the entire decade that didn't see the release of one or more classic pop or rock masterpieces. And that's not even mentioning all the seminal jazz albums released during the 1960s.]

Without further ado, the top selling album for the week of September 6, 1969 was Johnny Cash at San Quentin. The album had been on the charts for 10 weeks, and was spending its second week in the number 1 spot. It was followed by Blind Faith at number two (after only four weeks on the charts), Blood Sweat & Tears, Best of Cream, the original Broadway soundtrack for the musical Hair, Are You Experienced by Jimi Hendrix, The Doors' The Soft Parade, In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida by Iron Butterfly, Best of the Bee Gees, and the movie soundtrack from Franco Zeffirelli's hit film Romeo And Juliet. Wow.

 

The second ten may be even better, featuring Bob Dylan's Nashville Skyline, This Is Tom Jones, Crosby, Stills & Nash, Led Zeppelin, Bayou Country by Creedence Clearwater Revival, Three Dog Night's Suitable For Framing, Age of Aquarius by The Fifth Dimension, Isaac Hayes' Hot Buttered Soul, Aretha's Gold, and at number 20, the ground-breaking rock opera Tommy by The Who. And just as a bit of icing on the cake, sitting at number 21 was The Chicago Transit Authority. Holy guacamole, what a lineup! If you owned nothing else but these 21 albums you'd be well on your way to an outstanding classic rock collection.

And the stunning thing is that five of these LPs were debut albums: Blind Faith, Jimi Hendrix, Crosby, Stills & Nash, Led Zeppelin, and Chicago Transit Authority. What a time to be listening to and collecting music! I wonder if there has been any other week in the last 56 years that has included such an amazing list of debut performers?

As a testament to the quality of these top 21 albums, the majority of them are still in print. What's more, looking at the entire list of the top 200 albums that week, nearly every album - with a few exceptions - has held up pretty well. A sample of releases further down the list (that were either on the way up or the way down) includes Jack Beck's Beck-Ola, The Beatles (The White Album), Last Exit by Traffic, Arlo Guthrie's Alice's Restaurant, Popcorn by James Brown, and Preflyte by The Byrds.

Skimming through old copies of Billboard is akin to musical and cultural time travel. It's particularly revealing to look at the advertisements to get a real glimpse of the zeitgeist of the time. For example, the September 6, 1969 issue features a full-page ad (right) for a new Saturday morning cartoon series called "The Hardy Boys" about a rock band that tours and solves mysteries wherever they go. It was one of a string of late 60s and early 70s cartoons about rock bands, including the cartoon Beatles, The Archies, and Josie And The Pussycats. 

[Fun fact: The Hardy Boys was one of the first ever integrated cartoons, as the drummer, Pete Jones, was Black.]

Even though I was an aficionado of Saturday morning cartoons during the 1960s, I completely missed the Hardy Boys phenomenon. In fact, until seeing the ad in Billboard, I had never heard of the show. The series produced two actual spin-off albums by The Hardy Boys, which I've also never seen before. Keep your eyes peeled and report back if you come across them. A few of the cartoon episodes and some of the animated music videos from the show are available on Youtube. NB: They have not aged well.

Cassettes and eight-track tapes were introduced in the U.S. in 1964 and 1965 respectively. By 1969, the tape business was booming. The September 6, 1969 issue of Billboard is chock-a-block with trade ads for tape duplicating equipment and services, as well as direct-to-consumer promotions for tape decks. 

One ad (left) asks the burning question: Can a groovy chick like Millie find happiness with the family stereo? The answer is "You Bet!" The small print advises that: "The Roberts cassette deck really 'grooves.' Drop in a cassette, and gloriosky!" Millie just needs to plug her Roberts cassette deck into the family's console stereo (patch cord included!) and rock out (maybe with her Hardy Boys tapes?). 

Naturally, there are also numerous ads in the issue of Billboard promoting new music releases, including classics like the Ike and Tina Turner hit "River Deep - Mountain High," Jeannie C. Riley's "Harper Valley PTA," The Rolling Stones' collection Through The Past Darkly, a Judy Collins' best-of called Recollections, and Nancy Sinatra's new single "Drummer Man," featuring an incredible performance by session drummer Hal Blaine of the Wrecking Crew. [You can watch a live video performance of "Drummer Man" here, taken from Nancy's 1969 live show at Caesar's Palace in Los Vegas. Hal Blaine, playing a kit that appears to have about 25 different drums and cymbals, absolutely burns the place down. Seriously, go watch it now. I'll wait.] 

Perhaps even more interesting are the full-page ads promoting releases by artists who never quite made it, including Any Way That You Want Me by Evie Sands (a very good debut album), Love Of The Common People by The Winstons (no clue), and Make A Joyful Noise by Mother Earth (at left) which features Boz Scaggs on guitar and isn't half bad.

The entire library of Billboard back issues is available here. It's fun to pick a random issue and read the music industry news, enjoy the vintage ads, and check out the new music releases and top sellers for that week. 

Just for fun, I pulled up Billboard's "Best Sellers" listing for December 2, 1957, which reports on the top hits from November 23, the week I was born. If you click on the photo, you can see a larger image. 

I'm pleased to note that the top songs for the week include such classic hits as "You Send Me" by Sam Cooke, "Jailhouse Rock" by Elvis Presley, "Wake Up Little Susy" by the Everly Brothers, "Rock And Roll Music" by Chuck Berry (soon to be made more famous by the Beatles), "Peggy Sue" by Buddy Holly, and, debuting on the list at number 28, the rollicking "Great Balls Of Fire" by Jerry Lee Lewis.

Who knows if I heard these songs as an infant - maybe over the AM car radio or one of those newfangled transistor radios that came out in 1954. Either way, it's interesting that the songs from way back then still resonate with me today. 

Enjoy the music!