#222: Lonely Teenager by Dion

Peak Month: December 1960
10 weeks on Vancouver’s CFUN chart
Peak Position #2
Peak Position on Billboard Hot 100 ~ #12
YouTube: “Lonely Teenager”
Lyrics: “Lonely Teenager”

Dion Francis DiMucci was born in the Bronx, NY, in 1939. His parents named him Dion in honor of the French Canadian Dionne quintuplents who captured the interest of millions around the world after the five infants were born in May 1934. Dion’s dad, Pasquale DiMucci, was a vaudeville performer and Dion accompanied him to see his dad on stage. As a child he was given an $8 dollar guitar by his uncle while he lived on 183rd Street. Dion’s childhood was set in the midst of conflict between his parents. In an interview with New York Magazine in 2007, Dion remembers “…There was a lot of unresolved conflict in my house… My pop, Pasquale, couldn’t make the $36-a-month rent on our apartment at 183rd and Crotona Avenue.” He was a dreamer, a failed vaudevillian, and sometimes Catskills puppeteer. He’d talk big and lift weights he’d made from oilcans, while Frances, Mrs. DiMucci, took two buses and the subway downtown to work in the garment district on a sewing machine. “When they’d start yelling, I’d go out on the stoop with my $8 Gibson and try to resolve things that way.”

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#223: Don’t Talk To Him by Cliff Richard

Peak Month: February 1964
12 weeks on Vancouver’s CFUN chart
Peak Position #4
Peak Position on Billboard Hot 100 ~ did not chart
YouTube: “Don’t Talk To Him”
Lyrics: “Don’t Talk To Him”

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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Peak Month: April 1987
8 weeks on Vancouver’s CKLG chart
Peak Position #19
Peak Position on Billboard Hot 100 ~ did not chart
YouTube: “Dirty Water”

Paul Hyde was born in 1955 in Yorkshire, England. He me Bob Rock, born in Winnipeg, Manitoba, in 1954, later when Rock was high school in Langford, British Columbia. Hyde introduced Rock to the new musical genre of punk rock, popular in England. They formed a garage band and Bob Rock got a job at Vancouver’s Little Mountain Sound Studios as a recording engineer. This enabled The Payola$ to record, in the late 70s, punk rock songs “Money for Hype” and “China Boys” on independent labels. They solds singles at their performances and through local record shops. This led to a contract with A&M Records.

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#224: Cocaine/Tulsa Time by Eric Clapton

A-side: “Cocaine”
Peak Month: August 1980
14 weeks on Vancouver’s CFUN chart
Peak Position #4
Peak Position on Billboard Hot 100 ~ #30
YouTube: “Cocaine”
Lyrics: “Cocaine”

B-side: “Tulsa Time”
Peak Month: August 1980
10 weeks on Vancouver’s CFUN chart
Peak Position #4
Peak Position on Billboard Hot 100 ~ did not chart
YouTube: “Tulsa Time”
Lyrics: “Tulsa Time”

Eric Patrick Clapton was born in 1945 in a village in Surrey, England. When he was thirteen he was given a steel-stringed guitar for his birthday. By the age of sixteen, Clapton was busking in Surrey. By the age of 17, in 1962 Clapton joined an R&B band called the Roosters. Another guitarist, Tom McGuinness, later joined Manfred Mann. Clapton left in the summer of 1963 to join Casey Jones and the Engineers. Soon after he switched bands to join the Yardbirds. He contributed lead vocals on “Good Morning School Girl” and other blues-based tracks. The album, Five Live Yardbirds, included covers of “Smokestack Lightening” by Howlin’ Wolf, “Five Long Years” by Eddie Boyd, “Too Much Monkey Business” by Chuck Berry, and “I’m A Man” by Bo Diddley. Committed to a solid blues sound, Clapton was troubled by a growing commercial sound the band was showcasing. “For Your Love” hit the top of the charts in the UK and Canada and reached number six in the United States. This displeased Clapton, a blues purist whose vision extended beyond three-minute singles. Frustrated by the commercial approach, he abruptly left the band on March 25, 1965, the day “For Your Love” was released.

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#225: Arms Of Mary by Chilliwack

Peak Month: August 1978
15 weeks on Vancouver’s CFUN chart
Peak Position #6
Peak Position on Billboard Hot 100 ~ did not chart
YouTube: “Arms Of Mary”
Lyrics: “Arms Of Mary”

Bill Henderson was born in Vancouver in 1944. He learned guitar and became the guitarist for the Panarama Trio that performed at the Panarama Roof dance club on the 15th Floor of the Hotel Vancouver. He formed the psychedelic pop-rock Vancouver band, The Collectors, in 1966.

