#111: Breakdown Dead Ahead by Boz Scaggs
Peak Month: May 1980
15 weeks on Vancouver’s CFUN chart
Peak Position #2
Peak Position on Billboard Hot 100 ~ #15
YouTube: “Breakdown Dead Ahead”
Lyrics: “Breakdown Dead Ahead”
William Royce “Boz“ Scaggs was born in 1944 in Canton, Ohio, 60 miles south of Cleveland. His father was a traveling salesman, and the family moved to Oklahoma and next to Texas. While attending a private school in Dallas, Scaggs met Steve Miller while he was 12-years-old. Scaggs was learning to play guitar and was invited to join Miller’s band the Marksmen. In 1961-62 Boz Scaggs joined Steve Miller’s band the Ardells while the pair were studying university in Madison, Wisconsin. Scaggs followed Miller to Chicago in ’62-’63. Then he went to London and Sweden to perform as a solo artist in concert. While in Sweden, Boz Scaggs released his debut album, Boz, in 1965. The album only sold in Sweden and soon went out of print.
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#112: My Old Man’s A Dustman by Lonnie Donegan
Peak Month: June 1960
11 weeks on Vancouver’s CKWX chart
Peak Position #1
Peak Position on Billboard Hot 100 ~ did not chart
YouTube.com: “My Old Man’s A Dustman (Ballad of a Refuse Disposal Officer)”
Lyrics: “My Old Man’s A Dustman (Ballad of a Refuse Disposal Officer)”
Anthony James Donegan was born in Glasgow, Scotland, in 1931. His dad was a violinist in the Glasgow-based Scottish National Orchestra. Donegan became a fan of swing jazz and country music as he grew. When he was fourteen he got his first guitar. In the late forties “Tony” Donegan had learned how to play the banjo. Bandleader Chris Barber heard Donegan and had him audition for his Trad Jazz band. Tony Donegan played with the Trad Jazz band for a few years until he was called up for National Service that included three months of military training. While in the National Service in Southampton, England, Donegan played drum in Ken Grinyer’s Wolverines Jazz Band. In 1952 he began the Tony Donegan Jazzband. On June 28, 1952, Donegan’s band opened a concert for Lonnie Johnson at the Royal Festival Hall in London. Johnson was an American jazz and blues singer and pioneer of jazz guitar and jazz violin. Tony Donegan decided to bill himself as Lonnie Donegan in tribute to Lonnie Johnson.
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#113: Whip It by Devo
Peak Month: January 1981
15 weeks on Vancouver’s CFUN chart
Peak Position #2
Peak Position on Billboard Hot 100 ~ #14
YouTube.com: “Whip It”
Lyrics: “Whip It”
Mark Allen Mothersbaugh was born in 1950 in Akron, Ohio. He attended Kent State University in Ohio and met fellow students Gerald Casale and Bob Lewis. Mothersbaugh played in a rock band called Flossy Bobbitt. Gerald Vincent Pizzute was born in 1948 in a suburb of Akron. Gerald’s father had changed his name to his foster parents whose surname was Pizutte. But when Gerald was four-years-old, his dad changed his name back to his birth name Robert Casale, and Gerald Pizutte became Gerald Casale. Gerald grew up in Kent, Ohio, and attended the university.
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#114: Let’s Go by the Cars
Peak Month: September 1979
14 weeks on Vancouver’s CFUN chart
Peak Position #1
Peak Position on Billboard Hot 100 ~ #14
YouTube.com: “Let’s Go”
Lyrics: “Let’s Go”
According to AllMusic.com music critic, Jason Ankeny, The Grasshoppers were a rock ‘n roll band from Cleveland who formed in 1962. There were several lineup changes and Benjamin Orzechowski joined the band in 1964 and became the lead singer. Ben Orr, who was born in 1947, went on to be a lead singer in the New Wave band, The Cars. Jeff Niesel, of Rolling Stone Magazine writes that members of the Grasshoppers Fan Club included Diane Akins, the president of the club. She remembers meeting Ben Orr when the Grasshoppers were an opening act when the Beach Boys performed in Cleveland in November, 1964.
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#115: As The Years Go By by Mashmakhan
Peak Month: August 1970
10 weeks on Vancouver’s CKLG chart
Peak Position #1
Peak Position on Billboard Hot 100 ~ #31
YouTube.com: “As The Years Go By”
Lyrics: “As The Years Go By”
Mashmakhan was formed in 1969 in the southwestern Quebec town of L’Île-Perrot, by the Ottawa River near the St. Lawrence. In 1960, Pierre Sénécal, Brian Edwards (born 1943 in Saskatoon, SK), Jim Nuchter and Rayburn Blake first met in Montreal. Drummer Jim Nuchter failed to turn up for a booked performance. Drummer Jerry Mercer (born Newfoundland in 1939) was invited to replace Nuchter. Bass guitarist and vocalist Edwards quit shortly after. But the other three teenagers, Sénécal, Blake and Mercer continued to perform at local Montreal dance halls under names like the Phantoms, Ray Blake’s Combo, and the Dominoes. Sénécal played flute, organ and piano. Rayburn Blake was the lead guitarist.
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#116: The Next Time by Cliff Richard
Peak Month: September 1963
14 weeks on Vancouver’s CFUN chart
Peak Position #1
Peak Position on Billboard Hot 100 ~ #99
YouTube.com: “The Next Time”
Lyrics: “The Next Time”
Cliff Richard was born Harry Roger Webb on October 14, 1940, in the city of Lucknow in Uttar Pradesh, India. In 1940 Lucknow was part of the British Raj, as India was not yet an independent country. Webb’s father worked on as a catering manager for the Indian Railways. His mother raised Harry and his three sisters. In 1948, when India had become independent, the Webb family took a boat to Essex, England, and began a new chapter. At the age of 16 Harry Webb was given a guitar by his father. Harry then formed a vocal group called the Quintones. Webb was interested in skiffle music, a type of jug band music, popularized by “The King of Skiffle,” Scottish singer Lonnie Donegan who had an international hit in 1955 called “Rock Island Line”.
