Spiral Starecase – "More Today Than Yesterday" (1969)

I love you more today than yesterday

But not as much as tomorrow

[NOTE: 2 or 3 lines originally featured “More Today Than Yesterday” – the newest of the 2 OR 3 LINES “GOLDEN DECADE” HIT SINGLES HALL OF FAME – on May 14, 2019.  Here is a very lightly edited version of that post, which is certainly one of the very best of the more than two thousand that I’ve written since giving birth to this wildly successful little blog in 2009.]

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When I pick my grandson Jack up at day care, I usually sing along to the SiriusXM ’60s on 6 channel during the short drive to his home. 

A few weeks ago, today’s featured song popped up on that station.  Jack isn’t even three years old yet, and I wasn’t sure if the lines from the song that are quoted above would make any sense to him.  

But I started half-saying, half-singing those lines to Jack when I said goodbye after dropping him off at home.  I’m not sure if those lines are really true – do I really love Jack more today that I loved him yesterday? – but I thought it was a nice way to tell him how much I loved him, and might give him something to think about, too.

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Earlier today, my daughter Sarah – Jack’s mother – sent me two short videos of Jack singing to his baby brother Hunter, who just turned six months old.  To say that I was surprised by what Jack did in those videos is the understatement of the century.

Here’s the first video:

Here’s the second one:

(Note how Jack has captured the essential rhythm of these lyrics – the way he pronounces “yesterday” and “tomorrow,” and the pause between the two lines.)

Jack never really reacted to my singing those song lyrics to him – he certainly never sang along with me, or repeated the lines back to me.  

I hadn’t told anyone else about my reciting those lyrics as a goodbye catchphrase.  My daughter had no idea that I was doing that, so she couldn’t have prompted him to sing the lines to Hunter while she recorded him.

Jack has always seemed very taken with little Hunter – he stays pretty close to him when both boys are at home, and I’ve never seen him exhibit any jealousy or resentment when we are paying more attention to Hunter than to him.  But I can’t quite comprehend how his not-quite-three-year-old brain figured out that the song lyrics about love that I recited to him were appropriate for him to sing to his brother.  

I’ve been blessed with four grandsons, and a fifth is on the way – perhaps I’ll be fortunate enough to have even more grandchildren in the future.  I have a feeling there are other little miracles like this one in store for me, and I am very much looking forward to them.

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The Spiral Starecase’s “More Today than Yesterday” made it to #12 on the Billboard “Hot 100” in 1969.  

Pat Upton in 2013

In 2013, the group’s frontman, Pat Upton, talked to a newspaper reporter about writing the song:

I wrote “I Love You More Today Than Yesterday” in a motel room in Las Vegas.  I was thinking about Bobby Goldsboro singing it when I first wrote it.  Musically, I had a chord progression in my head, and I knew the only way I’d ever get to use it was if I wrote a song around it.  [The group recorded the song and] three months later, it took off.

After the Spiral Starecase broke up, Upton became a session musician and a member of Ricky Nelson’s band for a few years.  

On December 30, 1985, Nelson performed at Upton’s club in Guntersville, Alabama.  He was scheduled to play at a big New Year’s Eve show in Dallas, and invited Upton to join them, but Upton declined.  Nelson’s plane – a 40-year-old DC-3 with a history of mechanical problems – crashed about two miles from the airport where it was supposed to land, killing Nelson, his girlfriend, his manager, and all four members of his band.

Here’s a photo of Upton and Nelson taken just before Nelson’s ill-fated flight took off:

Upton died in 2016 at the age of 75.  I wish I had been able to share these videos of Jack with him – he had six grandchildren of his own, so I’m sure he would have enjoyed them.

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In 1889, the 18-year-old Rosemonde Gérard wrote the following lines to Edmond Rostand, a young playwright (he wrote Cyrano de Bergerac) whom she would soon marry:

Car, vois-tu, chaque jour je t’aime davantage,

Aujourd’hui plus qu’hier et bien moins que demain.

French poet Rosemonde Gérard

One English-language dictionary of quotations translates those lines as follows:

For, you see, each day I love you more,

Today more than yesterday and less than tomorrow.

Years later, a French jeweler came up with the idea of making a medallion engraved with an abbreviated version of the verse.  

The medallion depicted below reads has a plus sign followed by qu’hier, a minus sign, and que demain – in other words, “more than yesterday, less than tomorrow.”

