Music

ALWAYS ON MY MIND by Willie Nelson.

by generationxrewind

The #1 Country song this week back in 1982 was Willie Nelson’s classic version of Always on My Mind. The single also hit #5 on the Pop chart and #2 on the Adult Contemporary chart. Willie’s other big Pop hit of the eighties was a duet with Julio Iglesias, To All the Girls I’ve Loved Before, which also hit #5 on the top 40 charts.

Always on My Mind was the biggest Country single in 1982. It was the Country Music Association’s Song of the Year for 82 and 83. Nelson won a Best Male Country Performance Grammy Award and the single won Song of the Year and Best Country Song

Nelson’s version in 82 wasn’t the only time the song was a hit. Elvis Presley had a top 20 Country and Pop hit with Always on My Mind in 1972. John Wesley Ryles also had a top 20 Country hit with the song in 1979. The Pet Shop Boys had a #4 Pop hit with their version in 1987. Their version also hit #1 in the UK.

Always on My Mind was originally recorded back in 1970 by B.J. Thomas, but was not released as a single. There are over 300 versions recorded according to AllMusic.

Film

Pretty Woman: The #1 movie this week in 1990.

by generationxrewind

When you talk about the films and the movie stars of the nineties, you cannot have that conversation without mentioning Julia Roberts. Pretty Woman, the movie that made her a star, was the #1 movie this week back in 1990. The film actually first hit number one back in late March but had to take a back seat to The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles for an entire month before roaring back to the top spot for three more weeks.

The movie was originally much darker but it was reworked as a romantic comedy. Pretty Woman and When Harry Met Sally are both films credited with bringing back the genre of rom-coms. The film is still one of the highest grossing romantic comedies of all time.

Roberts was not Director Gary Marshall’s first choice for the film. Karen Allen of Raider’s of the Lost Ark fame was his first choice, but she turned it down. Other actresses who turned down the role include Molly Ringwald, Meg Ryan, Michelle Pfeiffer, and Darryl Hannah.

Music

Disco

by generationxrewind

When the first wave of Gen X kids were coming of age, Disco was riding high on the charts. It was the last Baby Boomer-driven musical movement before the new wave and the pop rock of the early MTV days dominated the airwaves.

Disco had been around for a good part of the seventies but it went into overdrive in December of 1977 when Saturday Night Fever was released into movie theaters all over the world. The 16x platinum soundtrack has sold 45 million copies. It’s the second best selling soundtrack of all time behind The Bodyguard. The soundtrack featured disco classics from The Bee Gees, Yvonne Elliman, and K.C. and the Sunshine Band.

Disco made household names out of Donna Summer and The Village People. Some other artists associated with disco are Sister Sledge, Gloria Gaynor, Anita Ward, and Alicia Bridges. As big as it got, and it got big, disco was pretty much over by 1980. Rock and New Wave was in and Generation X took over from the Boomers. While the National disco party didn’t last too long, It was and is a party that will always be talked about.

What’s your favorite disco song?


Music

ADDICTED TO LOVE. THE #1 SONG THIS WEEK IN 1986.

by generationxrewind

Addicted to Love by Robert Palmer was the #1 song the week of May 3rd, 1986. It was the second single from Palmer’s double platinum album, Riptide. The song was #10 on the year-end charts.

Bernard Edwards, former bassist of Chic produced the single. Andy Taylor of Duran Duran played lead guitar. Taylor and Palmer were bandmates in The Power Station, which had a big hit album the year before. The song was originally intended to be a duet between Palmer and Chaka Khan, but her record company would not let her appear on an album that was on Island Records.

The music video for the song is one of the most iconic of the early MTV era. The video featured Palmer with a band made up of mannequin looking models with pale skin, dark hair, and bright red lips. The video is ranked #3 on VH1’s Top 20 Videos of the 1980s. Several music videos by other artist paid homage to Addicted to Love, most notably, Man, I Feel like a Woman by Shania Twain.

TV

THE MIDNIGHT SPECIAL February 2, 1973 – May 1, 1981.

by generationxrewind

The late night music program, The Midnight Special aired its last show on NBC on May 1st, 1981. The show first appeared as a special in 1972 and then became a regular Friday night program in 1973. The original time slot was 1:00 a.m. to 2:30 a.m. and followed The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson. When Carson’s show went from 90 minutes to one hour The Midnight Special was moved up to 12:30 a.m.–2:00 a.m.

The success of the show proved that Late Night TV could be successful. NBC expanded the time slot to the rest of the week when it premiered The Tomorrow Show later in 1973.

The Midnight Special featured acts from different musical genres, but like another last night music show, Don Kirshner’s Rock Concert, the program was known to showcase acts that you normally would not see on TV. Hard Rock, New Wave, and Album Rock Radio artists like Black Oak Arkansas, Aerosmith, Ted Nugent, Journey, The New York Dolls, Reo Speedwagon, Heart, Blondie, The Cars and Thin Lizzy appeared on the show.

