song of the day – “Clones (We’re All)” | ALICE COOPER | 1980.

For whatever reason(s), I’ve been unintentionally lax in my FOREVER YOUNG: MY LIFE STUCK IN THE 80s blog post output so far this year.  Last year, between January 11, 2016 (my first-ever blog post), until June 1, 2016, I had written 111 blog posts.  Not bad for a first-timer.  From January 4, 2017 through today, June 1, 2017, I’ve posted less than half of that 2016 amount.  Well, that changes right now.

On June 15, 2014, Casey Kasem, host of the longtime countdown program, AMERICAN TOP 40, passed away at the age of 82.  From my first blog post (and prolly some more inbetween then and now), I explained how, in 1979, I was a geeky, lanky and somewhat lost 12-year-old living in Central Maine, had a few friends and not a lot of interest in much of anything, but at some point early that year, I discovered AMERICAN TOP 40, and was glued to it every weekend.  Not only could I hear the 40 biggest songs in the country every week, but also Casey’s cool trivia and facts about the songs and the artists, a trait I treasure to this day.  For me, the show was No. 1 with a bullet.  And still is (thanks to the re-airing of broadcasts of AT40 on iHeart Radio).

In honor of my radio hero, Casey Kasem, for the entire month of June, I will be highlighting a song each day (some days will have two songs!) that peaked in the Top 40 of the BILLBOARD Hot 100, and with every blog post, just like on AMERICAN TOP 40, the hits will get bigger with each post.  Today’s “song of the day” (June 1, 2017) will feature a song that peaked at No. 40.  On June 30, I’ll feature a “song of the day” that went all the way to No. 1. 

As Casey used to say on AT40, “And on we go!”

In the 1970s, Alice Cooper was famous for his “snake-eyes” makeup and his being “The Godfather Of Shock Rock,” from Rockin’ songs like “School’s Out,” his first hit, “I’m Eighteen” and “No More Mr. Nice Guy,” and awesome ballads like “Only Women Bleed,” “I Never Cry” and “You And Me.” 

Alice Cooper on the WELCOME TO MY NIGHTMARE tour, 1975.

It was his ballads, actually, that gave Alice Cooper his biggest hits in the 70s, which isn’t really that strange, because if you think about it, just about all of the big Rock bands of the 70s, 80s and even 90s had their biggest success with a ballad (pardon me, that should prolly read “power ballad”) – a list that includes but is not limited to Styx, Journey, Cheap Trick, Foreigner, Scorpions, Night Ranger, The Cars, Boston, REO Speedwagon, Heart, Kiss, Def Leppard, Mötley Crüe, Ozzy Osbourne, Poison, Queensrÿche, Warrant, Winger, Europe, Cinderella, Skid Row, Bad English (featuring John Waite) and Aerosmith, whose big song from the biggest film of 1998, ARMAGEDDON – “I Don’t Want To Miss A Thing” – gave the Boston band not only their first (and sole) No. 1 song, but their biggest hit in the 25 years they had been together at that point.

Well, by 1980, Alice Cooper wanted to try something new.  He ditched the makeup  and recorded the 28-minute album, FLUSH THE FASHION, with popular producer, Roy Thomas Baker, who, in the two years previous to FLUSH THE FASHION, had worked with bands like The Cars, Foreigner, Journey and Queen.

FLUSH THE FASHION had a sort of New Wave influence, and since its release, it has been hailed as a “hidden gem” in the 26 studio albums Alice has released since 1969 (his 27th, PARANORMAL, is scheduled to be released in late July 2017).  At the time of the release of FLUSH THE FASHION, though, many longtime fans were bewildered at the change in Alice’s sound.

Still, FLUSH THE FASHION became Alice Cooper’s biggest album in three years, and returned him to the Top 40 of the BILLBOARD Hot 100 for the first time in two years. 

“Clones (We’re All)” was the first single released from the album, making its debut on the Hot 100 in mid-May 1980 at No. 77, just a few weeks after the release of FLUSH THE FASHION.  “Clones” had risen to No. 51 by early June, and reached No. 40 on July 5, 1980, but, sadly like Blondie’s brilliant “Atomic” (No. 39 that week), both songs lost steam and plummeted down more than half the chart the following week after just nine weeks on the Hot 100.

