What are the classic albums of the seventies? I just stumbled across a box of CDs I’d packed away years ago and forgotten about, so I’ve begun listening to them in the car for the last few days. It’s a pure nostalgia trip, and it’s hard for me to tell the difference between what means a lot to me because of all the memories and associations, and what is true musical greatness. I don’t have the objectivity I need to assess these treasured albums. But surely, even without the element of nostalgia, Carole King’s Tapestry deserves classic status.
There are some lines that should have been left on the cutting floor (‘Snow is cold and rain is wet…’), and some tracks that reflect the inane optimism of hippie culture (‘You’ve got to get up every morning with a smile on your face, and show the world all the love in your heart’). But it has the perfect mix of longing and love, of everyday poetry and easy melody.
Here is James Taylor’s live version of ’You’ve Got a Friend’:
I’m not sure that this is my top album of that decade (I’ll have to think about that…) What’s your own ‘greatest album of the seventies’? You can leave any thoughts in the comment box below.
This really is a trip down memory lane Father Stephen! As a teenager in the 1970′s I listened to all sorts of music. For me, though, the greatest album of the 70′s has to be Tubular Bells by Mike Oldfield.
Oh Im in my element
Carole kings- tapestry wonderful.
James Taylor is beautiful
John Lennons greatest with my favourite song in the world Love
Hot Chocolate-tee hee
Ronco,s christmas album Amazing :o)
Nick Drakes-pink moon so cool
Joan Armatradings-Love and affection and willow
The Kinks- Greatest Hits
John Martyn-Bless the weather, and London conversation albums are my favourite
But the winner surely for her poetic precision and journey of pain, longing and loving has to go to Joni Mitchell’s -Blue Album……
doesn’t it?
Mags, were you my college roommate? ha ha
Joan Armatrading, Back to the Night (Get in Touch With Jesus)
Joni Mitchell, Blue (Case of You) is favorite next to Court and Spark (Court and Spark)
Carole King, Tapestry
Kinks
Police
Fr. Stephen, I think you are mistaken, or maybe transferred albums to CS’s because the 70′s were albums or 8 Tracks!
Carole King and James Taylor’s recent reunion is fantastic.
Yes, I was trying not to clog up the post with too many personal details. My first listening was a friend’s LP in about 1979, and not when the album was released (1971) – and then the CD came much later to my collection…
Hi Bo x
I have a confession, I actually never really knew any of this music in the 70′s maybe just my Dad playing ‘here we go round the lemon tree’ by the move (I think) and maybe the kinks. I was only born 1970 and mostly recall playing over the woods with my dog, or outside on my skateboard, or watching the banana splits, music I don’t remember featuring. Until I got given the Hot Chocolate album one christmas, and inherited others. I must have been around 10.
Like everything else Im a bit of a late starter. However as an adult I discovered all the lovely albums above and I think being a 70,s child I have a natural Love for all things poetic, flared and floral. :O) I will have to hunt down your others!
I hope we can continue to be room mates x
Brilliant Lyrics
A Case Of You lyrics (Joni Mitchell)
A case of you
Just before our love got lost you said
“i am as constant as a northern star”
And I said, “constant in the darkness
Where’s that at?
If you want me I’ll be in the bar”
On the back of a cartoon coaster
In the blue tv screen light
I drew a map of canada
Oh canada
And your face sketched on it twice
Oh you are in my blood like holy wine
Oh and you taste so bitter but you taste so sweet
Oh I could drink a case of you
I could drink a case of you darling
And I would still be on my feet
Oh I’d still be on my feet
Oh I am a lonely painter
I live in a box of paints
I’m frightened by the devil
And I’m drawn to those ones that ain’t afraid
I remember that time that you told me, you said
“love is touching souls”
Surely you touched mine
“cause part of you pours out of me
In these lines from time to time
Oh you are in my blood like holy wine
And you taste so bitter but you taste so sweet
Oh I could drink a case of you
I could drink a case of you darling
Still I’d be on my feet
And still be on my feet
I met a woman
She had a mouth like yours
She knew your life
She knew your devils and your deeds
And she said
Color “go to him, stay with him if you can
Oh but be prepared to bleed”
Oh but you are in my blood you’re my holy wine
Oh and you taste so bitter, bitter and so sweet
Oh I could drink a case of you darling
Still I’d be on my feet
I’d still be on my feet
Mmmmmmm
My vote goes to Bridge Over Troubled Waters, by Simon and Garfunkle. Paul Simon was a lifeline for me during those (and many preceding years). His clarity in imagery blended with often haunting melodies and the richness of vocals were an intoxicating blend for a western NSW farm boy.
ELO: ‘Out of the Blue’ (1977) without a doubt: listened to nearly every Friday in our house to accompany fish & chips – and then some. Not a single duff track on it.
(ELO: ‘Time’ – first album I ever bought – would be a close second, if it hadn’t come out 1981 – will ‘Classic albums of the eighties’ be the next post?)
The next ten posts will be my top ten albums of the seventies – then I can move onto the next decade… [Bluff]
Oh dear. This conversation opens up so much potential for profound embarrassment, given that I like to think that aspects of my musical tastes have developed considerably since the 1970s (I was only 15 at the end of that decade so please cut me some slack here). Note I say ‘aspects’: some aspects of my musical taste remain sharable among friends only. OK, it’s time for Fr Stephen to enter into sacramental mode because I’m about to confess…
It’s strange that no one has nominated an Abba album, given that they’ve been rehabilitated in recent years, albeit sometimes in an ironic way. I’ll nominate ‘The Album’ as a contender because it contains two of my favourite Abba tracks in ‘Take A Chance on Me’ and ‘The Name of the Game’.
OK, ready for another uncool nomination? It’s The Carpenters’s 1975 album, ‘Horizon’, which features an achingly sad version of the Eagles’ ‘Desperado’. Some years later, I got into the music of Janis Ian, whose ‘Between the Lines’ (1975) must be included in any list of great albums of the 1970s and would probably be my nomination as the greatest.
I did try and affect a liking for cooler stuff in the late 1970s, desperately struggling to work out what my mates at school thought was so great about Northern Irish punk bands of the time like the Outcasts, Rudi and Stiff Little Fingers. I finally achieved some relative coolness through developing a liking for Tubeway Army in 1979 (‘Replicas’ being the relevant album) and Gary Numan thereafter…but Abba and the Carpenters were always going to be hard to live down…
The firt time I watch the film Jesus Christ Superstart I was eight years old,still I am not tired to watch it again and again.He was the firt hippy.My favorite song is =I dont know how love him -).
I hadn’t finished the message when I left the page, and when I came back and tried to rewrite it and submit it, it detected a duplicate message. Well, you may now have three near identical messages! Or maybe only this will get through. This is what I intended to say!
Well, I was 12 at the end of the 70s and I have literally no memories of pop music in childhood. I was though mad about my two Tchaikovsky albums; Swan Lake and Sleeping Beauty. I remember that I used to like dancing around the living room to these, aged about 8, preferably wearing a tutu. In the 80s I made a real effort to to be knowledgable about the charts, but my heart was never completely in it. By then Bach and Mozart were calling….