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#117: Have You Ever Seen The Rain/Hey Tonight by Creedence Clearwater Revival
Peak Month: February-March 1971
10 weeks on Vancouver’s CKVN chart
Peak Position #1
Peak Position on Billboard Hot 100 ~ #8
YouTube.com: “Have You Ever Seen The Rain”
Lyrics: “Have You Ever Seen The Rain”
John Fogerty was born in 1945 in Berkeley, California. He was raised in nearby El Cerrito. He learned to play guitar in his youth. In 1959 John Fogerty, Stu Cook and Doug Clifford formed a trio named the Blue Velvets. Based in El Cerrito, California, just north of Berkeley, they were joined in 1960 by John’s brother, Tom, who had been in a band called The Playboys. The Blue Velvets were influenced by Little Richard and other rock ‘n roll greats. They played a number of hits on the radio and their cover of Bobby Freeman’s “Do You Want To Dance,” was an audience favorite. In 1964 the Blue Velvets changed their name to the Golliwogs. They had a Top Ten hit called “Brown Eyed Girl” in San Jose (#7), Fresno (#3) and Miami (#8) in the winter of 1965-66. It was a blues infused tune, but not the same-titled song that Van Morrison would take up the charts the following year.
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#118: Rock Lobster by the B-52’s
Peak Month: April-May 1980
12 weeks on Vancouver’s CKLG chart
1 week Playlist
Peak Position #4
Peak Position on Billboard Hot 100 ~ #56
YouTube.com: “Rock Lobster”
Lyrics: “Rock Lobster”
Frederick William Schneider III was born in 1951 in Newark, New Jersey. He went to college in Atlanta and wrote a book of poetry for one class project. After college, he was a janitor as well as a Meals on Wheels driver. At the time the B-52’s formed, Schneider III had very little musical experience. The B-52’s got their start when the fledgling bandmates played an impromptu number after drinking at a Chinese restaurant in Athens, Georgia. The band played their first real gig in 1977 at a Valentine’s Day party for their friends. Ricky Helton Wilson was born in 1953, and learned to play guitar in the winter of 1972-73. In the summer of 1969, Ricky Wilson met Wilson met Keith Strickland at a marijuana shop. In the following months, Wilson quietly came out as gay to Strickland while the two were in their teens. During mid-1969, both Wilson and Strickland collaborated in writing and performing music, loosely calling themselves Loon, and aspired to perform live. From 1969 to 1971, Wilson and Strickland collaborated with two high school friends in the four-member band Black Narcissus.
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#119: Shaggy Dog by Mickey Lee Lane
Peak Month: December 1964
12 weeks on Vancouver’s CFUN chart
Peak Position #2
Peak Position on Billboard Hot 100 ~ #38
YouTube.com: “Shaggy Dog”
Lyrics: “Shaggy Dog”
Sholom Mayer Schreiber was born in Rochester in 1941. He got a job in the Brill Building, located at 1619 Broadway on 49th Street in the New York City borough of Manhattan. As a songwriter in the late 1950s, Schreiber worked with Neil Sedaka as a touring pianist, and in the fading career of Bill Haley as a songwriter. In 1958, Schreiber recorded a song titled “Toasted Love” credited to Mickey and Shonnie Lane the Bright and Early Kids. “Singing together, Mickey and Shonnie sounded like the Everly Brothers, they danced great together and they had a great look,” said Bernie, who added that a 1959 movie deal with Warner Bros. put together by their manager Kay Twomey fell through when the siblings declined to move to California. Shonnie died in 1987. In 1959, billing himself as Mickey Lane, his song “It’s Love” was recorded by the Adrissi Brothers. According to AllMusic.com, Mickey Lee Lane also “floated around as a member of the Bell Notes” of “I’ve Had It” Top Ten hit fame in 1959. In 1960 he released a tune titled “Dum Dee Dee Dum” credited to Mickey Lane. It charted in Syracuse (NY) and Los Angeles. In 1962, his song “Baby (I Wanna Be Loved)” was recorded by Solomon Burke.
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#120: Son Of A Preacher Man by Dusty Springfield
Peak Month: January 1969
11 weeks on Vancouver’s CKLG chart
1 week Hit Bound
Peak Position #1
Peak Position on Billboard Hot 100 ~ #10
YouTube.com: “Son Of A Preacher Man”
Lyrics: “Son Of A Preacher Man”
Mary Isobel Catherine Bernadette O’Brien was born in West Hampstead in north London, in 1939. Along with her oldest brother, Dion, she recorded her first tape of a song they sang while still children. Her dad was an unhappy accountant who dreamed of becoming a concert pianist, but never became one. While Mary’s mother, according to the Karen Bartlett autobiography, Dusty: An Intimate Portrait, “was continuously drunk and sat all day in cinemas.”As she grew up, Mary went to school at a Roman Catholic Convent. At the age of 18 she became a member of a female group named the Lana Sisters. The group sang backup to pop singer Al Saxton who had several Top 30 hits in the late 50’s in the UK, including a cover of Sam Cooke’s “Only Sixteen” and “You’re The Top Cha.” While Saxton enjoyed his moments of fame, Mary teamed up with her brother, Dion, and a friend of theirs named Tim Field. By the end of 1959 she had taken the stage name of Dusty Springfield. The trio, now known as The Springfields, got a record deal with Philips Records in 1961.
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