Ramsey Lewis - "Them Changes" (1971)

Ramsey Lewis - "Them Changes" (did not chart). Written by Buddy Miles. Produced by Ramsey Lewis. 45: "Them Changes"/"Unsilent Majority" (Cadet 1971). LP: Them Changes (Cadet 1971).

This Ramsey Lewis track, the only single to be released from its album of the same name, shakes up the perception of a model MOR station like Los Angeles's KMPC, which used to play it in '71, as being a straight easy listening outlet. Although Lewis's live Rhodes piano version of Buddy Miles's signature song hearkens back to the club-date sound of earlier hits like "The In Crowd" and "Hang on Sloopy," it locks into a deep groove with the help of Morris Jennings (drums), Cleveland Eaton (bass), and Phil Upchurch (guitar). The current-event images on the album cover give it an activist vibe. (The non-charting single is credited to "Ramsey Lewis & Co.")

Ramsey Lewis - "Them Changes"

See also: A KMPC Playlist circa 1971

Chart Song Cinema: Madron (1970)

"Till Love Touches Your Life" (1970) Richard Williams

Written by Riz Ortolani and Arthur Hamilton * Produced by Alfred Perry * 45: "Till Love Touches Your Life"/"I've Never Loved Anyone" * LP: Madron * Label: Quad * Billboard charts: —

The theme song for this violent Wild Bunch-era Western (filmed in Israel) about a gunfighter and a nun was nominated for a 1971 Academy Award, and it's one of only two tracks on the album with vocals. (A different version with Jan Daley appears at the end.) The singer, Richard Williams, had been a regular on the TV show Love-American Style, and his 1970 Where Do I Go LP, which also contained "Till Love Touches Your Life," earned a plug in Billboard that predicted "good MOR mileage." Contrary to a blurb on that album's cover from KMPC personality Johnny Magnus declaring Williams as being "on his way to the very top," Williams subsequently disappeared with rare thoroughness.

Written by the prolific Italian film composer Riz Ortolani and lyricist Arthur Hamilton (who had written both words and music for Julie London's "Cry Me a River"), the flamenco-flavored song with its fluid bass guitar runs missed the Billboard charts, although it did appear on a 1970 airplay list for Los Angeles station KMPC, arguably the nation's most influential MOR outlet.  

Update (October 2017): As mentioned above, a non-charting version of the same song with a similar arrangement by vocalist Jan Daley (which was also released as a single) appeared at the end of the movie and as the last track on the soundtrack album. A cancer survivor (at the age of 22) and a former United Service Organizations tour member with Bob Hope, Daley has continued to record and perform since 1970. In the summer of 2017, her album The Way of a Woman entered the Billboard jazz album chart and peaked at #2. (Although Daley's bios refer to her as a former Miss California in the 1960s, none of my research efforts have been able to verify this.)

"Till Love Touches Your Life" (Richard Williams)


"Till Love Touches Your Life" (Jan Daley)


Also see: A KMPC Playlist circa 1971

Buddy Fite - "Evil Ways" (1970)

"Evil Ways" (1970)

Buddy Fite

Written by Clarence "Sonny" Henry * Produced by Robert S. Mersey * 45: "Evil Ways" / "El Jefe (The Chief)" * LP: Changes * Label: Cyclone * Billboard charts: —

Santana's 1969 hit single "Evil Ways" (Billboard #9) covered a 1967 Willie Bobo track that Bobo's guitarist Clarence "Sonny" Henry had composed. Buddy Fite's interpretation of the tune on his Changes album took its cues from the original, complete with Wes Montgomery-style octaves.

Fite was a guitarist's guitarist, even if the reserved, light jazz nature of this track doesn't always show it. He released only five albums between 1969 and 1987, and he attracted the most attention in his career with his first three. These came out on Cyclone/Bell, with Changes (1970) getting notice in Billboard for its "intriguing material" suitable for "easy listening playlists." (Los Angeles's KMPC, for one, had taken the bait.) Another Billboard mention refers to a track of Fite's called "Glad Rag Doll" being marketed as an early 12-inch single.

