My Favourite 45s of the Year: 1975 Quiz

Answer: Bee Gees

In terms of chart placings the Bee Gees had had a few quiet years in the early 1970s, but this song, "Jive Talking'", was the start of their comeback. It's said that the track's irresistible rhythm was taken from the sound of a car crossing a bridge near the recording studio.

The way that this rhythm is established before the scratch guitar and the funky bass line come in is sheer genius, and it's a great dance record. It was included on the "Saturday Night Fever" album in 1977, though the scene in which it was used was cut from the actual film.

It went to number one in the US Billboard Hot 100 chart and number five in the UK Singles Chart.

Answer: War

I first heard War when they were a kind of backing group for the former lead singer of the Animals, Eric Burden. He'd moved to California and had tuned in and turned on, leaving his R&B days behind for material more appropriate to the "Summer of Love" in 1967 and beyond. Aside from winning my award for the most clunking album title ever, in 1970 their first album, "Eric Burdon Declares "War"" spawned a hit record, "Spill the Wine". Sadly Burdon developed health problems and left the band, but they carried on quite successfully without him.

Their 1975 album, "Why Can't We Be Friends", featured an excellent single, "Low Rider". The song rather creeps up on you, with a really funky bass line and a squawking alto saxophone. Once the groove's been laid down, it just stays there! As for the lyrics - well, I now know a bit more about hot-rodding cars than I did before! It went to number seven in the US Billboard Hot 100 chart and number 12 in the UK Singles Chart; it's also been used as background music in more American movies than I've had hot dinners!

Answer: 10cc

Isn't it astonishing when you hear a song for the first time and all you can do is say "Wow!". As a confirmed 10cc fan I always expected their singles to be good, but "I'm Not in Love" was in a totally different class - a true masterpiece.
The story of the recording of this classic is fascinating - a lot of it depended on tape loops being repeatedly overdubbed. And the woman saying "big boys don't cry" was the studio's secretary, Kathy Redfern. I'd recommend the Wikipedia entry on the song if you want to know more.
The record sold in millions, going to number two in the US Billboard Hot 100 chart and number one in the UK Singles Chart. It also secured 10cc a five-year, five-album contract with Mercury Records worth a very large amount of money!

Answer: Bruce Springsteen

Having signed for Columbia records and recording two critically-acclaimed but poorly-selling albums, Bruce Springsteen invested many months in his third album, "Born to Run"; the title track was released as a single worldwide. Clearly influenced by Phil Spector's "wall of sound", it was adopted by many young people as an anthem for individual freedom.
There was, however, a slight problem - the hype. There had been a huge advertising campaign promoting the album using rock critic Jon Landau's quote saying that Springsteen was "the future of rock'n'roll". Here in the UK - probably as a consequence of Old World cynicism - the response of the music press and the record-buying public was along the lines of "oh yeah? - we've heard it all before". Certainly when compared to that in the US, the UK's response to Springsteen was muted.
It went to number 23 in the US Billboard Hot 100 chart but didn't chart in the UK. It was also ranked at number 21 in the 2004 "Rolling Stone" list of the 500 greatest songs of all time and at number 27 in the 2021 list.
At the time, although I found a lot of the song to be quite wonderful, for me it didn't quite hit the bull's eye. In my later years, however, I've come to love it.

Answer: Art Garfunkel

A real oldie but goldie, "I Only Have Eyes For You" was written in 1934 by Harry Warren and Al Dubin for the movie "Dames". In 1958 a doo-wop version by the Chicago group The Flamingos got to number 11 in the US Billboard Hot 100 chart; much later this version was ranked at number 157 in the 2004 "Rolling Stone" list of the 500 greatest songs of all time.
Now I'd really liked Simon and Garfunkel for a long time, but when they split I went down the Garfunkel route rather than along the Simon route - I'd bought Garfunkel's 1973 album "Angel Clare", and it was then and remains now one of my favourite albums of all time. So the version of "I Only Have Eyes For You" that caught my ear in 1975 was that released as a single by Garfunkel off his album "Breakaway". His version of the song was wonderful, with his pure voice carrying the melody perfectly. It went to number 18 in the US Billboard Hot 100 chart and number one in the UK Singles Chart.
I had the great good fortune to see Garfunkel in concert in Belfast in 1997, and his rendition of the song that night was sheer perfection.

