Give me CSNY or even Joni Mitchell’s rendition over this dull cover. Blech..

OK but personally my favorite rendition of this song is from Jerry “The Iceman” Butler.

Watch a performance of the song on YouTube:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z9QNlFrNL04

Wish I could fix the rating. I’d really like “Wishy-washy” instead of “Not worth consuming”. Meh…

This collection began a craze of sorts for Rhino, who ended up making 24 more just like it as well as a box set. The idea was simple: reclaim the 70s from the extreme camps of “classic rock” and punk and highlight the songs you heard on AM radio…you know, the POP stuff.

For a series debut, the effort is somewhat less than auspicious with only 1 charttopper, 2 Top 5 efforts, and 1 from the Top 10 with a ringer from 1969 brought in to beef it up. (Sonny and Cher soundalike “More Today than Yesterday” from the Spiral Starecase)

Besides the zippy ringer, goofoff studio creation “Na Na Hey Hey Kiss Him Goodbye”, midtempo rocker “Venus” (Bananarama took a cover of this straight to the top in 1986) and the tender “Smile a Little Smile for Me” all are charmers.

Outside those 4, things are spottier with cowbell thudder “Mississippi Queen” an especial sore thumb amid poppier fare and frothier-than-a-latte “Tracy” (done by ex-Archies’ lead singer Ron Dante by overdubbing his own voice repeatedly) the biggest question marks here.

BOTTOM LINE:
Ho-hum. Hard to imagine this led the way for a wildly successful series for them. Things would get better later…

Entry #3 in Rhino’s 70s pop series is a strong contender in chart terms with #1 song “I Think I Love You” from the Partridge Family and 6 Top 10 tunes squeezed in.

Unfortunately, some of them don’t hold up all that well. Alive and Kicking’s Tommy James produced “Tighter, Tighter” is limp..the sort of song you’ll listen to after you’ve punched ALL the radio buttons first but nothing you’d ever turn up. Likewise mid-tempo “Gypsy Woman” from Bryan Hyland.

In fact, some of the best tunes here didn’t score all that well in the Top 40. Mungo Jerry only cracked the Top 40 once but “In the Summertime” became a warm weather classic, revived every time the mercury climbs. The faux reggae “Montego Bay” ensured Bobby Bloom a spot on oldies radio with its lilting drums and buoyant whistling. And Sugarloaf’s “Green Eyed Lady” still sizzles out of speakers.

BOTTOM LINE:
It’ll do but this isn’t one of the first discs from the series I’d pick up if cash is limited.

Don’t expect lots of folks with 4 and 5 hit careers here but though the artists’ names might be a dim memory, the songs won’t if you grew up listening to Top 40 radio in the 70s.

With this disc, you get a charttopping smash with the Raiders “Indian Reservation” and 4 from the Top 10 (DJ turned singer Daddy Dewdrop’s “Chick-a-Boom (Don’t Ya Jes’ Love It?)”, hippie ballad “Me and You and a Dog Named Boo” from Lobo, “When You’re Hot, You’re Hot” which had claimed the top of the country chart for Jerry Reed, and Tommy James’ chuggin’ “Draggin’ the Line”). The best part is the good tunes don’t stop at the big hits, Rhino has chosen well some “second-tier” hits that have staying power such a a brisk runthrough of the Fabs’ “Here Comes the Sun” from folkie Richie Havens, The Fortunes’ ironically chipper “Here Comes that Rainy Day Feeling Again” and zippy horn rocker “Get it On” from the ill-fated Chase, the majority of the band dying in a plane crash 3 years later.

BOTTOM LINE:
A good bet for 70s pop lovers.

Cheesy 70s pop is an addiction for me so this series from Rhino is a sort of nirvana. However, this is not one of the better discs overall. Really there are only 3 Top 10 hits here (The Pipkins’ novelty “Gimme Dat Ding”, Five Man Electrical Band’s “Signs” which later was an 80s hit for Tesla, and The Stampeders “Sweet City Woman”) so the value of this has to come in “Wow! What a great song, never heard THAT before!” appeal. Unfortunately that only happens once with Lighthouse’s jazz-rock ditty “One Fine Morning” which only managed Top 30 status in November of 1971 but deserved a better fate.

BOTTOM LINE:
You can probably get the highlights here elsewhere. Skip this one…

This is a 2000 repackage of the debut by the Katinas from 1989 when the group was called “The Katina Boyz” on the tween oriented label Arcade Records.

I think my “worth consuming” is overdoing it. It’s decent modern country but really only “A Broken Wing” still stands out in my memory these days. I’d call it “wishy-washy” these days…