Redartz: Season's greetings, one and all! For a bit of a holiday indulgence, today we've pulled the ol' Retro Metro out of the garage for a trip back to the middle of December, 1976. Just to get a taste of the festive excitement and cultural diversion we all enjoyed waaaay back then...
First off, here's a look at the popular music that might have been playing while we eagerly scoured the Sears Wishbook for Christmas treasures . But to be honest, at that time I wasn't actually wishbooking, I was going out on my very first date (yes, with an actual girl; took her to see "2001: A Space Odyssey" at the local cinema; might explain why I never got a second date with her).
Popular on the US Billboard charts:
"Tonight's the Night" by Rod Stewart
"The Rubberband Man" by The Spinners
"Muskrat Love" by The Captain and Tennille
"More Than a Feeling" by Boston
"Sorry Seems to Be the Hardest Word" by Elton John
Apparently the impact of the holiday season on the US pop charts in 76 was minimal. Although, the Captain and Tennille hosted a televised Christmas variety special , joined on the schedule by Bing Crosby's White Christmas Special and Perry Como's Christmas in Austria.
Meanwhile, across the big pond...
High on the UK Music charts:
"Under the Moon of Love" by Showaddywaddy
"When a Child is Born" by Johnny Mathis
"Somebody to Love" by Queen
"Portsmouth" by Mike Oldfield
"Bionic Santa" by Chris Hill
At least in the UK there was some holiday spirit represented on the audio airwaves. Johnny Mathis for the traditional types. And "Bionic Santa" for the more contemporary. I'd never heard of this, and had to investigate. So here it is...
Quite amusing; much like the 'break in' comedy records of Dickie Goodman that chuckled up the pop charts in the early to mid 70's.
Of course the Christmas season was well in evidence on the television airwaves by mid-December. 1976 saw the debut "Rudolph''s Shiny New Year", a sort of sequel to the classic 1964 Rankin/Bass "Rudolph".
If you were scanning the channels during those wintry weeks, you also might have caught Frosty the Snowman, and the Grinch.
You just gotta love Jimmy Durante belting one out in the snow!
And everyone knows that you don't get to watch all that tv wonderment without paying the price in commercial advertising. So here are several such ads that would have been running back then. How could anyone ever forget the Norelco Santa riding his shaver?
Ronald McDonald gets into the holiday act, along with a few friends...
Next up, a familiar tune from the folks at Coca Cola...
And finally, for all those who invited 'Andre for the holidays'...
Meanwhile, down the street at the local magazine vendor, the spinner racks were full of four color holiday fun. Archie and the 'kid' books were more winter themed, but Marvel certainly had some spirit. Always loved that Spider-Man cover. Incidentally, DC was kind of sparse with the Christmas covers this season...
And there you have it, folks: Hope this evoked a few fond memories for those of us who were around at the time. I also hope you share some of those memories, thoughts, impressions, good feelings and bad jokes. From your friends at BitBA to all of you, the very best of wishes for the holidays and the year to come!
14 comments:
Happy Holidays Red! Merry Xmas Ho! Ho! Ho!
I'll be reading this all week! SO! MUCH! HERE!
This must have taken you hours to put together so I hope Santa and his Elves are extra good to you this year!
I'll also need to show the now-officially-all-adult kids, who are home for the Holidays!
Cheers All!
I was listening to "When A Child Is Born" on YouTube a few days ago. It was at #2 in this particular week but rose to #1 on December 21st 1976. The song's okay but the speaking bit in the middle makes me cringe. A much better festive tune from 1976 is "Ring Out Solstice Bells" by Jethro Tull which is one of the few Christmas songs I can listen to more than once at this time of year.
I always have appreciated the depth of research in these posts - wonderful!
Lots of memories up and down the post. Rubberband Man remains a favorite song, as does Boston's More Than a Feeling (although it is admittedly overplayed on the classic rock stations). Love the nod to holiday specials.
Regarding Avengers #157, young Doug experienced some major disappointment when - right after the epic crossover with Super-Villain Team-Up - we got a fill-in issue. With art by Declining Don Heck no less. Thank goodness #158 soon landed and featured one of the best superhero slugfests of all time.