NERDY AT40 FACT: To my knowledge, “Clones (We’re All)” was actually never mentioned by Casey Kasem, because on that chart dated July 5, 1980, AMERICAN TOP 40 aired a special broadcast of the “AMERICAN TOP 40 Book Of Records” that week, so “Clones” was never even played on AT40 because it was gone from the Top 40 that following week.

“Clones” did have some chart success elsewhere, reaching No. 15 in Canada, No. 36 in Australia, No. 58 in Germany, and somehow all 2 minutes and 51 seconds of “Clones” was serviced to Dance clubs, and it actually reached No. 69 on BILLBOARD’s Dance chart.

Alice Cooper, 1980.

I’m not sure exactly how “Clones,” a song about forced conformity (“I’m all alone, so are we all / We’re all clones / All are one and one are are all…”), came onto my music radar, I just really liked it.  Strangely enough, today was the first time I ever saw the music video for “Clones,” and if videos were as popular then as they would be a year or so later, and if the 13-year-old version of myself had seen Alice’s frail-looking and somewhat menacing appearance, I am not sure if I would have changed my mind about the song.  But, honestly, whatever attracted me to this odd and yet topically-interesting song still attracts me to it 37 years later.

After “Clones” and FLUSH THE FASHION, his next few albums fizzled and most of the 80s were not good to Alice Cooper.  But, by 1989, he was on a new record label and returned with a vengeance with the album TRASH, his first Platinum album since 1975, which featured the biggest hit of his career – no, not a power ballad this time – the Hard Rockin’ “Poison.”  That song was certified as a Gold single and reached No. 7 on the Hot 100, plus it reached the Top 10 in (at least) the U.K., Australia, Austria, Canada, Holland, Ireland, Norway and Sweden.  Alice Cooper was back. 

From the “Poison” music video…

In 1992, Alice appeared as himself in the highly successful and fun film adaptation of the SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE skit, WAYNE’S WORLD, where he performed at a concert and got his intellectual on about Milwaukee, Wisconsin backstage with Wayne (Mike Meyers) and Garth (Dana Carvey).  In my humble opinion, they’re all worthy.

On top of a new album release this summer (an album which features contributions from Larry Mullen of U2 and Billy Gibbons of ZZ Top, among others), Alice will be co-headlining a tour in August with Deep Purple and Edgar Winter.

You know, regardless of chart positions, I’ve always found it interesting how there’s no rhyme or reason to which songs we choose to like and keep liking and loving over the years, but when when do like and love them, those songs really matter, and will forever. 

On the opposite end of the spectrum, or the radio dial if you prefer, as much as I love radio, and loved being involved in it for the better part of 32 years (so far), you’ve gotta wonder how a commercial and/or conglomerate station determines what songs are deemed “worthy” of being played forever and what songs are left behind.  I suppose that’s been the case all along (I mean, how else can you explain two great songs dropping 53 places out of the Top 40 from one week to the next?). 

I know for me, for many great shows on community stations like WMPG, and for shows like Barry Scott’s “The Lost 45s” and the (unrelated) STUCK IN THE 80s podcast based in Florida, I could never forget the amazing songs I loved from my youth and discovered into adulthood and beyond.  And I was proud to share them for nearly 21 years on my weekly STUCK IN THE 80s radio show on WMPG in Portland, Maine, and will again, because I’m sure I’m not the only one out there that feels this way. 

I love Billy Joel, but every time I hear his overrated “Big Shot,” I can’t help but cringe (The guy’s got a gajillion songs!  Play another one!).  The song jumped from No. 51 to No. 23 on the Hot 100 and stopped at No. 14 three weeks later, and yet it’s been deemed “worthy” for radio eternity by the powers that be.  Play something different, dammit!  Give me 1980’s “Sometimes A Fantasy” every day of the week and twice on Sunday (and look for it in an upcoming blog post, dammit!). 

I don’t know, after listening to commercial stations for nearly 40 years, from the big conglomerate ones to the locally-owned ones with diminutive, covfefe head GMs who think 80s Hard Rock songs should be played back-to-back with the likes of Justin Bieber and Taylor Swift, maybe it’s those programmers and radio heads who are the ones that are clones. 