Answer: Roxy Music

"Love Is The Drug" by Roxy Music evolved in the recording studio from a ballad to a sleazy funk track, held together by an excellent bass line. It's a song about a man going out for the night and looking for some action - "you can guess the rest". For the first time Roxy Music made an impact on the American charts with this song; it went to number 30 in the US Billboard Hot 100 chart and number two in the UK Singles Chart.
And of course there's the wonderful cover version by Grace Jones - a much more dynamic sound that got to number 35 in the UK Singles Chart in 1986.

Answer: Kraftwerk

The German electronic band Kraftwerk were formed in Dusseldorf in 1970, and over the next few years progressively completely abandoned orthodox instrumentation. The result was their 1975 album "Autobahn", featuring the title track, a 22-minute epic representing the experience of driving a fast car on the highway - like a "sound painting" said Ralf Hutter, the co-writer. Only electronic instruments were used.
"Autobahn" was totally different to absolutely everything else on the charts - I thought it was just magical, weird and hypnotic.The track was edited down to three minutes for release as a single, which went to number 25 in the US Billboard Hot 100 chart and number 11 in the UK Singles Chart. It's impossible to overestimate its importance to the development of popular music in the remainder of the 20th Century - its influence is everywhere.
By the way - there were two musicians working with Kraftwerk in the early 1970's, drummer Klaus Dinger and guitarist Michael Rother. They eventually formed a band called Neu!, who are in my opinion brilliant - their album "Neu! 75" is one of my top ten favourite albums and is well worth a listen, especially if you're into ambient music and proto-Punk (a strange combination I know, but give it a try!).

Answer: Queen

"Bohemian Rhapsody" by Queen is widely regarded as one of the greatest songs of all time. Nobody could quite believe it when it was first released - six minutes of ballad, mock opera and hard rock. And of course there was the legendary video.
I'm not going to embark on a detailed description of the song and its recording, but here are a few interesting factoids that I've picked up while researching it and that you might find interesting:
* Notes in his journals show that Freddie Mercury started writing the song in the late 1960s;
* Mercury played a Bechstein concert grand piano on the recording, possibly the same one that Paul McCartney used when recording "Hey Jude";
* during the recording the band sang their vocal parts continually for up to 12 hours a day for three weeks;
* the song was originally going to be called "Mongolian Rhapsody"; and
* the video was recorded in four hours and cost just £4,500.
It's also interesting and instructive to read the initial comments of the UK music press, for example: "It has no immediate selling point whatsoever" and "the whole adds up to less than the sum of its parts" (Ray Fox-Cumming, "Record Mirror"), and "a superficially impressive pastiche of incongruous musical styles" (Allan Jones, "Melody Maker").
In 1975 the song went to number one in the UK Singles Chart, staying there for nine weeks; a subsequent re-issue in 1991 also went to number one. At the time of writing (2023) it's officially the third best-selling single in the UK, and has sold over six million copies worldwide. In the US the 1975 release went to number nine in the Billboard Hot 100 chart and a 1992 re-release went to number two. It was also ranked at number 166 in the 2010 "Rolling Stone" list of the 500 greatest songs of all time and at number 17 in the 2021 list.
And the cover version by the Muppets is brilliant!

Answer: Bob Marley and the Wailers

I first heard "No Woman, No Cry" in 1974 when I bought the "Natty Dread" album, but the live recording on the following year's "Live!" album took the song to another level of warmth, excitement and impact. It was the major success needed to bring Bob Marley to world attention.
It went to number eight in the UK Singles Chart but was not released in the US. It was also ranked at number 37 in the 2004 "Rolling Stone" list of the 500 greatest songs of all time. A mediocre cover version by the Fugees got to number two in the UK Singles Chart in 1996.

Answer: David Bowie

By 1975 David Bowie was a true star; the release of "Fame", the second single from the album "Young Americans" cemented his status as it became his first number one single in the US. Themed around his break-up with his then manager, the song portrays a lot of anger and bitterness at his situation. Bowie was joined in the recording studio by John Lennon, who can be heard singing the falsetto "fame" throughout.

However the song is very much a piece of blue-eyed funk rock with a great groove. It went to number one in the US Billboard Hot 100 chart and number 17 in the UK Singles Chart.