#1160: Every Bit of Love by Ken Tobias

Peak Month: December 1975
10 weeks on CKLG chart
Peak Position #19
Peak Position on Billboard Hot 100 ~ did not chart
YouTube.com: “Every Bit Of Love”
Lyrics: “Every Bit Of Love”

In 1945 Ken Tobias was born in Saint John, New Brunswick. His family’s home was filled with music and young Ken was featured in a number of tap dancing performances. Though he dreamed of becoming a draftsman, out of high school he and his brother Tony formed the folk group The Ramblers. By the mid-60s Tobias lived in Halifax and was a staple in the roster of performers on CBC TV’s afternoon show, Music Hop. This led to his appearing several years later on Singalong Jubilee with other Canadian music stars Anne Murray, Gene MacLellan.

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#1161: Please Forget Her by The Jury

Peak Month: September 1966
9 weeks on CFUN chart
Peak Position #11
Peak Position on Billboard Hot 100 ~ did not chart
Two more weeks on the CFUN All-Canadian Top Ten
YouTube: “Please Forget Her”

The Jury was a band formed in Winnipeg in 1964. According to Garage Rock Radio, The Jury has roots in a Winnipeg group named the Chord U Roys. This was a take-off on a popular men’s pant in the late 50s called the corduroy. (Corduroy goes back to  18th Century in Manchester, England). The Chord U Roys consisted of Terry Kenny on lead guitar, Bruce Walker on vocals and Ray Stockwell on drums. There were a number of changes in the lineup. Once they reformed as The Jury, the bandmates were Terry Kenny, Bruce Walker, Ray Stockwell, Roland Blaquiere on bass guitar and George Johns on rhythm guitar. The Jury got a recording contract with London Records in Canada in 1965. That year they released their first single, “Until You Do.” It was a hit in Winnipeg as a result of their emerging fan base, reaching the Top Ten on CKY.

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#1164: Sugar Mountain/When You Dance I Can Really Love – Neil Young

Peak Month: April 1971
6 weeks on Vancouver’s CKVN chart
Peak Position #7
Peak Position on Billboard Hot 100 ~ #93
YouTube.com: “Sugar Mountain”
Lyrics: “Sugar Mountain”
YouTube.com: “When You Dance I Can Really Love”
Lyrics: “When You Dance I Can Really Love”

Neil Young was born in Toronto in 1945. His family moved to Omemee, Ontario, and he contracted polio in 1951, two years before the polio vaccine was introduced. He learned guitar and dropped out of high school. He played in the Winnipeg based band called The Squires, who toured parts of Manitoba and northern Ontario. They played instrumental covers of Cliff Richard’s backup band, The Shadows. Young moved to California in 1966 where he was a founding member of the Buffalo Springfield. In 1968 he released his self-titled debut studio album. And in 1969 he became the fourth member of Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young. Since then he has released 35 studio albums and more live and compilation albums.

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#1165: Teen Angel by Wednesday

Peak Month: June 1974
7 weeks on Vancouver’s CKLG chart
Peak Position #10
Peak Position on Billboard Hot 100 ~ did not chart
YouTube.com: “Teen Angel” ~ Mark Dinning version
“Teen Angel” lyrics ~ Original Mark Dinning version
YouTube.com: “Teen Angel” ~ Wednesday version
“Teen Angel” lyrics ~ Wednesday version (see below)

“Teen Angel” is a teenage tragedy song written by Jean Dinning and her husband, Red Surrey. It became a hit for Jean’s brother, Mark Dinning, in 1959. “Teen Angel” was released in October 1959. The song was not an instant success, with radio stations in the U.S. banning the song, considering it too sad. Despite the reluctance of radio stations, the song continued to climb the charts. In the last week of 1959, the single jumped from #100 to #50 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart. It went on to reach #1 on the Billboard Hot 100 in February 1960. In the UK it climbed to #37 on the UK Singles Chart, despite being  banned from being played by the BBC. At the end of 1960 Billboard ranked it as the #5 song of the year.

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#1167: Cousin Mary by Fludd

Peak Month: November 1973
8 weeks on Vancouver’s CKLG chart
Peak Position #11
Peak Position on Billboard Hot 100 ~ did not chart
YouTube.com: “Cousin Mary”
Lyrics: “Cousin Mary”

Fludd had its roots in a band called The Pretty Ones, formed by Ed Pilling and Greg Godovitz. The band was briefly part of Toronto’s Yorkville scene in the 1960s, but broke up before achieving much commercial success. Pilling and his brother Brian then moved to Birmingham, England, where they formed a band called Wages of Sin and spent some time touring as a backing band for Cat Stevens in 1970. However, disagreement over musical direction with Stevens led the brothers to return to Toronto by the end of the year. Inspired by the then-emerging psychedelic blues rock sound of British acts such as Small Faces, they then reunited with Godovitz, and recruited drummer John Andersen and guitarist Mick Walsh to create Fludd.