The plus and minus signs on these medallions are often enhanced with gemstones – a romantic poem is all well and good, but diamonds are a girl’s best friend!

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Click here to listen to “More Today Than Yesterday.”

Click here to buy the record from Amazon.

Fifth Dimension – "Aquarius/Let the Sunshine In" (1969)

Mystic crystal revelation

And the mind’s true liberation

Aquarius!

A year after today’s featured recording was released, my high school jazz band performed an instrumental arrangement of it to close our spring concert.

My high school had a big-ass grand piano, and the lid was opened wide when I played it that night.  I was a pretty accomplished student pianist by the time I was a senior, but the thing I did best was play the piano LOUD.

I never played louder than when I played the second part of the “Aquarius/Let the Sunshine In” medley that night.  I banged the piano keys as hard as I could – after all, I was trying to be heard over four trumpets, four trombones, five saxophones, and a drummer.

A big-ass concert grand piano

I also ripped off full-length glissando after full-length glissando.  By the time the band got to the last chord, my knuckles were raw and bleeding from all those glissandos.

I’ve played the piano in public dozens of times, but I was never more jacked up during a performance than I was when we played “Aquarius/Let the Sunshine In” that night.

Is that why I decided to include the Fifth Dimension’s recording of that medley in the 2 OR 3 LINES “GOLDEN DECADE” HIT SINGLES HALL OF FAME?  Well, it’s certainly a reason – although it’s not the only reason.

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Berry Gordy – the man who built Motown Records into the most profitable African-American-owned business in the United States – didn’t make many mistakes.  But he slipped up on occasion.  

For example, he didn’t think Marvin Gaye’s recording of “I Heard It Through the Grapevine” – which was only the best Motown record ever made – was worthy of being released as a single.

And when the head of Motown’s Los Angeles recommended that Gordy sign the Fifth Dimension, he passed on the group.  

B-i-g mistake, Berry! 

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“Aquarius/Let the Sunshine In” held the #1 spot on the Billboard “Hot 100” for six consecutive weeks in 1969, and was the best-selling single of that year.  Not surprisingly, it won the Grammy for “Record of the Year.” 

The Fifth Dimension had also won the “Record of the Year“ Grammy two years earlier for “Up, Up and Away” – which is the song I think of first when I think of the Fifth Dimension.  (Somehow “Up, Up and Away” only made it to #7 on the Billboard charts – that’s very surprising.)

Between 1967 and 1973, a total of 20 of the group’s singles made the top forty.  They not only had another #1 hit (“Wedding Bell Blues”), but also had a #2 (“One Less Bell to Answer”) and a #3 (“Stoned Soul Picnic”).

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I didn’t pay a lot of attention to the Fifth Dimension when I was a teenager back in the sixties.  I heard their records on the radio hundreds (if not thousands) of times, but never seriously considered buying one of their albums.

As a teenager, I didn’t appreciate the craftsmanship and professionalism of recording artists like the Fifth Dimension when I heard it – now that I’m an adult, I get it. 

The three male and two female singers who were the group’s original members sang beautifully, but that was only one of the reasons their recordings were so good.

The Fifth Dimension with
Bones Howe and Jimmy Webb

Their producer, “Bones” Howe, was savvy enough to hire members of the legendary “Wrecking Crew” group of studio musicians to back up the group’s vocals.  (Those vocals were arranged by Bob Alcivar, who had worked with Howe when Howe produced the Association’s equally impeccable records.)

And the group had excellent taste when it came to choosing material.  They recorded songs by a number of first-rate songwriters, including Jimmy Webb (“Up, Up and Away”), Burt Bacharach and Hal David (“One Less Bell to Answer”), and especially Laura Nyro.

Sadly, Laura Nyro’s own recordings of “Stoned Soul Picnic,” “Sweet Blindness,” “Wedding Bell Blues,” and “Save the Country” never cracked the top forty.  But the Fifth Dimension’s covers of them made it to #3, #13, and #1, and #27, respectively. 

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The Fifth Dimension told Bones Howe that they wanted to record “Aquarius” after seeing the musical Hair on Broadway. 

Howe was skeptical at first.  But after seeing the show himself, he decided to create a medley by combing “Aquarius” – which was the first song in Hair – with part of the musical’s final number, “The Flesh Failures (“Let the Sunshine In).”  The transition from the first part of the medley to the second part is anything but smooth – the songs are in dramatically different tempos – but Howe decided to just “jam them together.”

