#9: Dancin’ Shoes by Nigel Olsson
City: Fredericton, NB
Radio Station: CFNB
Peak Month: March 1979
Peak Position in Fredericton: #2
Peak position in Vancouver ~ #17
Peak Position on Billboard Hot 100 ~ #18
YouTube: “Dancin’ Shoes”
Lyrics: “Dancin’ Shoes”
Nigel Olsson was born in Cheshire, England, in 1949. He began his musical career playing the guitar in small bands, and took up the drums at a gig where the drummer did not show up at the last minute. His first appearance on a record album was in the band Plastic Penny, which released Two Sides of a Penny in 1968. Olsson was spotlighted on one song on that album, “I Want You,” performing both lead vocals and a drum solo. In 1969 he played drums on the flower power pop single “Mr. Boyd” by Argosy, a one-off group which also included Reginald Dwight (later known as Elton John), and future Supertramp band member Roger Hodgson. Olsson also had a brief stint with the English hard rock band Uriah Heep, playing drums on two songs on their 1970 debut album, Very ‘easy… Very ‘umble.
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#6: Bowling Green by the Everly Brothers
City: Fredericton, NB
Radio Station: CFNB
Peak Month: July 1967
Peak Position in Fredericton: #1
Peak position in Vancouver ~ #35
Peak Position on Billboard Hot 100 ~ #40
YouTube: “Bowling Green”
Lyrics: “Bowling Green”
Isaac Donald “Don” Everly was born in 1937 and Phillip Jason “Phil” Everly was born in 1939. Don was born in Muhlenberg County in Kentucky, and Phil was born in Chicago. Their dad, Ike, had been a coal miner who decided to pursue music as a guitar player. From the mid-40s Ike and his wife, Margaret, sang as a duo in Shanendoah, Iowa. Later they included their sons “Little Donnie and Baby Boy Phil,” on local radio stations KMA and KFNF. In time they were billed as The Everly Family. In 1953, the family moved to Knoxville, Tennessee. Family friend and musician Chet Atkins got a record deal for the Everly Brothers with RCA Victor in 1956. However, their first single release was a commercial failure and they were dropped from the label. Next, Atkins got them connected with Archie Bleyer, and the boys were signed to Cadence Records. In 1957, their first single on the label, “Bye Bye Love“, became a million-seller and launched their career.
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#1: Shadows In The Moonlight by Anne Murray
City: Fredericton, NB
Peak Month: July 1979
Radio Station: CIHI
Peak Position in Fredericton #1
Peak position in Vancouver ~ #15
Peak Position on Billboard Hot 100 ~ #25
YouTube: “Shadows In The Moonlight”
Lyrics: “Shadows In The Moonlight”
In 1945 Morna Anne Murray was born in Springhill, Nova Scotia, a coal-mining town. Her father was a doctor and her mother was a registered nurse. Growing up she took piano lessons for six years and began taking vocal lessons at age fifteen in 1960. Anne loved music. It was the age of rock ‘n’ roll, and growing up she sang along with all her favourites – Buddy Holly, Bobby Darin and Connie Francis. However, Anne was also inspired by a wide variety of musical styles, including the classics, country, gospel, folk, and crooners such as Patti Page, Bing Crosby and Rosemary Clooney. She loved them all. In 1962 she gave one of her first public performances singing “Ave Maria” at her high school graduation. She went on to be part of the CBC variety show Singalong Jubilee in 1967.
