Stories behind 60s and 70s hits: 15 facts your DJ might tell you

The biggest hits of the 60s and 70s are full of stories you would never guess from the radio: Stayin' Alive was built on a two bar drum loop credited to a drummer who did not exist, and the twenty first night of September may not mean anything at all. Here are 15 of those stories, from Motown and soul to folk, country, reggae and disco, each checked against a source and with the disputed parts marked as disputed.

They are the kind of thing a good radio DJ tells you in the few seconds before a song starts. That is what Stationz.fm does: it is our Chrome extension that adds an AI radio DJ to YouTube playlists on youtube.com in desktop Chrome, and before a song it can tell a short story like these, taken from a checked library when one is available.

1. Where Did Our Love Go (The Supremes, 1964): the song nobody wanted

The usual story says Holland, Dozier and Holland wrote it for the Marvelettes, who turned it down, so the Supremes got it because they could not say no. Mary Wilson, Eddie Holland and Lamont Dozier all told it that way. But Brian Holland said it was written for the Supremes all along, and the Marvelettes denied ever rejecting it (source). It was also cut in a key that suited Mary, and one BBC history says Berry Gordy insisted Diane Ross sing it instead. It became their first number one. More on The Supremes.

2. Mr. Tambourine Man (The Byrds, 1965): only one Byrd played on it

The band were not impressed when they first heard the unreleased Bob Dylan song. David Crosby thought it was too folky. So manager Jim Dickson brought Dylan to a rehearsal, and Dylan said you could dance to it. On the single, Roger McGuinn was the only Byrd who played: the backing came from the session players later known as the Wrecking Crew. That started a myth that session men played the whole album, but they played on only two tracks (source). More on The Byrds.

3. Respect (Aretha Franklin, 1967): who spelled it out?

Otis Redding wrote and released Respect in 1965 as a man's song. Aretha reworked it with her sisters Erma and Carolyn in her Detroit apartment and turned it into a woman's demand. The famous spelled out chorus was not in the original, and who came up with it is disputed. Engineer Tom Dowd credited Carolyn, while Aretha told NPR that she and Carolyn came up with it together at a piano by the window (NPR). At Monterey that summer, Otis joked that a girl had taken the song away from him. More on Aretha Franklin.

4. (Sittin' On) The Dock of the Bay (Otis Redding, 1968): the whistle

Otis died in a plane crash in December 1967, only weeks after recording it. Steve Cropper mixed it while Otis's body was still being recovered, and added seagulls and waves because he remembered Otis clowning with gull noises in the outtakes. The whistling at the end is disputed. Cropper always said it was a placeholder: Otis could not think of an ad lib and planned to fix it later. Stax executive Al Bell insists it was pure Otis and fully intentional (Rolling Stone). It became his first number one. More on Otis Redding.

5. Mrs. Robinson (Simon and Garfunkel, 1968): it started as Mrs. Roosevelt

Most accounts agree Paul Simon was working on a song about times past called Mrs. Roosevelt. How it became Mrs. Robinson is told two ways. In one, director Mike Nichols heard it and told Simon it was now about the seductress in The Graduate. Art Garfunkel remembered it differently: they had been using Mrs. Robinson as a working title, and when he mentioned it, Nichols leapt to his feet and asked why nobody had shown it to him (source). After Joe DiMaggio died in 1999, Simon sang it at Yankee Stadium in his honour. More on Simon and Garfunkel.

6. Proud Mary (Creedence Clearwater Revival, 1969): a song from discharge papers?

John Fogerty's best known version is that Proud Mary came to him in a rush the day his Army Reserve discharge came through. He told NPR he opened the papers, grabbed his guitar, and the opening line poured out. In a 1969 interview he said it took two days. But critic Joel Selvin, in notes for a 2008 reissue, wrote that the riff was dreamed up at an Avalon Ballroom show and that the song was stitched together from parts of different songs, one of them about a washerwoman named Mary (source). More on Creedence Clearwater Revival.

7. Big Yellow Taxi (Joni Mitchell, 1970): a view from a hotel window

Joni wrote it in Hawaii, after opening her hotel curtains to green mountains and a vast parking lot below. That gave her the famous line about paving paradise. The last verse turns personal, as her man is taken away in a big yellow taxi, and some listeners believe the taxi is really a police car, because Toronto's patrol cars were painted yellow until 1986. Nobody has confirmed that reading, and plenty of people simply hear a cab (source). Janet Jackson later built Got 'til It's Gone around a sample of it. More on Joni Mitchell.

8. What's Going On (Marvin Gaye, 1971): the "worst thing" Berry Gordy ever heard?

Marvin's brother Frankie came home from Vietnam with stories that left both brothers in tears. When Marvin produced What's Going On himself in 1970, saxophonist Eli Fontaine played the famous opening line while he thought he was only fooling around. The legend says Berry Gordy called it the worst thing he had ever heard. Gordy has denied that, saying he liked its jazzy feel but feared a political song would cost Marvin his audience (source). Motown released it anyway, reportedly without Gordy's knowledge, and it became the label's fastest selling single. More on Marvin Gaye.