Thanks for today's fare, Red!
Doug
Well, I was only four in 1976, so I don't really remember much, but I've seen most of those Xmas specials at one time or another (and I do remember Santa on the electric razor!) Some cool comics too: Stegron in Amazing, Vandal Savage in All-Star, and Hulk vs Absorbing Man. Then there's the Calculator ... can't all be winners, I guess.
I've just taken a look at the UK Christmas chart for 1976.
As Colin says, Johnny Mathis was Number One but I've never been overly gripped by that one.
Among the singles I do approve of, on that chart, are:
3. ABBA - Money Money Money.
6. ELO - Livin' Thing.
19. 10cc - The Things We Do For Love.
21. Elton John - Sorry Seems to be the Hardest Word.
31. Boney M - Daddy Cool.
36. Rod Stewart - Maggie May. Though not totally sure why that reappeared on the chart in 1976.
37. Julie Covington - Don't Cry for me, Argentina.
38. The Sex Pistols - Anarchy in the UK. (It's so Christmassy!).
47. Rod Stewart - Sailing. I think that was back on the chart courtesy of being used as the theme tune to a fly-on-the-wall documentary series about the Ark Royal aircraft carrier.
I think it was that Christmas that I got Origins of Marvel Comics, Son of Origins of Marvel Comics and Bring on the Bad Guys for Christmas. It was, therefore, a very special Christmas for me.
Huh. I don't remember Bionic Santa at all. Its cut and paste aesthetic sampling seems well ahead of the curve (Double Dee & Steinski eat your heart out).
Mind you, comedy records were always where developments came from in the British music biz - I believe most of the techniques used on Sgt Pepper came from George Martin's experience producing records for the Goons before he ever met the Beatles.
Hope you lot all have a good Christmas/Hannukah/Saturnalia/whatever you're into.
And Doug, sorry to see your B&W blog go quiet (hopefully its not permanent). I didn't always comment, but enjoyed it a lot. Thanks.
-sean
Thanks for the feedback, guys!
Charlie- Best season's greetings to your kids, too. Let us know what they think of our vintage 70's trivia and esoterica...
Colin- ah, another tune for me to look up. Thanks for the tipoff on Jethro Tull; never knew they had a holiday offering.
Doug- glad you enjoyed it. These posts have always been rather labor intensive, but also fun. It was nice to revisit. And yes, that Avengers fill in was a letdown. Another example of that all-too-common Dreaded Deadline Doom at 70's Marvel.
Mike W.- totally agree on the Calculator. About a year ago I picked up that Detective issue at a flea market, thinking I was in for a Marshall Rogers treat. Art was fine, but story wasn't much. The Calculator was a walking 'deux ex machina'; his head piece could do about anything.
Steve- man, with those books as gifts, you had a fine Christmas indeed! Instant library of classics...
Sean- fascinating comments about British comedy records. George Martin had some experience therein? Intriguing. Actually, I can also imagine John Lennon doing some comedy; he certainly showed some humor (especially on the Christmas fan club recordings)...
Damn, late again - I've been getting slain with work the past few weeks, and I always forget to check BitBA out on Tuesdays.
Anyway, nice to see the retro-bus again.
Back in the winter of '76, at the tender age of 8, I'm pretty sure I had that issue of Superman Family, but I certainly had the Marvel Treasury. I loved that book so much, esp. the new bridge pages between the reprinted stories that featured the superheroes have a snowball fight in Central Park.
As for the popular songs of the day, I so loved (and still love) "Rubberband Man," but "Muskrat Love" - even today, just remembering that song makes me shudder a bit. I remember how heavily that song was played on the radio back then, and it so grated on my nerves.
"More Than a Feeling" reminds me that both my older sister and brother liked Boston, and bought their debut album and then the follow-up, and as I got older and inherited their joint record collection as they both eventually went off to college, I listened to those albums quite a bit. Still have a soft spot for a bunch of those songs...
Thanks, Sean!
