September 11, 2026 —– Chart #367 Hello Music Friends, Every so often a songwriter sits down and writes a hymn, and the whole world decides it’s a drug song. Tommy James wrote “Crystal Blue Persuasion” with a Bible open on his lap. It was 1968, and James — the same fellow who gave the world […]
September 4, 2026 —– Chart #366 Hello Music Friends, Before John Mellencamp ever wrote a note about fighting authority, authority took his name. In 1976 his management decided that nobody named Mellencamp was going to sell records, and his debut album came out credited to “Johnny Cougar.” The story goes that John found out about
August 28, 2026 —– Chart #365 Hello Music Friends, No woman in the history of rock and roll ever got better songs out of her men than Pattie Boyd. George Harrison married her and wrote “Something.” Eric Clapton fell for her while she was still married to his best friend and wrote “Layla,” which is
August 21, 2026 —– Chart #364 Hello Music Friends, The most famous father-and-son conversation in popular music is not about a father and son. It’s about the Russian Revolution. I’ll give you a minute with that one. In 1969 Cat Stevens was writing a musical called Revolussia, set in 1917 Russia, about a boy who
August 14, 2026 —– Chart #363 Hello Music Friends, Herb Alpert had a question he liked to ask great songwriters, and it’s a beauty: is there a song tucked away in your drawer somewhere — one that never got the right recording — that you still find yourself whistling in the shower? He put that
August 7, 2026 —– Chart #362 Hello Music Friends, Rusty Young was hired to be the guy in Poco who didn’t sing. That was the deal. He played the pedal steel, the banjo, the dobro — all the instruments that make a country-rock band sound like a country-rock band and none of the ones that
July 31, 2026 —– Chart #361 Hello music friends, Welcome back to another edition of Chart of the Week. This week we are going deep into soul music with one of the great heartbreak songs ever recorded. Today’s feature is “The Dark End of the Street” by James Carr. This is not a happy little
July 24, 2026 —– Chart #360 Hello music friends, Welcome back to another edition of Chart of the Week. This week we are going all the way back to the early days of rock and roll with one of the greats. Today’s feature is “Ain’t That a Shame” by Fats Domino. And before we are
July 17, 2026 —– Chart #359 Hello music friends, Welcome back to another edition of Chart of the Week. This week we are returning to Van Morrison, and that is never a bad place to go. Today’s feature is “Bright Side of the Road,” a terrific Van Morrison song from his 1979 album Into the
July 10, 2026 —– Chart #358 Hello music friends, Welcome back to another edition of Chart of the Week. This week’s selection is a little different from many of the songs I feature here. It is a little racy, a little suggestive, and not exactly the kind of tune you would expect to hear at