As I am, unlike these sad folks, not a drone or a clone, I think the best response I can give to that is this simple but appropriate quote from Alice’s mostly-forgotten kick-ass gem from 1980:

“I just want wanna be myself / I just wanna be myself / I just wanna be myself / Be myself / Be myself…”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-q3ly1d-WGw

song of the day – “The Sun Always Shines On T.V.” | a-ha | 1986.

Over the course of the 20 years I’ve been on the air with my little 80s radio show, STUCK IN THE 80s (on WMPG-FM community radio in Portland, Maine), I’ve advocated for those many recording acts who had the one big hit in America and continue to be labeled as “one-hit wonders,” though they had more than one chart hit on the BILLBOARD Hot 100. 

There were nearly 500 artists during the Fall of 1979 through the end of 1989 who really did hit the Hot 100 only the one time.  I call them “(real) one-hit wonders of the 80s,” and I like to try and feature one every week on the blog. 

There are several recording artists remembered for the “one BIG hit” here in the U.S. who actually had more than one Top 40 hit on the Hot 100 and are STILL considered one-hit wonders (thanks to folks like VH1), including Eddy Grant, The Outfield, John Waite, Information Society (who had 2 Top 10 hits), General Public, Quarterflash, ’til Tuesday, Neneh Cherry (another artist with 2 Top 10 hits) and the Oslo, Norway band, a-ha. 

Vocalist Morten Harket, keyboardist Magne Furuholmen and guitarist Pål Waaktaar-Savoy formed a-ha in 1982, and on their first album, 1985’s HUNTING HIGH AND LOW, and their second attempt at making the song “Take On Me” into a hit, their lives as they knew it would never be the same again.  “Take On Me” was a massive hit in Norway and beyond, reaching No. 1 in 10 countries worldwide (including the U.S.), and the Top 10 in another 8 countries, and parent album, HUNTING HIGH AND LOW, was a global hit as well.

I adore “Take On Me” and its sensational and creative video, and have for many years, but it was the follow-up single, “The Sun Always Shines On T.V.,” that made a-ha a part of my life for all-time.

“The Sun Always Shines On T.V.” was the third single overall released from HUNTING HIGH AND LOW, but the second single from the album released worldwide.  It made its way onto the BILLBOARD Hot 100 the end of November 1985 and debuted in the Top 40 in January 1986.  It climbed steadily until pausing at No. 20 for a week in late February 1986, and spent 17 weeks on the chart.  The trio would make one more appearance on the Hot 100, with 1986’s “Cry Wolf,” which reached No. 50.

Though I was disappointed in the Stateside chart performance of “The Sun Always Shines On T.V.,” I took comfort in the fact it was well-received around the world, reaching the Top 10 in Austria, Belgium, Canada, Denmark, Finland, Germany, Holland, Norway, South Africa, Sweden, Switzerland and the BILLBOARD Dance chart.  In Ireland and the U.K., where “Take On Me” had stopped at No. 2, “The Sun Always Shines On T.V.” reached No. 1 in both of those countries, which was indeed validating, not only for the band, but also for my love of the song.

The video for “The Sun Always Shines On T.V.” starts as a epilogue to the “Take On Me” video, where an animated Morten Harket realizes he can’t stay in the world of his young love interest, and heads back to the comic book world where he came from.  The video then turns into an impressive performance piece, set in a former English Gothic church (still owned by the Church of England), loaded with very interesting European mannequins (which are WAY different than your run-of-the-mill American mannequins).

The editing of this video is magnificent.  Just setting up the hundreds of mannequins in the church as an orchestra, chorus, and patrons must have taken many hours if not days.  Also validating in my love for this song and its video is that, in a year where “Take On Me” won 6 MTV Video Music Awards, the video for “The Sun Always Shines On T.V.” deservedly won the band 2 more: Best Editing and Best Cinematography.  It remains as one of my all-time favorite videos.

a-ha is still around today, and in their native Norway, every studio album they released between 1985 and 2005 reached No. 1 on the Norway album chart.  And, their most recent albums, 2009’s FOOT OF THE MOUNTAIN, and 2015’s CAST IN STEEL, reached No. 2. 