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#226: You Showed Me by Salt-N-Pepa

Peak Month: April 1992
13 weeks on Vancouver’s CKLG chart
Peak Position ~ #2
Peak Position on Billboard Hot 100 ~ #47
YouTube: “You Showed Me”
Lyrics: “You Showed Me”

Cheryl Renee James was born in 1966 in Brooklyn, New York. She later went by the stage name Salt. Sandra Jacqueline Denton was born in 1964 in Kingston, Jamaica. She moved to join her family in Queens, New York, in 1970, at the age of six. While she was a child she was sexually molested. Both James and Denton attended nursing school at Queensborough Community College in Queens. In 1985, James and Denton were working as customer service representatives at Sears. The duo recorded their first single “The Show Stoppa”, which was a minor R&B hit in ’85. The duos’ original name was Super Nature. However, they changed their name because in “The Show Stoppa” they rap the lines “Right now I’m gonna show you how it’s supposed to be ‘Cause we, the Salt and Pepa MCs”. This resulted in radio stations getting phone calls requesting “The Show Stoppa” by Salt & Pepper.

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#227: Cry by Godley and Crème

Peak Month: June 1985
12 weeks on Vancouver’s CKLG chart
Peak Position #3
Peak Position on Billboard Hot 100 ~ #16
YouTube: “Cry”
Lyrics: “Cry”

Godley & Creme were a rock duo comprised of Kevin Godley and Lol Creme. Kevin Michael Godley was born in 1945 in a suburb of Manchester, England. Raised in a Jewish family, he formed a group named Group 17, along with four other members of the Jewish Lads Brigade. Godley studied Art and Design at Stoke On Trent College of Art from 1966-68. In the late ’60s, Kevin Godley met Lol Creme at a wedding. Laurence Neil “Lol” Creme was born in 1947 in the same suburb of Prestwich as Kevin Godley. Creme was also raised in a Jewish family. The pair co-founded a band in 1970 named Hotlegs, who had a #2 hit in the UK titled “Neanderthal Man”. The band split in 1970 and morphed into 10cc.

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#228: The Boy Next Door by the Secrets

Peak Month: January 1964
12 weeks on Vancouver’s CFUN chart
Peak Position #2
Peak Position on Billboard Hot 100 ~ #18
YouTube: “The Boy Next Door”
Lyrics: “The Boy Next Door”

The Secrets were a female vocal group from Cleveland, Ohio. The original members included lead singer Karen Gray Cipriani, (born 1943), alto and bass singer Carole Raymont McGoldrick, high dum-dee-dum singer Jackie Allen Schwegler, (born 1943), and soprano Patty Miller, (also born 1943). Karen told Spectropop, “My father was in a barbershop quartet back in the 1920s. I think that I got my singing ability from him,” Carole took tap dancing and ballet lessons. She also sang “Take Me Out To The Ballgame” at a recital at the age of eight. Patty sang in church and school choirs. The future Secrets met at Shaw High School in Cleveland. They also got to know Tom King, who later was a member of The Outsiders who had a Top Ten hit in 1966 with “Time Won’t Let Me”.

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#229: Sleeping Satellite by Tasmin Archer

Peak Month: June 1993
12 weeks on Vancouver’s CKLG chart
1 week Playlist
Peak Position #3
Peak Position on Billboard Hot 100 ~ #32
YouTube: “Sleeping Satellite”
Lyrics: “Sleeping Satellite”

Tasmin Archer was born in Bradford, Yorkshire, in 1963. After she graduated from school, she worked as a sewing machine operator. Subsequently, she learned to type and became a clerk at Leeds Magistrates’ Court. Into the 80s she joined a band called Dignity. Later, she was part of a group called The Archers. In 1990 she signed a record contract with EMI.
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#1335: Two Girls In One by Pursuit Of Happiness

Peak Month: July 1990
9 weeks on Vancouver’s CKLG chart
Peak Position #19
Peak Position on Billboard Hot 100 ~ did not chart
YouTube: “Two Girls In One”
Lyrics: “Two Girls In One”

Murray Kevin “Moe” Berg was born in Edmonton, Alberta, in 1959. He watched his father play in country bands while he grew up, and spent his time admiring guitarists like Eddie Van Halen, Jeff Beck and Johnny Winter. From his late teens, Berg was in the Edmonton bands Troc ’59, The News, Modern Minds and Facecrime. The Pursuit of Happiness were launched in 1985 when he and Troc ’59 drummer Dave Gilby moved to Toronto. They soon met bassist Saskatoon native Johnny Sinclair and formed the band, adding Winnipeg-born sisters Tamara and Natasha Amabile as backing vocalists. Their debut single, “I’m an Adult Now”, quickly became a Top 30 hit across Canada in 1986, sparked by a low-budget video (made by Berg’s director friend Nelu Ghiran) which made it onto the Canadian music video channel MuchMusic. In the spring of 1987, “I’m An Adult Now” peaked at #14 on CKOC in Hamilton, Ontario.

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