Songwriter Jimmy Webb walked into the studio when the Fifth Dimension were recording the vocals.  “My God, that’s a number one record,” he told Howe after listening for a few moments.

(You da man, Jimmy Webb!)

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Click here to listen to the Fifth Dimension’s recording of “Aquarius/Let the Sunshine In.”

Click here to buy that recording from Amazon.

Glen Campbell – "Wichita Lineman" (1968)

And I need you more than want you

And I want you for all time

After he reads a question, my favorite trivia host plays music to fill the time that teams are allowed to think about that question before turning an answer in – which is usually two minutes. 

One of the reason that my favorite trivia host is my favorite trivia host is his playlist – which includes songs like “Pepper” by the Butthole Surfers, “88 Lines About 44 Women” by the Nails, “People Who Died” by the Jim Carroll Band, and “Flagpole Sitta” by Harvey Danger.

But my favorite of the songs that this host plays regularly is “Wichita Lineman” by the late Glen Campbell.  

You didn’t see that coming, did you?

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As much as I like that record, it wasn’t on my original short list for this year’s class of the 2 OR 3 LINES “GOLDEN DECADE” HIT SINGLES HALL OF FAME.

“Wichita Lineman” made it all the way to #3 on the Billboard “Hot 100,” so it certainly qualifies as a hit single.  (Marvin Gaye’s “I Heard It Through the Grapevine” held down the number one spot that week.)

And “Wichita Lineman” had a hall-of-fame-worthy pedigree: it was written by Jimmy Webb, who was one of the truly great pop songwriters of all time.  (That statement would be true even if the only song he had ever written in his life was “MacArthur Park.”)

But the real reason I chose to include “Wichita Lineman” among this year’s group of “Golden Decade” hit singles hall of fame selections was that I learned recently that no less a cultural icon than Bob Dylan himself has called it “the greatest song ever written.”

(Oh yes he did!)

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Of course, Dylan’s other favorite songs include “I Want to Hold Your Hand” by the Beatles and “Pretty Maids in a Row” by the Eagles . . . which proves that his musical judgment is a little suspect.

But while it’s fair to discount Dylan’s enthusiastic endorsement of “Wichita Lineman,” there’s certainly no reason to discount mine.  If 2 or 3 lines tells you that a record is great, you’d best believe that record is great.

And those of you who don't agree that "Wichita Lineman" is a great record can just form a line to kiss my ass!

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Click here to listen to “Wichita Lineman.”

Click here to buy that recording from Amazon.

Cowsills – "The Rain, The Park & Other Things" (1968)

I saw her sitting in the rain

Raindrops falling on her

She didn't seem to care

At our weekly trivia competition last night, the host played brief snippets from three pop records and asked us to identify the groups that recorded them – each of whom consisted entirely of siblings.

I immediately thought of the Cowsills.  But the host didn’t play “The Rain, the Park & Other Things,” or “Indian Lake,” or any other Cowsills recording.

Then it hit me.  While there were six Cowsill siblings in the group – Bill, Bob, Barry, John, Paul, and Susan (but not Bob’s fraternal twin, Richard) – their mother Barbara joined them just before they recorded their first album, which included today’s featured song.

The Cowsills inspired “The
Partridge Family” TV show

So the group didn’t consist entirely of siblings (like the Jackson 5) – meaning they couldn’t have been one of the answers to that trivia question.

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Several of the Cowsills siblings pursued post-Cowsills musical careers after the group broke up in 1972.

Susan – the youngest member of the Cowsills – joined the Continental Drifters in 1993, and quickly demonstrated that she was a talented songwriter as well as a gifted singer.  

Ex-Bangle Vicki Peterson – who married John Cowsill – was also a member of that group. 

Susan Cowsill and Vicki Peterson in 2018

Click here to hear “Who We Are, Where We Live,” which the Continental Drifters released on their Vermillion album in 1998.

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Bob, Paul, and Susan are still touring as the Cowsills.  John occasionally joins them.  

Sadly, Barry drowned in New Orleans in 2005 as a result of the flooding caused by Hurricane Katrina.  Bill died of natural causes on February 18, 2006 – the day before his siblings gathered for Barry’s memorial service.  