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Peak Month: June 1976
8 weeks on Vancouver’s CKLG chart
Peak Position #12
Peak Position on Billboard Hot 100 ~ did not chart
YouTube.com: “Old Time Movie”

Lisa Hartt was born in 1946, and when she turned 45 CTV did a lifestyle feature in 1991. At the time Hartt was attending Concordia University’s Communication Art’s Program. By the time Lisa was fifteen she was performing as a backup vocalist for bands in Montreal. She took the stage name Lisa Hartt. In 1973, while in Montreal, she formed her own band called The Lisa Hartt Band. After a few changes in the line-up, by 1976 the band consisted of bass player Denny Gerrard (Paupers, Lighthouse), guitarist and vocalist Rayburn Blake (Mashmakhan), keyboard player and vocalist Richard Yuen (Tranquillity Base) and drummer and vocalist Marty Cordrey (Bearfoot, Small Wonder). Lisa Hartt was the lead vocalist and also played acoustic guitar.

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#1172: Do It To ‘Em by B.T.B. – 4

Peak Month: June 1967
8 weeks on Vancouver’s CFUN chart
Peak Position #12
Peak Position on Billboard Hot 100 ~ did not chart
6 additional weeks on the CFUN All-Canadian Top Ten
YouTube.com: “Do It To ‘Em”

Toronto singer Tommy Graham joined his first band in 1958 and managed to work his way through the Toronto club scene with Kay Taylor And The Regents at the legendary Club Bluenote. Following this, he took one year away from the business, traveled to Los Angeles to hone his musical skills and developed contacts there. Returning to Canada he, and some others, formed the group Big Town Boys. The group gained prominence as backing musicians for vocalist Shirley Matthews on Tamarac Records. The band broke out on its own with after being signed to RCA/Victor under the name Tommy Graham & The Big Town Boys for one single called “Put You Down” in 1965. The tune climbed to number 40 on CHUM radio in Toronto.

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#1174: Cinderella by Paul Anka

Peak Month: September 1961
5 weeks on Vancouver’s CKWX chart
Peak Position #8
Peak Position on Billboard Hot 100 ~ #70
YouTube.com: “Cinderella”
Lyrics: “Cinderella”

Paul Anka was 16 years old when he had a number one hit with “Diana” in 1957, a song he wrote about a girl in the church he attended. (Diana Ayoub, who inspired Anka to pen the song, died in December 2022). He continued to have a string of Top Ten and Top 20 hits into 1963 in Canada, the United States, the UK and Italy. But with the British Invasion, Paul Anka was sidelined not to return to the pop charts until his #1 hit in 1974, “You’re Having My Baby”. The song was a duet with Odia Coates. The duo enjoyed a string of Top 20 hits in Canada and the USA including 1974’s “One Man Woman/One Woman Man”, 1975’s “I Don’t Like To Sleep Alone” and “(I Believe) There’s Nothing Stronger Than Our Love”.

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#1179: Fading Away by Bobby Taylor & The Vancouvers

Peak Month: May 1968
8 weeks on Vancouver’s CKLG chart
Peak Position #8
Peak Position on Billboard Hot 100 ~ did not chart
YouTube.com: “Fading Away”
Lyrics: “Fading Away”

Born in 1934, Robert Edward Taylor was born and grew up in Washington D.C. From the age of three he began to sing. Taylor told the South China Morning Post in a 2011 interview that he could sing Gregorian chant and still knew it by heart in 2011. His mother was friends with Billie Holiday. The musical connection led the young Bobby Taylor to meet Nat King Cole, Ella Fitzgerald, Nina Simone and Miles Davis, among others, while he was a boy. He graduated from high school at the age of 14. The Ku Klux Klan had weekly meetings on the steps of the Capitol buildings in D.C. This frightened young Bobby Taylor and he enlisted to join the U.S. Army in the Korean War where he thought he’d be safer. Taylor was signed up to be a cook in the Korean War. However, he was assigned to an all-black unit that fought in the war. His commanding officer had told Bobby Taylor, “They’re not going to be able to see you.” At the age of 17 Taylor was discharged by the end of 1951. He relocated to New York City in the early 50s and sang in street corner doo-wop groups. Among the singers he sang with included future members of  Frankie Lymon & the Teenagers and Little Anthony and the Imperials.

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#1180: Let the Song Last Forever by Dan Hill

Peak Month: July 1978
8 weeks on Vancouver’s CFUN chart
Peak Position #14
Peak Position on Billboard Hot 100 ~ #91
YouTube.com: “Let The Song Last Forever”
Lyrics: “Let The Song Last Forever”

Daniel Grafton Hill IV was born in 1954 in Toronto. He father, Daniel Hill, was a social scientist. Hill’s parents moved to Canada before he was born to live in a less racially charged setting where their interracial marriage would not be met with intolerance. Hill would later write about his parents exit from the USA in his song “McCarthy’s Day.” While young Dan was in his teens he learned the guitar and started to compose songs. When he was just 18 years old he got a songwriting contract with RCA Records. In 1975 Hill released his first album, but it would be his third album, Longer Fuse, that got the attention of deejays and record buyers. His #1 hit single from the album, “Sometimes When We Touch“, was co-written with Barry Mann, of Manhattan’s Brill Building’s songwriting fame. With the song came multiple Junos Awards: Composer, Male Vocalist, and Single of the Year. Hill also was nominated for a Grammy Award in 1978 for Best Male Pop Vocal Performance, losing out to Barry Manilow’s “Copacabana“.

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