Rant #2,582: Knock Three Times

 

Well. Let’s start off by adding Cicely Tyson to the list that I wrote about yesterday.

 
She was an ageless wonder as an actress, and she passed at age 96 yesterday … not quite the age she was in her most famous role in “The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman,” but awful close to it in real life.
 
She also starred in many other TV shows and moves, including “Sounder/”
 
That film came out in 1972, which means that it was probably shot in 1971, and that is the year I am going to focus on today, 50 years ago this week.
 
For the first time in about six months, we are going to look today at the top songs on the Billboard Hot 100 50 years ago almost to the day.
 
So much has happened in the world during the past six months that I had to drop this monthly feature because, well, there were so many other things to talk about during that period, but today, finally, while the world is still a mess, we can take a few minutes and look at what people were listening to on January 30, 1971, when no one could imagine that 50 years later, we could ever be in the state that we are in today.
 
There were concerns back then, of course, but who could ever believe that we would be in a civilization that begged us to stay away from each other for our own safety?
 
So it is appropriate that 50 years later, the number 10 song on the chart was “Stoney End” by Barbra Streisand, a song written by Laura Nyro that was recorded by many artists. Hopefully, that name doesn’t apply to where we are going as a civilization today, but whatever the case …
 
The number nine song on the chart was the Osmonds’ “One Bad Apple,” and while this song didn’t spoil the whole bunch, girl, the song was reportedly turned down by the Jackson 5 during their dominant period on the chart.
 
Elton John’s “Your Song” came up at number eight on the chart this week, one of the long string of hits the singer-songwriter had that stretched into the 2000s.
 
A remake of an old song came in at number seven, and Dave Edmunds took “I Hear You Knocking” to that height on the Hot 100 this week. Edmunds later re-emerged as a popular singer, songwriter and producer during the new wave period in music, producing the Stray Cats, among others, and having some mild hits on his own.
 
King Floyd’s smooth soul came up at number six on the chart, with “Groove Me” coming in just outside the Top Five. This was the New Orleans native’s biggest hit.
 
Country crossovers were big in 1971, and “Rose Garden” by Lynn Anderson was one of the biggest of these tunes, coming in at number five this week. Anderson had many country hits, but this was far and away her biggest hit on the pop charts.
 
The 5th Dimension had established themselves as probably the top pop group in the country by 1971, and their string of hits continued with “One Less Bell To Answer,” which came up at number five on the chart this week. The song was written by Burt Bacharach and Hall David.
 
The Bee Gees were huge hit makers well before the disco days, and one of their biggest hits was “Lonely Days,” which was at number three on the chart this week.

 
Double-sided hits were all the rage 50 years ago, and George Harrison’s “My Sweet Lord”/”Isn’t It a Pity” was one of the biggest of these double hits, this week residing at number two on the chart, falling from its number one listing of just a few weeks earlier.
 
And the number one record of the week, and a song that stayed at the top spot for three weeks, was—
 
“Knock Three Times” by Dawn. Led by Tony Orlando, this act had many hits during the early 1970s and became ubiquitous on TV, which is ironic because the act was originally solely a bubblegum studio act, but became so huge that Orlando was joined by later TV actresses Telma Hopkins and Joyce Vincent as backing vocalists, and they became one of the most popular acts of the decade.
 
The highest debut record on the chart was “Mama’s Pearl” by the aforementioned Jackson 5. The song debuted at number 47 on the Hot 100, and it eventually became a number two hit for the family clan.
 
The biggest mover on the chart, or the song that moved up the most places from one week to this week, was that aforementioned “One Bad Apple” by the Osmonds, which jumped up to number 9 from number 34 that is rested at the previous week. The tune would eventually hit the number one spot and stay there for five weeks,
 
So there you have it … let’s see, back in 1971 at this time, I was 13 going on 14 years of age, in junior high school in eighth grade at I.S. 72 in Rochdale Village, South Jamaica, Queens, and the only time I wore a mask was during Halloween, which I don’t think at this point I participated in anymore, and I know that I wondered whether I should or not being that I was one year removed from my bar mitzvah, and thus was a “man” and not a “kid” anymore.
 
If only I had such problems to work through today.
 
Have a good weekend, and I will speak to you again on Monday.