The show left the airwaves a few months before the premiere of MTV. For many Gen X kids who lived in places where you only had R&B, Top 40, and Country stations, or had no concert venues, The late night music shows of the seventies and early eighties were the only way to see or hear a performance from the Rock bands that you only read about in magazines.

Click the image to read about a DVD box set of The Midnight Special via Amazon.

Film

Beetlejuice: The #1 movie this week in 1988.

by generationxrewind

The number 1 movie of the entire month of April in 1988 was Beetlejuice. This was the second feature film directed by Tim Burton. The film starred Michael Keaton as a poltergeist trying to scare away a family who has moved into a home that was formerly occupied by a recently deceased young couple.

The film is considered a comedy classic and took Keaton’s career to another level. It also made a star out of Winona Ryder. Catherine O’Hara and Jeffery Jones played Ryder’s parents, and Alec Baldwin and Geena Davis portrayed the dead couple who died in a car accident and then enlisted the services of Beetlejuice after their attempts to scare away the new owners fail.

The film earned over 73 million at the box office and was the 10th highest grossing film of the year. Beetlejuice won the best make up prize at the Academy Awards and The Saturn awards. It was also won for the best Horror film at the 1988 Saturn Awards.

The film spawned a Saturday morning cartoon that aired on ABC for four years. A stage musical based on the film debuted on Broadway on April 25, 2019.

One interesting note about the film is that Burton’s first choice to play Beetlejuice was Sammy Davis Jr.

Click the image to watch Beetlejuice via Amazon.

Film, TV

THE KARATE KID and the sequels.

by generationxrewind

The Karate Kid is THE martial arts movie of the Generation X era. That is a fact and not even up for discussion. The 1984 film is one of the signature films of the era. The movie was so big, that to this day, it seems like half of the suburban strip malls in America have a Karate or Tae Kwon Do school. Yes, there were plenty of martial art schools before the movie came out, but that particular business went into overdrive after 1984.

The movie was also so big that it spawned 3 sequels: The Karate Kid Part 2 in 1986, The Karate Kid Part 3 in 1989, and The Next Karate Kid in 1994. Pat Morita appeared in all four movies. Ralph Macchio was in the first three films and Hilary Swank was The Next Karate Kid.

There was a short-lived Saturday morning cartoon on NBC in 1989. YouTube Premium has continued the legacy with its show, Cobra Kai. Of the three film sequels, which one is your favorite and why?

Click the image to get all four Karate Kid Movies via Amazon.

Music

WE ARE THE WORLD: #1 song this week in 1985.

by generationxrewind

We are the Word, the Charity single from USA for Africa was the number one song in America this week in 1985. The song was released on March 8, 1985, and spent four weeks on top of the Billboard singles chart.

The song also hit the top of the R&B and Adult Contemporary charts. We Are the World was the first single to ever be certified multi-platinum. It was the biggest selling single of 1985 as well as the entire decade.

We are the World was written by Michael Jackson and Lionel Richie and produced by Quincy Jones and Michael Omartian. The blockbuster hit received three Grammys, one American Music Award and one People’s choice award.

Jackson, Richie and nineteen of the biggest artist of the day contributed vocals to the song. Some of the stars include Stevie Wonder, Kenny Rogers, Tina Turner, Willie Nelson, Cyndi Lauper, Bob Dylan, and Ray Charles. Another twenty stars contributed to the chorus of the song.

After the song was released, 63 million dollars was raised for Humanitarian causes. That equals out to about 144 million dollars today.

TV

Growing up with Baby Boomer TV Shows.

by generationxrewind

For Gen X kids, afternoon TV was not Courtroom or talk shows. There also wasn’t two or three hours of news in the afternoon. Gen X kids came home from school to two hours worth of Baby Boomer TV.

Soap Operas went off the air at 4 pm. The News came on at 6 pm. Between that time, the airwaves were filled with shows from the fifties and the sixties. Batman, Superman, The Lone Ranger, The Beverly Hillbillies, Green Acres, The Monkees, Leave it to Beaver, The Andy Giffith Show, Gilligan’s Island, Dark Shadows, Bewitched, I dream of Jeanie and the list goes on.

What was your favorite afternoon TV show? Did watching boomer TV shows help us relate to people outside of our age group better than younger generations that had their own cable channels to watch?

Music

Full Moon Fever: Tom Petty

by generationxrewind

Hard to believe it’s been this long ago, but today, April 24, 2019, is the 30th anniversary of the debut solo album, Full Moon Fever, from the late great Tom Petty. The album was produced by Jeff Lynn, who also played along Petty in The Traveling Wilburys. Fellow Wilburys George Hamilton and Roy Orbison also contributed to the album. Lynn also doubled as the bass player for the record.

Although this was a solo album, Heartbreaker’s guitarist Mike Campbell was the lead picker on the record. Fellow Heartbreakers Benmont Tench and Howie Epstein also appeared on the album.

Full Moon Fever went to #3 on the album charts and sold over five million copies. The album contains such Petty classics as Free Fallin‘, Running Down a Dream, and I Won’t Back Down.

Buy or Stream Full Moon Fever by Tom Petty by clicking on the Amazon image below.

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