"Fingerstyle jazz" is perhaps an apt description for the Oregon-based Fite's guitar style, and he counted Willie Nelson, Les Paul, and Chet Atkins among his friends and admirers. His legendry otherwise locates him as a former Hell's Angel in the sixties and/or a timber worker who, after abandoning the music business in the seventies, would occasionally crash West coast clubs, turn the audience on its ear, and then disappear. Fite did publish one guitar instruction book for Mel Bay in 1997, a few years before his death in 2001.

"Evil Ways"


Also see: A KMPC Playlist circa 1971

Minnie Riperton - "Les Fleurs" (1971)

"Les Fleurs" (1971)

Minnie Riperton

Written by Charles Stepney and Richard Rudolph * Produced by Charles Stepney * 45: "Les Fleurs" / "Oh! By the Way" * LP: Come to My Garden * Label: GRT * Billboard charts: —

A cult favorite nowadays, Minnie Riperton's first album flopped in 1971, so it's interesting to see that stations like Los Angeles's MOR outlet KMPC had been hip to it in the very beginning by including it on a playlist. An experienced backup vocalist and a member of Rotary Connection, Riperton adopted a floral concept-album approach for her debut, and one wonders if Stevie Wonder—who would later work with Riperton—had drawn from it as inspiration for his 1979 Journey Through the Secret Life of Plants soundtrack music.

"Les Fleurs," with its "Dear Prudence" changes, was the only single released from the album, which featured the string-psych production, arrangements, and compositions of Charles Stepney along with the musicianship of Ramsey Lewis (keyboards) and Phil Upchurch (guitar). In 1974, Riperton would release "Loving You," her chart-topping signature song with those high whistle-pitch vocals, and in 1976 she would announce on The Tonight Show that she had breast cancer, which she succumbed to in 1979.

The original Come to My Garden LP showed the first song's title as "Les Fleur"—a case of plural/singular disagreement that CD reissues later fixed as "Les Fleurs." Riperton can be heard showcasing her high vocal range on the single's flipside, "Oh! By the Way".

Side A: "Les Fleurs"


Side B: "Oh! By the Way"

Perry Como - "It's Impossible" (1970)

Perry Como - "It's Impossible" (Billboard #10, entered 11/14/70; easy listening #1). Written by Armando Manzanero and Sid Wayne. Produced by Ernie Alschuler. 45: "It's Impossible"/"Long Life, Lots of Happiness" (RCA Victor 1970). LP: It's Impossible (RCA Victor 1970).

This song first hit big in Mexico, when its composer, Armando Manzanero, recorded and released it in 1968 as "Somos Novios" (we're a couple). Como's re-do with new lyrics by Sid Wayne sounded like a cinematic farewell with its shimmering strings and crashing piano. The song would, in fact, be Perry Como's final Top Ten hit and the last grand opus for the prolific arranger Marty Manning, who had first made a name for himself on Tony Bennett hits like "Rags to Riches" and "I Left My Heart in San Francisco."

Perry Como - "It's Impossible"

Also see: A KMPC Playlist circa 1971

A KMPC playlist circa 1971

One of the nation's top MOR stations, KMPC-AM in Los Angeles was high-grade "personality" radio featuring heavy-hitting disk jockeys like Gary Owens, Dick Whittinghill and Geoff Edwards, and its sports, news, and—especially—traffic coverage had the ear of every kid in Southern California's parents. But it also had an album orientation that distinguished it as uniquely early '70s MOR. The adult contemporary formats of the future would drift away from this deeper cut approach.

For such a widely listened-to station, playlists from the early seventies are scarce, with only two readily available online at a 710 KMPC tribute site. They come from 1971 and 1973 and list only albums instead of song titles. The following playlist for 1971, then, includes songs that most likely would have been chosen for KMPC airplay. (I'm guessing it comes from February of that year.)