Click here to listen to “The Rain, the Park & Other Things,” which made it to #2 on the Billboard “Hot 100” in December 1967.  (“Daydream Believer” by the Monkees kept the Cowsills out of the top spot.)

Click here to buy that recording – the newest member of the 2 OR 3 LINES “GOLDEN DECADE” HIT SINGLES HALL OF FAME – from Amazon.

Strawberry Alarm Clock – "Incense and Peppermints" (1967)

Incense and peppermints, meaningless nouns

Turn on, tune in, turn your eyes around

The Strawberry Alarm Clock performed in Joplin, Missouri – my hometown – on March 7, 1969, when I was a junior in high school.  To my everlasting regret, I didn’t go to the show. 

The band was on its last legs by then.  Today’s featured song, “Incense and Peppermints,” had hit #1 on the Billboard “Hot 100” in November of 1967, and the group’s debut album – also titled Incense and Peppermints – sold well on the strength of its title track.  

But it was all downhill for the Strawberry Alarm Clock after that.  Their follow-up single – which was titled “Tomorrow” – didn’t do badly, but none of the singles they released after that made it into the top forty.  Their subsequent albums were flops as well.

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What brought the Strawberry Alarm Clock to Joplin?  They were last-minute replacements for the Buckinghams – whose “Mercy, Mercy, Mercy” is also a new inductee into the 2 OR 3 LINES “GOLDEN DECADE” HIT SINGLES HALL OF FAME. 

In the words of Chappell Roan, the Buckinghams were hot to go in 1967, when they had singles that reached #1, #6, #5, #12, and #11 (respectively) on the Billboard singles charts.  But nothing they released after that year sold worth a damn – which may explain why they initially accepted a Joplin gig.

Back in the day, I heard that the Buckinghams had to cancel because their guitarist had broken an arm in a car accident.  I have no idea if that was true – at the time, I assumed it was bullsh*t.

(You got that right!)

But while my hometown wasn’t good enough for the Buckinghams, it was more than good enough for the Strawberry Alarm Clock, who drew a crowd of about 1800 to Joplin’s Memorial Hall (where I had seen Paul Revere and the Raiders perform live two years earlier).

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From an article about the Strawberry Alarm Clock concert that appeared in the Parkwood High School student newspaper, the Spectator:

The group’s appearance was made possible through Mr. Ed Varner of Mar-Scott Associates.  The goal of Mr. Varner and his company is to provide the young adults of Joplin with a well-known singing group or band every eight weeks.  With the proper support from the young people of Joplin, this worthwhile goal can be accomplished.

I guess Ed Varner didn’t get the “proper support from the young people of Joplin” he wanted because we sure as hell didn’t have a well-known band popping up in Joplin every two months.

More from the Spectator article:

The Spectator staff was on the scene to meet the Strawberry Alarm Clock at the [Joplin] airport.  Although they were tired, the group consented to answering our questions.  One member of the group noted, “We haven’t had any sleep since 10 o’clock yesterday morning.  We never went to bed. . . . [Mr. Varner] called at 8 o’clock and we packed and then left.”  When asked what they had planned for the day, they replied, “We were going to sleep.”

But sleep never came.  After a busy morning of unpacking, the Strawberry Alarm Clock had an autographing session from 4 to 5 at May’s [Drug Store].  From there a brief rest, and on to Memorial Hall.

That account raises more questions than it answers, doesn’t it?  (With all due respect, the Spectator was not exactly the New York Times when it came to the quality of its reportage.  It wasn’t even the Joplin Globe and News-Herald.)

It sounds like the group woke up at 10:00 AM on March 6 and never went to bed that night.  Varner called them the next morning at 8:00 AM – when the band members were certainly sleep-deprived and probably intoxicated to a greater or lesser degree.  

Somehow they pulled themselves together and got to the airport in time to make it to Joplin in time for a 4:00 PM meet-and-greet at a local store.   That would have been almost impossible if they had been in Los Angeles – which is where the band was from.  (There were no nonstop commercial flights from LAX to JLN in 1969 – or in any other year, for that matter – and I doubt that Mr. Varner sprang for a private jet to bring our heroes to Joplin.  So maybe they were on tour and got the call in a city not too far away from Joplin?)

The group must have been exhausted by the time they took the stage – I’m surprised they could keep their eyes open long enough to finish the show.

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Click here to listen to “Incense and Peppermints.”

Click here to buy that record from Amazon.