Over the weekend, we started looking at the 20 records that peaked at Number 98 on the Hot 100 between 1955 and 1986. In this installment covering the last 10, we pick up in 1967.
“Walkin’ Proud”/Pete Klint Quintet (10/21/67). This group, from Mason City, Iowa, packed ‘em in around the Midwest in the 1960s, and are, according to their Iowa Rock and Roll Music Association Hall of Fame page, one of the most successful groups in Iowa recording history. Now when it comes to producing rock stars and classic recordings, Iowa ain’t Liverpool or anything, but listen to “Walkin’ Proud” and then try to tell me it ain’t a really good pop record.
“Dear Delilah”/Grapefruit (3/2/68). Like Jackie Lomax, Grapefruit benefited from an association with the Beatles, but not enough to become more than a footnote. They were managed by an associate of Brian Epstein’s, John Lennon gave the band its name and appeared at press conferences introducing them, and Paul McCartney directed a video for them. All of this explains why Around Grapefruit, a compilation of single releases, sounds the way it does. The group’s second album, conceived as a whole, abandoned the Beatlesque sound, with a predictable result.
“Happy”/Hog Heaven (5/1/71). At the close of the 1960s, an exhausted Tommy James moved out to the country and found Jesus, leaving the rest of the Shondells to do what they could on their own. They formed a band called Hog Heaven, which hung around long enough to make one album.
“Top of the World (Make My Reservation)”/Canyon (7/25/75). Canyon is a band of hazy origin, produced by bubblegum masters Jerry Kasenetz and Jeff Katz, that recorded at the studio K&K built on Long Island. Kasenetz/Katz productions tended to be less sugary than many other bubblegum records, and some of them could rock, like the demented “Quick Joey Small,” a particular favorite of this blog. “Top of the World” certainly does, although its good-time boogie would have sounded a little bit dated even in 1975.
“Foot Stompin’ Music”/Hamilton Bohannon (9/20/75). Originally hired by Stevie Wonder as a drummer in 1965, Bohannon eventually became the arranger and bandleader for Motown’s live shows before the label departed Detroit for Los Angeles in the early 70s. After that, recording under his own name, he scored a string of club hits, including “Foot Stompin’ Music,” that also got some airplay on R&B radio before things slowed for him in the 80s. He hasn’t recorded since 1990.
“Chinese Kung Fu”/Banzaii (10/11/75). In late 1974, Carl Douglas scored an international hit with “Kung Fu Fighting.” “Chinese Kung Fu” is”Kung Fu Fighting” turned inside out—it uses the same chords, and it’s possible to sing the same lyrics to it. And it’s also easy to imagine it as a dance-floor monster.
“Tubular Bells”/Champs’ Boys Orchestra (6/5/76). A disco version of the theme from The Exorcist, which was backed on some 45 releases by a disco version of Chuck Mangione’s “Land of Make Believe.” It’s actually not horrible.
“Say You Love Me”/D.J. Rogers (7/10/76). A lovely piano-driven ballad that deserved a better fate. Certainly Rogers thought so. When “Say You Love Me” and a handful of his other singles failed to hit big, he was quoted in Soul magazine blaming RCA Records for its failure to promote him properly, suggesting that the label was a tax write-off for RCA’s parent company. Several of Rogers’ later releases hit the R&B charts in the late 70s and early 80s before he started to record gospel. Today, he’s a preacher in Los Angeles.
“You to Me Are Everything”/Revelation (8/7/76). “You to Me Are Everything” is a terrific song—so terrific that three versions of it were on the Hot 100 at the same time, by the Real Thing (a version that topped the charts in Britain), Broadway, and Revelation. The competition couldn’t have helped the chart performance of any of ‘em.
“The Part of Me That Needs You Most”/Jay Black (9/20/80). Jay Black was the Jay of Jay and the Americans, and this is pretty much the sum total of his solo career. “The Part of Me That Needs You Most,” written by Mike Chapman and Nicky Chinn, was also recorded by Exile, B.J. Thomas, and Billy Crash Craddock. The most notable fact about Black’s version is that it spent four weeks on the chart, three of them at Number 98.
When I started exploring the bottom of the charts during One Hit Wonder Week in September, I thought we might unearth some interesting history, but I had no idea how much. So you can bet that another installment, on Number 97 next time, is not far off.
“Dear Delilah”/Grapefruit (buy it here)
“Happy”/Hog Heaven (seven-minute album version of the 3:39 single; buy the album here)
Filed under: Forgotten 45, One Hit Wonders, Record Charts, Tracks | Tagged: Champs' Boys Orchestra, D.J. Rogers, Hamilton Bohannon, Hog Heaven, Pete Klint Quintet
jb, I couldn’t agree more on the PKQ record. Of the two “Walkin’ Proud”s KDWB played in 1967, it was a much stronger performance than the Marlys Roe & The Talismen version from six months earlier. Pete sure had the chops.
If Grapefruit’s “Dear Delilah” was influenced by the Fabs, to my ears, it sounds like the final rinse was filtered through ‘Bee Gees’ 1st’ and ‘Horizontal.’
Never heard the competing versions of “You to Me Are Everything,” but The Real Thing’s version has always been an underrated favorite of mine. It got some airplay in Chicago (I recall both dance station WGCI and adult-contemporary WYEN playing it) even though it wasn’t a huge hit.
You’re probably familiar with the Ass End of the 80s over at Popdose – every song in the 80s that failed to hit the Top 40. I recognize only about 20 percent of them, and some I hoped to have forgotten…
There’s a good remix of the Tubular Bells song too: