The world wasn't such a great place to be in 1974. Gas prices had gone up dramatically. There was crisis in the Middle East with Israel and Egypt at the forefront. But the lowlight in the summer of 1974 came on Thursday night, August 8, when in a speech made from his Oval Office to the country, President Richard M. Nixon announced that as of that next day at noon, he was resigning the office of the presidency and replaced by Vice-President Gerald R. Ford.
Watergate had gotten too much at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue and in a short amount of time, President Nixon was going to be asked to testify in front of the Senate hearing committee and asked what he knew and when he knew it to them and a national audience.
Let's just say it wasn't going to end too well.
The people were bummed. They didn't like the world or their own country at this point in 1974. And so they turned to the one thing they could always turn to -- nostalgia. The year before, a movie that told of a simpler time in the early 1960s was released called "American Graffiti" and it became a huge hit and made household names of such actors as Ron Howard, Richard Dreyfuss and Harrison Ford. Earlier in 1974, the first No. 1 hit of the rock 'n roll era was released -- Billy Haley & The Comets' iconic "Rock Around The Clock" -- and in late May, it hit the Top 40, peaking at No. 39, spending one week in the countdown. And ABC was beginning to develop a new television show about life in the 1950s in Milwaukee that would star Howard and little-known actors such as Tom Bosley, Marion Ross, Anson Williams, Donny Most and a guy named Henry Winkler ... yup, "Happy Days."
And on the weekend of August 24, 1974, there was plenty of that nostalgia to go around in a number of songs within the Top 40.
Debuting at No. 33 was the latest single for the British artist known as Cat Stevens. A decade earlier, Sam Cooke went to No. 10 with "Another Saturday Night. Now Stevens was having his playful take with that number and would peak higher on the chart with his version at No. 6.
Moving up nine solid notches from No. 40 to No. 31 was the first and only Top 40 hit for the British group First Class. "Beach Baby" was a longing look at the long, beautiful days of summer lovin' and enjoying days on the sand and in the surf. It's the closest thing any foreign act has ever come to sounding like Brian, Carl, Dennis, Mike, Al and Bruce and the Beach Boys sound. With singer Tony Burrows, who made a history of singing on other one-hit wonder studio acts such as the Pipkins' "Gimme Dat Ding," White Plains' "My Baby Loves Lovin'" and Edison Lighthouse's "Love Grows (Where My Rosemary Goes), leading the way, that smash single was a hit long after summer turned to fall, peaking at No. 4 in this country.
Also leaping nine places from No. 30 to No. 21 was the latest hit by lead singer Burton Cummings and his group, The Guess Who. "Clap For The Wolfman" was also an ode to a disc jockey who first made a name for himself playing rock 'n roll records while on a Mexican radio station, Wolfman Jack (real name, Robert Smith, from Brooklyn, N.Y.). The Wolfman made a name for himself in that smash movie "American Graffiti" the year before and the Guess Who paid tribute to the man, who was now also the host of NBC's highly successful "The Midnight Special." It would end up peaking at No. 6.
Another act getting nostalgic ... well, in a much different way ... was the British band Fancy, led by the lone female in the group, lead singer Helen Court. They moved up four places from No. 22 to No. 18 with their fresh take on the Troggs' 1966 No. 1 hit "Wild Thing."
But maybe the most unique act with any kind of nostalgic lineage was a country star who failed as a pop singer in the 1950s. Billy "Crash" Craddock, given his nickname for his prowess on a Greensboro, N.C. football field as a running back, released numerous songs with unique titles such as "Smacky-Mouth," "Birddoggin'" and "Boom Boom Baby." Only one title even reached the Billboard Hot 100 and that was the No. 94 song "Don't Destroy Me" in 1959. So in the mid-1960s, Craddock stopped trying to be a rock-a-billy star and turned his focus to the country music scene, where he scored numerous Top 10 hits, including his breakthrough smash, his No. 3 country remake of Dawn's pop No. 1 smash "Knock Three Times" in 1971. Then came "Rub It In," the playful tease of a record about layin' the suntan on while bakin' on a summer's day at the beach. It became Craddock's first No. 1 country hit at 35 years old and even better, the song finally helped him crack the pop Top 40. The man who had the same kind of charisma as the King of Rock 'n Roll did, Elvis Presley, moved up four places in this countdown from No. 20 to its peak position of No. 16, where it held down for three straight weeks.
Moving up a notch from No. 9 to No. 8 was the first collaboration of Donny and Marie Osmond, who were 5 and 4 years old, respectively, when Dale & Grace took "I'm Leaving It Up To You" to No. 1 for two weeks in November 1963. Donny and Marie decided to add an "all" into the title and "I'm Leaving It All Up To You" would wind up peaking at No. 4.
Last but not least was the guy at the top. Between June 1963 and the middle of July 1974, Canadian Paul Anka had exactly one Top 40 hit with the No. 27 song "Goodnight My Love" in 1969. But it wasn't as if he was doing nothing in the interim. He had composed the theme song to "The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson" and he wrote the classic Frank Sinatra Top 30 smash "My Way." And he was still on the circuit, doing night clubs in Vegas. He was hot even if he wasn't having a hit. Well it was this week in 1974 that Anka's first Top 40 hit since "Goodnight My Love," "(You're) Having My Baby" jumped up from No. 3 to land at No. 1 to become his first No. 1 hit since "Lonely Boy" in 1959 and 17 years after scoring his very first No. 1 hit at 16 years old, "Diana."
The song caused a stir in two ways: First was the title of the song. A lot of women were offended by the title, "(You're) Having My Baby," as if he was saying we were giving birth instead of the mother, who got to endure the nine months of labor and then give birth. The feminists out there said that Anka didn't get it, even if he didn't think anything of it. Second, the song contained the line, "Didn't have to keep it ... wouldn't put you through it. You could've swept it from your life, but you wouldn't do it. No you wouldn't do it." Those who were pro choice got all over Anka, but the star defended himself, saying in 1974, "I am into the antihuman thing, and I do understand the other side of it. There are those who can't cope, and it's not in the cards for them to have kids. I'm a libber myself, in the sense that ... if you've got to abort, you do. Some people just can't cope."
Though given the title by some as "the worst song ever," Anka's song has lasted for three generations and was one of his biggest hits ever, staying at No. 1 for three weeks.
It was a nostalgic time on the music charts. And with what was happening in the world, especially in this country, you could understand why Americans turned to a more cherished and "innocent" time.
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