Customer Reviews

Billboard Top Pop Hits: 1969

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I'm only fourteen, but I like to listen to oldies now and then, and when I heard the song "In The Year 2525", I thought it was the coolest! Teenagers shouldn't be sterotyped as heavy metal or punk music lovers. We like to know where today's music comes from, too.

I can't say enough of the Rhino Records Billboard Collection. The albums are very reasonably priced for all of the great songs they contain. My favorite recordings on this particular album are "In the year 2525" and "Spinning Wheel". But don't listen to "2525" if you're in a sad mood; it will only depress you further. "Spinning Wheel" puts an interesting show to that old law of gravity 'What goes up must come down'.

Billboard Top Pop Hits: 1969 gives us a great look back at the pop music tunes that made the grade in 1969. This will bring back some memories for you--or maybe start your interest rising in this type of music! The sound quality is very good.

Blood, Sweat & Tears kick things off with a major hit for them entitled "Spinning Wheel." "Spinning Wheel" has great vocals and musical effects; although it is pop music there is a jammin' musical interlude that is quite jazzy and fresh sounding even today. I really like this tune and the way it uses the brass, drums and percussion. Great!

The Ventures do their theme from the incredibly popular television show Hawaii Five-O. This uses great horns, percussion, drums and a flute to carry the bulk of the melody. Next comes "In The Year 2525 (Exordium & Terminus);" this tune by Zager & Evans uses major and minor keys to make quite a stir; it always impresses me whenever I hear this tune. Zager & Evans sing and play "In The Year 2525 (Exordium & Terminus)" to perfection.

Glen Campbell weighs in with his "Wichita Lineman;" and he sings this so passionately it also could never be a tune I could forget. Glen's excellent diction bolsters his performance and the beautiful musical arrangement never ceases to sound pleasant to the ear. This is pop music that can double as "mood music," too.

Brooklyn Bridge turns in a strong performance of a number that always tugs at my heartstrings entitled "Worst That Can Happen." Listen also for Henry Mancini's wonderful interpretation of the love theme from Romeo and Juliet. Henry Mancini's arrangement uses the piano to great advantage and the strings are wonderful, too.

Overall, this is a very strong installment in this multi CD series of pop music. I highly recommend this album for aficionados of this genre of music; and people who are new to `60s music should like these tracks, too.

This is truly represenative of what was on the radio in 1969. I was only 5 years old at the time and in kindergarten, but my parents constantly had the radio on Charleston's top-40 station WTMA-AM (now a talk station) and I remember all of these songs. To this day, i fell a rush when I hear "Wedding Bell Blues" or Glen Campbell's "Witchita Lineman." However, "In the Year 2525" scared me to DEATH as a child (even before I comprehended the lyrics) and to this day, I will not listen to it when I'm alone in a dark room. But hey, listen and enjoy a most wonderful history lesson with this one.

Back almost two decades ago now when CDs were just emerging all you saw in terms of oldies compilations were the 10- to -12 selection types, some of which presented mainly re-makes of original hits, and very few of which contained any liner notes.

Among the better choices was this series from Joel Whitburn's Billboard/Record Research organization and Rhino, although even here there were seldom any background notes.

Since then we have been blessed with the likes of Ace Records of London, Eric Records of California, Varese-Sarabande, the Bear Family of Germany, Taragon from New York, and Stardust of Canada whose products extend to 28 selections and up and who offer up detailed and well-written liner notes.

Most of what the Billboard series presents has also since resurfaced many times in the offerings of the above and other outlets and at prices not that much higher and, with one notable exception, this one is no different.

That would be Oliver Swofford's Jean, a # 1 Adult Contemporary (for 4 weeks)/# 2 Billboard Pop Hot 100 in late 1969 from the film The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie starring Maggie Smith. Surprisingly, this is not easy to find. Everything else though is in the easy-to-find category.

We used the Top Pop Hits and Top Rocks Hits of 1969 to set the mood as we worked on our 1969 Porsche 912, and prepared it for its first exhibit in a car show. What fun!