I know everyone has their own opinions on what or what not constitutes an artist being a one-hit wonder.  American radio stations, DJs and venues like VH1 have a stranglehold on which songs they think people should remember over others.  Luckily, WMPG is not one of those stations, and I sure as hell am not one of those DJs.  Yes, I realize there is a whole other world going on that has much more important issues than whether or not someone was a one-hit wonder.  But, in the world in which I live and breathe every day of my life – the 80s music world – a-ha is NOT a one-hit wonder.  And “The Sun Always Shines On T.V.” is my proof…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a3ir9HC9vYg

wouldn’t it be good.

To borrow from Nik Kershaw’s 1984 gem of a song, wouldn’t it be good to be on your side (or my side) of the subject of one-hit wonders?  What do you think of when you think of a one-hit wonder?  You think of a band or a singer who had one big hit, and that’s it, right?  What 80s one-hit wonders come to mind right away for you?  a-ha?  Falco?  Men Without Hats?  Eddy Grant?  Information Society?  The Outfield?  ’til Tuesday?  Madness?  For the record (no pun intended), NONE of these acts were one-hit wonders here in America.  In fact, every one of the acts listed above had multiple Top 40 hits, and in some cases, multiple Top 20 hits on the BILLBOARD Hot 100. 

Well, if you’re surprised that the artists listed above had more than one hit, don’t blame yourself; most people feel that way.  It’s not at the fault of the people, it’s radio stations and media outlets like VH1 who, over the years, “determine” what songs are the ones worth remembering, and what songs get left behind, despite what imprint they may have left on the singles chart.  And I love radio.  

In 2009, VH1 did a show on the “Greatest One-Hit Wonders Of The 80s,” and I responded with a show on STUCK IN THE 80s, titled “Why I Wasn’t A One-Hit Wonder,” featuring hits by artists listed above and other artists who appeared on VH1’s list like Thomas Dolby, John Waite, Devo, Frankie Goes To Hollywood, A Flock Of Seagulls and Dead Or Alive.  I don’t know who put this bullshit list together for VH1, but if I recall, nearly 75% of the list was inaccurate.

Later that year, in advance of their first Portland, Maine show, I had the amazing opportunity to interview Dave Wakeling, the voice and force behind The English Beat and General Public.  Knowing General Public had more than one hit (“Tenderness” in 1984 and their brilliant cover of The Staple Singers’ “I’ll Take You There” in 1993), I had played “I’ll Take You There” on my “Why I Wasn’t A One-Hit Wonder” show, and asked Dave if it bothered him that General Public, according to VH1, was referred to as a one-hit wonder (“Tenderness” was No. 77 on the list):

“[VH1] asked me to be involved in that, and I sent them a list of [our] hits, and I was like, ‘Sadly, we can’t be involved in a one-hit wonder [show], can we?’  So, I told him that I thought they were barking up the wrong tree, and beating a dead horse, and it seems to be something, I think it stems more from VH1 than anything else, to try and marginalize or even ridicule the 80s somehow, and most of the people working on those damn programs weren’t even there; with their young sarcastic tones.  I put the guy in his place, frankly.  And, I said, ‘Even if I was a one-hit wonder, it’d be one more than you, mate, wouldn’t it?!’  Or, as my dad used to say, ‘Better to have been a has been than a never-bleeding wozzer!’”

Between late 1979 and the end of 1989, there were nearly 500 (real) one-hit wonders of the 80s.  Once a week, prolly on Mondays, I’ll feature a (real) one-hit wonder of the week.  For me, being the chart nerd I am (I have warned you of this), a (real) one-hit wonder was a artist that reached the BILLBOARD Hot 100 just one time, whether it was a No. 1 hit, like M’s “Pop Muzik,” a Top 10 hit like Soft Cell’s cover of “Tainted Love,” a Top 40 hit like Laid Back’s “White Horse,” or a song that just squeaked into the Hot 100 at No. 96, like “The Only Way Is Up,” by Yazz & The Plastic Population, a song that actually spent 5 weeks at No. 1 in the United Kingdom.  And with nearly 500 (real) one-hit wonders of the 80s (including the aforementioned Nik Kershaw), I could do this as a weekly feature for many years to come.  Stay tuned…