Edo, those two Boston albums were some of the biggest of my middle school years. It's a wonder the band didn't stick.
Doug
I was 8-years-old during the winter of 1976, but turned nine on Dec. 28, and I had copies of those Avengers, Spider-Man, Superman Family (I was nuts for DC's Dollar Comics), and All-Star Comics. Living deep in the 'burbs (Braintree, MA), there was a small, family-owned convenience store nicknamed "Rosie's" - since it was owned by a brash woman in her '50s named Rosie Richardi, also the town's pot dealer - and she kept a decent spinner rack of comics. It was a 2-minute walk from my house, so even in bad weather, it was an easy trip. I purchased a copy of that Avengers at Rosies, but had to walk an additional half-mile to Hennessey's News to purchase Superman Family, since Rosie wouldn't stock it. Too expensive for kids, she told me and my friend Wayne. Bizarrely, when I was a junior in high-school, Rosie was part of my class. She never graduated from high-school and decided to return and finish her final two years. She was 58 when we graduated. Sounds sweet, and it is, but she also introduced us kids to the C-word, and I don't mean "Comics."
There was some great Christmas TV in 1976 - the 1936 Flash Gordon serial (one episode a day), a short season of Johnny Weismuller/Lex Barker Tarzan films and the 1933 King Kong movie (still the best one - ignore the remakes).
FINALLY have a working, accessible laptop again-- and an evening w/out rehearsal to go along with it. Man-- falling 'way behind the team, here!
Christmas '76? I would have just turned 16, yep. First year in our little town's brand new modern-era high school. Sadly, the holidays for these years were becoming seriously marred by a lengthy, protracted fracturing of our parents' marriage-- and so the holiday scene on the homefront had as much angst is it did joy, really. Probably why I'm such an over-the-top Christmas celebrationist as an adult. The season brings me intense joy-- no question.
That particular Avengers story was great indeed-- once you got yerself to accept that the villain was no one other than the flippin' (generally lame) Grey Gargoyle-- ha! And the Hulk/Abomination story, IIRC, was surprisingly poignant in the end. We were also in the early stages of the terrific Claremont/Cockrum initial run of All New X-Men, right? In fact----- would this have been the Christmas where the Sentinels attacked the group during Holiday activities on Times Square? Like, Issue #99 or so? Oh, good stuff, that!
Just heard that Jethro Tull song for the first time yesterday (on "Weasel's Wild Weekend")-- recognized the group instantly, in the face of withering skepticism from wife & daughter. ha! Still have to change the channel if "Muskrat Love" ever comes on, though--- yikes.
Both musically and with the television offerings, the pop-culture landscape seems right on a dividing line, doesn't it? The Norelco commercial was a relic at that point-- and man, Perry Como style Christmas Specials HAD to be uttering their very, very last gasp. Heck, it wouldn't be too long before we'd have that awful KISS TV special soaking up the ratings, IIRC. .
Merry Christmas, Teammates!
(Oh say-- as, like, an administrative side-bar. . . I cannot get Google to find our little community here for love nor money. How do we get them to grant us our existence??)
HB
Rick- great story about Rosie; thanks for sharing! Seems many of us had interesting characters who helped in the acquisition of our beloved comics...
HB- glad you could join us! Hope your Christmas season has been, and continues to be, a great one. Yes, that was the New York/Sentinels story. Great cover on that issue; probably should have included it here.
And yes, the Perry Como type specials were about to fade into obscurity (until Youtube, that is). But that Norelco commercial seemed to have a longevity exceeded only by that of the Tootsie Pop owl commercial (which, unbelievably, still airs occasionally now)...
Oh, and I too have failed to get Google to bring us up. I'll keep on trying, but am beginning to suspect that my tech skills are lacking.
Merry Christmas, Red and Martinex and all others who are reading these deathless words.
Red, when it comes to attracting the attention of search engines, whenever you publish a post, try using the Ping-o-Matic site to announce its existence to the world. You simply paste your site's name and url into the boxes, tick all the little boxes below those and then press, "Send Pings." You can find it here: http://pingomatic.com/
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