Rant #1,953: If It's Windy, Can You Still Light My Fire?

I thought it would be fun to look back at the Summer of Love, look back 50 years and see what the American public was listening to way back when.

Of course, the media is heralding the 50th anniversary of the so-called Summer of Love, because it trumpets the first time that the counterculture had a major impact on social mores in our country.

And the music was what was leading the charge ... or so the media wants you to believe.

I mean, revisionist history is fun, isn't it?

I have said all along that yes, the Summer of Love was an important milestone in our history, but it wasn't as far reaching as some would have you believe.

The No. 1 act in the country, and probably the world at that moment, was the Monkees--not the Beatles, not the Rolling Stones and certainly not the Grateful Dead.

But the media today doesn't find the Monkees "sexy" enough for them to admit that a corporately conceived entity like the Monkees could have been so huge, but heck, they were, and their continued popularity to this day demonstrates just how popular Davy, Micky, Mike and Peter really were.

But back to the music on this date, 50 years ago ...

The No. 1 song in the country on August 4, 1967 was a tune by a new act that defined the current mores, and the rebellion that was ensuing.

"Light My Fire" by the Doors, a rock act that emerged out of the art community on the West Coast, unseated the staid Association's "Windy" at the top of the Hot 100 chart.

Sure, the Association--a West Coast-based pop band that was also hugely popular at the time--toyed with counterculture ethics with its song "Along Comes Mary"--was it about pot?--but they also seemed to be as staid as vocal groups like them had been for decades.

They were about as counterculture as their hair was long, which it really wasn't.

But the Doors were another animal altogether.

Led by Jim Morrison--a military brat who epitomized both the vulnerability and the emerging sexuality of the time--this foursome's tune sitting at the top of the charts pretty much signaled that the counterculture had permeated Middle America.

Well, kinda, sorta.

Certainly, the world's most successful pop acts were letting their hair grow long and wearing the with-it clothes of the time--even the Supremes started to ditch the ball gowns for more current attire--but did the Summer of Love really, truly have that much of an effect on what we were listening to?

Prior to the Doors, the No. 1 singles on the chart during 1967 were about as counterculture as Richard Nixon was. They included tunes by the aforementioned Association, but also songs by the Monkees, the Buckinghams, Nancy and Frank Sinatra, the Turtles, the Rascals and Aretha Franklin.

Sure, No. 1s were also posted by the Beatles and the Rolling Stones, but they were being so entrenched in the framework of that period that they almost don't count as far as the counterculture breaking down our ears.

After "Light My Fire" ran its course, it was back to the acts that preceded it to man the No. 1 spot on the charts.

Sure, the Beatles had "All You Need Is Love" and "Hello Goodbye," but look at the other acts that had No. 1 hits through the end of 1967: Bobbie Gentry, the Box Tops, Lulu, the Strawberry Alarm Clock--a pseudo-psychedelic bunch that was about as counterculture as Barney Fife was--and yes, the Monkees.

Well, one can say that the counterculture didn't embrace the singles market, but back then, that was the way to get into the heads--and ears--of Middle America.

Looking at the album chart, yes, the Beatles' "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band" dominated the Top Album Chart that year, but it unseated the Monkees' "Headquarters" at the top spot.

Others who had No. 1 albums during 1967 were Herb Alpert and the Tijuana Brass, Bobbie Gentry, the Supremes, and the Monkees, who actually had not one, but three No. 1 LPs during the year.

Yes, I am only looking at the top spot on the charts, but that top spot is highly indicative of what people were listening to back in 1967 and during the so-called Summer of Love, when the music did truly matter.

So while there certainly was a Summer of Love, and social mores were certainly changing, let's not get carried away with it as some have been doing.

Certainly things were changing, but not by as much as some people want us to think.

And sadly, even the term "Summer of Love" seems to have become more of a marketing tool than anything else.

So for every Doors and Beatles, there was Frank and Nancy Sinatra to bring people down to earth.

I was 10 years old during that summer, and I loved "Light My Fire," and I loved "Windy."

You could have a happy medium back then, you really could.

And I wasn't smoking banana peels to do it, either.

Have a good weekend. Speak to you again on Monday.