"Trouble In Paradise" by Jarreau

1983 / #63

Rate Your Music score: 3.04 out of 5!

Ever spend decades trying to identify an old song you used to hear?

AM radio in our area in the early 1980s was in an MOR malaise. When a local AM station finally switched to a new format of current rock, my parents refused to add it to the presets on the car radio for months. I listened to this station on the way to and from school in 5th grade, but that was a pretty short distance, and my parents usually controlled the radio the rest of the time.

This means much of the music I heard on the car radio was geared to a grownup fan base. I wouldn't say this music was always bad. Some of it is at least listenable, and most of it reached the pop chart. But this softer music just wasn't what I was usually interested in when I was young.

Music evokes memories. For 40 years, I had the opening of a song stuck in my head that I couldn't identify. I associated it with all of the zillion stations that played music for the oldsters - and, by extension, their angry lectures that were so common then. How I longed for those days! At least that was better than putting up with The Today Show lately.

Just recently, with the help of YouTube, I figured out this unidentified song was a lost hit by Al Jarreau - back when he used only his last name. It turns out that it was popular right when the MOR madness was starting to let up for a few years. It never went away completely, of course, but it was less of a factor through the mid-1980s.

This wasn't the only oldie that took a long time for me to identify. I identified "Romeo's Tune" by Steve Forbert about 10 years after it was popular. I know there was a 1960s-era song that used a melody that's strikingly similar to a longtime opening theme to National Geographic specials, but I can't identify it. A YouTube commenter called the National Geographic theme "the music of intelligence", because those specials were indeed much smarter than the crap that fills the TV airwaves now.

"Take It Away" by Paul McCartney

1982 / #10

Rate Your Music score: 3.78 out of 5!

Time for some 4th grade memories!

When I entered 4th grade, "Take It Away" was one of the songs everyone in my class absolutely loved. The others were "Eye Of The Tiger" by Survivor and "Don't Fight It" by Kenny Loggins with Steve Perry. Someone even brang a record of Kenny and Steve's hit to class one day. I don't know why, because it's not like the school would let us wear down the motor in their precious record player by listening to it.

"Take It Away" inspired some obvious commentary during serious school projects. One day, there was an assignment we had to read in front of the class. One student stood up to read his assignment, and the teacher said, "Take it away." I knew exactly what would happen next. Another student immediately lapsed into a rousing chorus of the Paul McCartney tune.

The teacher was MAD!!!!!

I got kicked out of her class for good in the middle of the school year. Teachers there had a higher turnover rate than students did though. That was the year the school replaced 75% of its instructors.

People remembered "Take It Away" years after it misappeared from radio. When I was a high school freshman, science class was taught by an aging nun. One day, a student was playing with some toy in class, like a yo-yo or something. The nun angrily warned, "Put it away or I'll take it away."

Guess what happened? Yep! That rousing chorus was again heard!

This is like when my 1st grade teacher sent kids to the "time-out room" and said, "Let's go." That was when the Cars had a hit with that title, so somebody would inevitably erupt in song.

Take it away!

"Club At The End Of The Street" by Elton John

1990 / #28

Rate Your Music score: 2.87 out of 5!

Even superstars have lost hits.

The year 1989 saw stunning comebacks of acts who enjoyed their peaks of success in the 1970s. We had "One" by the Bee Gees, "This Time I Know It's For Real" by Donna Summer, and "Call It Love" by Poco - all of which are now lost hits. I remember that Power 94½ began playing each of those hits weeks before Q-102 did. That was true of most new records, in fact. Those tracks are in a different category from "Soldier Of Love" by Donny Osmond, because I just assumed Donny was politically connected enough that stations would add him right out of the box. He has espoused some right-wing stances in interviews. True to form, his record charted higher than the others.

Elton John never needed a comeback, because he was always putting out hit after hit. The lost hit we're profiling in this entry helped vault him into the 1990s.

It's about a club at the end of the street.

Most folks I knew didn't have a club at the end of their street. They usually had a trash dump, an ill-placed stop sign, or a creek where people threw bodies, but rarely a club. Not even a Honeycomb Hideout. But Elton took exception to this misrule.

This song is noteworthy because of what happened one weekend at an important family gathering at my grandparents' house. This record kept coming on the radio, and I kept calling it "Club On Sesame Street." A younger cousin thought that was absolutely hilarious.

It was one of the highlights of the decade!