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#2: Broken Hearted Me by Anne Murray
City: Fredericton, NB
Radio Station: CIHI
Peak Month: November 1979
Peak Position in Fredericton #2
Peak position in Vancouver ~ did not chart
Peak Position on Billboard Hot 100 ~ #12
YouTube: “Broken Hearted Me”
Lyrics: “Broken Hearted Me”
In 1945 Morna Anne Murray was born in Springhill, Nova Scotia, a coal-mining town. Her father was a doctor and her mother was a registered nurse. Growing up she took piano lessons for six years and began taking vocal lessons at age fifteen in 1960. Anne loved music. It was the age of rock ‘n’ roll, and growing up she sang along with all her favourites – Buddy Holly, Bobby Darin and Connie Francis. However, Anne was also inspired by a wide variety of musical styles, including the classics, country, gospel, folk, and crooners such as Patti Page, Bing Crosby and Rosemary Clooney. She loved them all. In 1962 she gave one of her first public performances singing “Ave Maria” at her high school graduation. She went on to be part of the CBC variety show Singalong Jubilee in 1967.
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#3: Heart Of The Night by Poco
City: Fredericton, NB
Radio Station: CIHI
Peak Month: July 1979
Peak Position in Fredericton: #2
Peak position in Vancouver ~ did not chart
Peak Position on Billboard Hot 100 ~ #20
YouTube: “Heart Of The Night”
Lyrics: “Heart Of The Night”
Richard Furay was born in 1944 in Yellow Springs, Ohio. He got his first guitar when he was eight years old. He met Stephen Stills in the summer of 1963, and the pair formed the Au GoGo Singers. In 1965, they joined the Buffalo Springfield. Furay was part of the trend-setting sound of the Buffalo Springfield, with “For What It’s Worth” and other classics. The Buffalo Springfield began splintering in 1968. When Bruce Palmer left the band, he was replaced by Jim Messina who was in the recording studio for the bands’ last album Last Time Around. Messina and Furay formed Poco later that year. Messina began playing guitar at the age of five. He left Poco after the first two albums and became part of the duo of Loggins and Messina.
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#5: Chiquitita by ABBA
City: Fredericton, NB
Radio Station: CIHI
Peak Month: January 1980
Peak Position in Fredericton #3
Peak position in Vancouver ~ did not chart
Peak Position on Billboard Hot 100 ~ #29
YouTube: “Chiquitita”
Lyrics: “Chiquitita”
ABBA is a pop band from Sweden. Agneta Fältskog was born in 1950 in the lakeside city of Jönköping in southern Sweden. Fältskog wrote her first song at the age of six, which she named “Två små troll” (“Two Small Trolls”). In 1958, she began taking piano lessons, and also sang in a local church choir. In early 1960, Fältskog formed a musical trio, the Cambers. At age 15 she left school to pursue a career in music. She considers Connie Francis, Lesley Gore, Aretha Franklin and Marianne Faithfull as her prime influences on her musical style. Fältskog worked on reception for a car firm while performing with the Bernt Enghardt band. In 1967 she wrote “Jag var så kär” (“I Was So in Love”), after a dating relationship ended. The single topped the Swedish pop charts in early 1968. That year she met Björn Ulvaeus, a member of the Hootenanny Singers. Ulvaeus was born in the western coast city of Gothenburg, Sweden, in 1945. In the early Sixties, Ulvaeus joined the Hootenanny Singers. They had a #5 hit in Sweden in 1964 with “Gabrielle”, based on the Russian folksong “May Here Always Be Sunshine”. The folk group had many Top Ten hits in Sweden into the early 70s, including a cover of “Green, Green Grass of Home” (“En sång en gång för längese’n”).
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#7: Even The Bad Times Are Good by the Tremeloes
City: Fredericton, NB
Radio Station: CFNB
Peak Month: October 1967
Peak Position in Fredericton #1
Position on CFNB for the year 1967 ~ #17
Peak position in Vancouver ~ did not chart
Peak Position on Billboard Hot 100 ~ #37
YouTube: “Even The Bad Times Are Good”
Lyrics: “Even The Bad Times Are Good”
In 1956 at Park Modern Secondary School in Barking, Essex, two school mates, Brian Poole and Alan Blakley, started a band. On family holidays together, they’d tell their parents about their dreams of being on TV. They learned a couple of tunes by Buddy Holly and Everly Brothers, got two acoustic Hofner guitars, and asked their saxophone and bass playing school mate, Alan Howard to join them. Once they started performing at local parties, they met drummer Dave Munden, who soon joined them. Soon Alan Blakley, Dave Munden and Brian Poole found that they could harmonise any song they wanted to and developed a style of their own, with all of them singing and playing and Alan Howard on bass guitar. At this time they did not have a name but soon opted for Tremilos after the sound on the new amplifiers which they could not yet afford. In time, the lead guitarist from Joe & The Teems, Ricky West (born Richard Westwood), was added to the band in 1960.
