Saturday, September 3, 2011

Every sha-la-la-la, every wo-wo-wo still shines (The Carpenters)

Greg's blog talked about the radio the other day and this got me thinking about great songs that are about the radio.

I love songs about the radio. Here are my top five:

1Yesterday Once More (The Carpenters)

(keep watching for an oldies medley)


2 Overnight Sensation (The Raspberries)

(beware the long title intro)


3 Caravan (Van Morrison)



4 Crusin' Music (The Raspberries)

5 On The Radio (Donna Summer) (it was a toss up for 5th place between this and Joni's You Turn Me On, I'm a Radio which is also great from the title on down but Donna's hystrionics won the day)
Surprised that my favourite is Yesterday Once More (The Carpenters)? I was a little bit too, because, really - the Carpenters?

Never cool, always the other side of twee thanks to Richard Carpenter's hair and shocking dress sense (and vocals!), and something of a guilty pleasure.

But they had a secret weapon. Karen Carpenter's voice. A thing of beauty it was to be sure.

The Raspberries were just a great Badfinger style Beatles influenced group (with a Who obsession as well). These two songs acknowledge how much they loved the radio and specifically how much they loved hearing themselves on the radio. I like this idea that they are also music fans (same with the Carpenter's song).

Same goes with Van the man. I love this ode to the radio - turn it up indeed!