But on Saturday mornings, the radio goes to WKIX 102.9, Carolina's Greatest Hits. Remastered versions of Kasey Casem's American Top 40 play until 10 am. Today's program was from exactly 39 years ago, February 2, 1980. The #1 was Michael Jackson's Rock with You and #2 was Do That to Me One More Time by Captain and Tennille. Having heard Muskrat Love too often I was not a big fan of Captain and Tennille, but my mother was a babysitter for the Tennille family (four daughters) so I'm disposed to be generous.
I like to follow along AT40 by reading the "cue sheets" and looking up the songs on Wikipedia using the kitchen laptop. For example, Rock with You was written by Rod Temperton — perhaps not a household name, but he also wrote Thriller; my favorite song performed by Manhattan Transfer, Mystery; and many more. As I get older, I pay more attention to who wrote lyrics and music, as well as who wrote screen plays for movies and TV. For many popular songs and movies, there is a fascinating story about how the piece came to be performed and produced, a story separate from what we usually hear about the performers themselves. Rock with You was first offered to Karen Carpenter (!) who turned it down. Well, in her defense she probably couldn't imagine what Quincy Jones could do with it. Jones now has 80 Grammy nominations and 27 Grammy awards. I'm not sure he is done yet, even at age 85.
AT40 finishes at 10 am, and then it's just one oldie after another. The game starts, who was the performer and what year did it come out? Most of the time, I can identify the performer and get within 2 years of the date. If Gail is in the kitchen too, between us we almost always can answer those questions. What's interesting to me is that I can usually peg the date by remembering where I listened to the song:
- AM in the 1962 Ford Galaxie? 1972 or earlier.
- AM in the 1972 Olds Cutlass? 1973-1981.
- FM in the 1982 VW Jetta? 1982 onward. This was the first car I owned that had an FM radio.