9. Superstition (Stevie Wonder, 1972): whose song was it?

Jeff Beck came up with the drumbeat while working with Stevie, and he always said Stevie wrote Superstition for him in return for playing on Talking Book, until Motown decided it was too good to give away. Stevie's version was that Motown needed a strong single, and that he expected Beck's recording to come out long before his own (Ultimate Classic Rock). Stevie's came out first and went to number one. To add a twist, Cheap Trick's Bun E. Carlos said Cozy Powell once hinted the drums on the record were his, though Stevie is credited. More on Stevie Wonder.

10. Jolene (Dolly Parton, 1973): who was the real Jolene?

Dolly's best known explanation is a red haired bank clerk who flirted with her husband Carl Dean when they were newly married. But she also said the name, the red hair and the green eyes came from a little girl who came on stage asking for an autograph, and she repeated the name over and over so she would remember it. That fan may have been a Canadian girl called Juline Whelan, who met Dolly at ten in 1972. Dolly also said for years that she wrote Jolene and I Will Always Love You on the same night (source). More on Dolly Parton.

11. No Woman, No Cry (Bob Marley, 1974): the credit that fed a soup kitchen

First, the title: it is Jamaican patois for woman, don't cry. The song is credited to Vincent Ford, known as Tata, a Trenchtown friend who ran a soup kitchen, and the royalties helped keep it running. Many believe Bob wrote it himself and put it in Tata's name to keep it away from his old publisher. Danny Sims sued on exactly that basis, and lost in 1987. When writer Vivien Goldman asked Tata directly, he only smiled and said, well, what do you think (source)? The live 1975 London version became Bob's first hit outside reggae. More on Bob Marley.

12. Dancing Queen (ABBA, 1976): first played for a king

It began in August 1975 as a demo called Boogaloo, inspired by the disco beat of George McCrae's Rock Your Baby. When Benny Andersson played the backing track to Frida at home, she cried because she found it so beautiful. Benny wanted it out right away, but manager Stig Anderson insisted on releasing Fernando first. So Dancing Queen had its public premiere at a royal gala in Stockholm for King Carl Gustaf and Silvia Sommerlath, the night before their wedding (source). It became ABBA's only number one in the United States. More on ABBA.

13. Stayin' Alive (Bee Gees, 1977): the drummer who never existed

Drummer Dennis Bryon had to leave the sessions when his mother died, and no replacement could be found. So the producers took two bars of his drumming from Night Fever, spliced them into a tape loop and built the song on it. On the sleeve they credited a drummer called Bernard Lupe, who did not exist, and for a while people tried to hire him (source). The film was going to be called Saturday Night until the brothers refused to rename their song, so it became Saturday Night Fever. More on Bee Gees.

14. September (Earth, Wind and Fire, 1978): why the twenty first?

Co-writer Allee Willis hated Maurice White's placeholder phrase, ba dee ya, and begged him to change it. When she asked what it meant, his answer was, more or less, who cares. The date is disputed. Willis always said it meant nothing: they ran through the numbers and the twenty first simply sang best (NPR). In 2019 Maurice's widow said the twenty first of September was the expected due date of their son. Maurice himself generally said he picked it for the sound. Los Angeles now marks it as Earth, Wind and Fire Day. More on Earth, Wind and Fire.

15. Heart of Glass (Blondie, 1979): not filmed at Studio 54

The band had played an early version for years, calling it the disco song. Who turned it into sleek dance music is disputed: producer Mike Chapman has taken the credit and also given it to Debbie Harry, while Debbie and Chris Stein point to Jimmy Destri, who brought in the drum machine and wanted it to sound like Kraftwerk (The Guardian). Many fans think the video was shot inside Studio 54 because it opens with a shot of the club. Chris says it was filmed at a short lived club he remembered as the Copa. More on Blondie.

FAQ

What is the biggest myth about a 70s hit?

One of the best is the story behind Saturday Night Fever itself. The film was sold as being based on a real 1976 magazine article about a Brooklyn dancer, but about twenty years later the writer, Nik Cohn, admitted he had made it up (The Guardian).

Why do so many 60s and 70s song stories disagree?

Most of them come from interviews given decades later, by people who were in the room but remember it differently. Songwriting credits, money and pride play a part too. That is why the stories above give the competing versions instead of picking the most dramatic one.

Where do these facts come from?

Each story comes from our researched artist files, which list their sources, and each one links to a source you can read yourself. Disputed details are marked as disputed.

Hear stories like these before the song plays

If you want a DJ who tells you one short story like these and then lets the music play, try one of our stations: 60s Hits, 70s Hits, Motown or Disco. Stationz.fm works on YouTube playlists in desktop Chrome, and you can add it from the Chrome Web Store. For more, see stories behind 80s and 90s hits and stories behind classic rock songs.