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#12: There Goes My Everything by Engelbert Humperdinck
City: Fredericton, NB
Radio Station: CFNB
Peak Month: August 1967
Peak Position in Fredericton #1
Peak position in Vancouver ~ did not chart
Peak Position on Billboard Hot 100 ~ #20
YouTube: “There Goes My Everything”
Lyrics: “There Goes My Everything”
Arnold George Dorsey was born in 1936 in city of Madras (now Chennai) during the British Raj. His father was a British Army officer and the family returned to England in 1946. It was only in 1954 he first sang in public at a pub contest. He was conscripted into the British Army in 1955 and after being discharged he recorded his first record. Billed as George Dorsey, his debut single was Decca Records was “I’ll Never Fall In Love Again”. He worked in nightclubs until 1961 when he suffered from tuberculosis. In 1965 his former roommate, Gordon Mills, had become the manager of Tom Jones. Mills suggested Dorsey change his name to Engelbert Humperdinck, after a 19th Century German composer.
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#8: Where Were You When I Was Falling In Love by Lobo
City: Fredericton, NB
Radio Station: CIHI
Peak Month: October 1979
Peak Position in Fredericton #2
Peak position in Vancouver ~ did not chart
Peak Position on Billboard Hot 100 ~ #23
YouTube: “Where Were You When I Was Falling In Love”
Lyrics: “Where Were You When I Was Falling In Love”
Roland Kent LaVoie was born in Tallahassee, Florida, in 1943. He began his musical career in 1961 as a member of a local band, The Rumours. The band included Gram Parsons and Jim Stafford, as well as drummer Jon Corneal, who later joined Parsons’s International Submarine Band. In 1964, while attending the University of South Florida, LaVoie joined a band called the Sugar Beats and met producer Phil Gernard. He recorded a regional hit for the band, a cover of Johnny River’s song, “What Am I Doing Here?” During the 1960s, LaVoie performed with many other bands, including US Male, The Uglies, and Me and the Other Guys. By 1969, LaVoie released his first solo recording titled “Happy Days in New York City”.
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#14: It’s A Happening World by the Tokens
City: Fredericton, NB
Radio Station: CFNB
Peak Month: August 1967
Peak Position in Fredericton #2
Peak position in Vancouver ~ did not chart
Peak Position on Billboard Hot 100 ~ #69
YouTube: “It’s A Happening World”
Lyrics: “It’s A Happening World”
In 1955 a doo-wop group called The Linc-Tones formed in Brooklyn, New York. Neil Sedaka was a founding member of the group but left in 1957. They renamed themselves in 1957 as The Tokens. That year they appeared on TV for the first time on The Ted Steele Dance Time. In 1959 the Tokens recorded “Picture In My Wallet” under the name of Darrell & The Oxfords, which became a Top Ten hit in San Bernardino. They had a #15 charting hit in the USA in 1959 titled “Tonight I Fell in Love”. The Tokens are known best for their number one 1961 hit, “The Lion Sleeps Tonight.” The song was originally a Zulu folk song called “M’bube” and Anglicized to “Wimoweh”. The Tokens consisted of Jay Siegel, Hank Medress and brothers Mitch and Phil Margo. True rock pioneers, they were among the first to successfully use the falsetto lead voice, a sound that influenced groups such as the Four Seasons and the Beach Boys. The group had their first Top 20 hit in the USA billed as The Tokens with “Tonight I Fell In Love”, in 1961. The song peaked at #27 in Vancouver.
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