Perry Como - It's Impossible ("It's Impossible")
Simon and Garfunkel - Bridge Over Troubled Water ("El  Condor Pasa")
Minnie Riperton - Come to My Garden ("Les Fleur")
Buddy  Fite - Changes ("Evil Ways")
Original Soundtrack - Love Story ("Theme from Love Story")
John Rowles - Cheryl Moana Marie ("Cheryl Moana Marie")
Original Soundtrack - Madron ("Till Love Touches Your Life")
Ramsey Lewis - Them Changes ("Them Changes")
Dionne Warwick - Very Dionne ("The Green Grass Starts to Grow")
Blood, Sweat and Tears - Blood, Sweat and Tears 3 ("Lucretia MacEvil")
Anthony Newley - For You ("We Took Our Love Outside Today")
The Assembled Multitude - The Assembled Multitude ("Woodstock")
The Partridge Family - The Partridge Family Album ("I Think I Love You")
The Renaissance - Bacharach Baroque ("Always Something There to Remind Me")
Gordon Lightfoot - Sit Down Stranger ("If You Could Read My Mind")
Johnny Mathis - Sings the Music of Bacharach and Kaempfert ("I'll Never Fall in Love Again")
The Lettermen - Everything's Good About You ("Everything Is Good About You")
Gabor Szabo - Magical Connection ("Close to You")
Sergio Mendes and Brasil '66 - Stillness ("For What It's Worth")
Nancy Wilson - Now I'm a Woman ("Now I'm a Woman")
Andy Williams - The Andy Williams Show ("Joanne")
Pat Moody Williams - Carry On ("Junk")
Bobby Goldsboro - We Gotta Start Lovin' ("Watching Scotty Grow")
The 5th Dimension - Portrait ("One Less Bell to Answer")
Liz Damon's Orient Express - Liz Damon's Orient Express ("1900 Yesterday")
Original Soundtrack - Jesus Christ Superstar ("I Don't Know How to Love Him")
Luiz Bonfa - The New Face of Bonfa ("Window Girl")
Elton John - Tumbleweed Connection ("Come Down in Time")
Bert Kaempfert - Orange Colored Sky ("Orange Colored Sky")
Neil Diamond - Tap Root Manuscript ("He Ain't Heavy...He's My Brother")
Henry Mancini - Love Story ("Love Story")
Steve and Eydie - A Man and a Woman ("Love Is Blue/Autumn Leaves")
Ed Ames - Ed Ames Sings Songs of Bacharach and David ("Make It Easy on Yourself")
Dawn - Candida ("Knock Three Times")
The Carpenters - Close to You ("Close to You")
Al DeLory - Love Story ("Love Story")
Elvis Presley - That's the Way It Is ("You Don't Have to Say You Love Me")
Jack Jones - Jack Jones in Person at the Sands ("Get Together")
Anne Murray - Snowbird ("Snowbird")
Floyd Cramer - Class of '70 ("Make It with You")

San Francisco regional breakout: Earth Quake - "Tickler" (1971)

"Tickler" (1971)

Earth Quake

Written by J. Robert Dunbar * Produced by Earth Quake and Allan Mason * 45: "Tickler" / "Guarding You" * LP: Earth Quake * Label: A&M * Billboard charts: Regional breakout—San Francisco

San Francisco's Earth Quake played the type of well-chiseled rock and roll that would eventually get called power pop. "Tickler," their first single, is the only record between 1970 and 1974 to appear on Billboard's listings as a San Francisco "regional breakout hit" and to not move any higher.

The song would actually be Earth Quake's only Billboard appearance although they'd maintain a steady following in the Bay Area and have a cachet of historical coolness for their involvement with Beserkley Records, the indie label their manager Matthew "King' Kaufman formed out of frustration with A&M. (He'd also gotten some money from New Generation Pictures, who'd used a snippet of uncredited Earth Quake music in the 1972 Steve McQueen movie The Getaway—it's a scene where McQueen and Ali MacGraw are at a drive-in while Sally Struthers shimmies in a motel room wearing radio headphones.)

The Beserkley label also carried artists such as Jonathan Richman's Modern Lovers, the Rubinoos (who included Tommy Dunbar, brother of Earth Quake guitarist and "Tickler" composer Robbie), and future hit makers the Greg Kihn Band. By 1979, with six solid power pop albums under their belts, Earth Quake would call it good. Side B, also from the Earth Quake album, is a track written by bassist Stan Miller and drummer Steve Nelson. (Earth Quake Vocalist: Steve Doukas.)

Side A:"Tickler"


Side B:"Guarding You"