Customer Reviews

Have a Nice Day 15

5 star:		(5)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

As a fan of Rhino Records for many years I was elated when they started this series years ago. This was the 70s collection with songs that you couldn't find on any other compilation - the quirky ones that you remember hearing on AM radio, had the 45 but wasn't on the "most popular" list. For example: Sky High by Jigsaw (which I remember hearing in 1975) and Convoy by C. W. McCall (which I had the 45 rpm of). This isn't my favorite volume of the series but nonetheless, a volume that should be in your collection.

Please note! The cassette versions are different from the CD release. There are "Bonus Tracks" on the CD that are not found on the cassette.

Volume 15 of the "Have a Nice Day" series covers just about every facet of the decade's musical free-for-all. From country-flavored comedy with C. W. McCall's "Convoy" to cutting-edge funk with Hot Chocolate's "You Sexy Thing", this disc has it all. Janis Ian's "At Seventeen" has strong folk overtones, the Bay City Rollers check in with the roller rink/disco standard "Saturday Night", and Austin Roberts adds the sugary sweet, almost bubblegummy ballad "Rocky".

While the variety is a bit startling, the sound quality is excellent and most of these cuts were legitimate hits. This volume is an excellent value and well worth owning. Highly recommended.

How tacky are some of these songs? Well, I can remember hearing these songs being played at SEARS while shopping for clothes (no choice in those days. I lived in the suburbs and didn't yet have a car). The direct memories of denim jackets with sequins, and shorty tops - with sequins, fill me with shivers both warm (memories) and cold (fashion hell), as I listen to these songs. But not all of 'em are tacky. There are a couple of juicy goodies that actually broke the ground of riskless AM radio. "You Sexy Thing" was a hot crossover tune that got white people dancing (one could even say it was one of the first preludes to disco), and that title garnished many a sequined shorty top. Even many a pair of ..... (the seventies were SO fabulously sleazy!). And "Eighteen With A Bullet", despite it's slight '50sish Frankie Lymon feel, had a tight euphoric bite to it, which was a fresh charge in let's face it, what was a pretty stale, generic musical wasteland by the mid-seventies. Even Bay City Roller-mania was a delightful change, despite the fact that their fans all looked like Catholic school rejects (I guess that's where they got all that plaid). Come to think of it, maybe sequined shorty tops weren't so bad after all! Have fun -
and don't forget to have a nice day! :)

Some more huge chartbusters from Rhino Records, many of which have been tough to find for years. Great sound quality and quirky liner notes round out a good selection of songs.

This series has songs that are unavailable on almost all other collections. If you want some of the great "one-hit wonders" from the 1970's, then this is the place to go!

These songs are all basic throwaway hits. The only reason why I gave it five stars was because it had Rocky by Austin Roberts on it. Its the only cd ive ever found with the song on it. Its one of my all time favorite songs and im glad that I finally found it on cd.

Oh great songs and great memories when I was only in elementary school and listening to these hits on the old KJR AM in Seattle! Great collections from Rhino!

The rare gems worthy of my appeal are "At Seventeen" by Janis Ian, "Sky High" by Jigsaw, "Fallin' in Love" by Hamilton, Joe Frank, and Reynolds", and "You Sexy Thing" by Hot Chocolate (which I thought would be better placed in Rhino's "Didn't It Blow Your Mind" series which is the soulful sister collection to "Have a Nice Day").

Let us remember that this is a collection of respectfully charted one hit wonders and the such so it will contain tracks that were big during its era of release, but totally forgettable now. For instance, "Convoy" by C. W. McCall, "Black Superman - Muhammad Ali" by Johnny Wakelin, and "Saturday Night" by the "here today, totally gone and forgotten tomorrow" Bay City Rollers.

One country beauty here is the soft and heart breaking "I'm Not Lisa" by Jessi Colter. I barely remember hearing Dwight Tilley's "I'm on Fire" but it's pretty good.

The stinkers here are "Run Joey Run" by David Geddes. But thankfully, he helped us forget this stupid song by releasing another song even more stupid. Beware of volume 20 where his song "Last Game of the Season" taints the collection. "Rocky" is just plain dumb. Austin Roberts sealed his fate as a pop suicide artist with this crappy song. Yes, it went Top Ten, but so did a lot of absolute crap while some fabulous songs couldn't get into the Top 40. That's the mystery of the seventies, I guess.

"Eighteen With a Bullet" by Pete Wingfield isn't entirely uninteresting; it just feels out of place with everything else on this CD. If I play it by itself, I like it. If I'm playing the whole disc, I don't care for it. I don't know why. Anyway, volume 15 is where the "Have a Nice Day" series ended for about 2 years. The following year, Rhino started right away with releasing the "Didn't It Blow Your Mind" collection of the early seventies soul charters, which justifies why I noticed so many important one hit wonders were not getting released. I'm glad Rhino released these CD's divided like this. I have all 25 of the "Have a Nice Day" collection and all 20 of the "Didn't It Blow Your Mind" collection. All 45 of these CD's may have an outstanding value maybe a hundred years from now (if we still play CD's).

With this look at 70s A.M. radio hits, Rhino gives us proto-power pop (Dwight Twilley), a bit of bubblegum (Austin Roberts, David Geddes), country (Jessi Colter), folkie earnestness (Janis Ian), the 70s idea of a 'boy band' (Bay City Rollers), and a foretaste of disco (Hot Chocolate).

HIGHLIGHTS:
"S-A-TUR-DAY NIGHT!" is still as insistent today as it was then, threatening to resurrect Rollermania if played at good volume. The percolating "You Sexy Thing" also continues to charm. "At Seventeen" is the anthem of "ugly ducklings" everywhere and the frenetic stabbing strings of Jigsaw's "Sky High" make it one of the finest one hit wonders ever.

MIDDLING:
These two are kind of in the "love it or hate it" category so I chose to make special mention of Austin Roberts' "Rocky" and David Geddes "Run Joey Run". Both feature melodramatic plotlines ('Rocky' dies young leaving the song's protagonist a single father while "Joey" is a single father dodging the shotgun of his would-be bride's father) that ensure not much middleground. I like them both but they're definitely not for everyone.

LOWS:
Usually I like power pop but Dwight Twilley's "I'm on Fire" leaves me cold. "Fallin' in Love" is a bland followup to the zippy "Don't Pull Your Love" (even if it was the bigger chart hit). Pete Wingfield's "Eighteen With A Bullet" is an unlistenable mess.

3 1/2 stars

"Have A Nice Day-Volume 15" features a variety of radio-friendly hits from the mid-'70's. Here you will find the country-to-pop crossover smash "I'm Not Lisa", by Jessi Colter (who used to be married to country crooner Waylon Jennings), Hamilton, Joe Frank And Reynolds' second and final Top-40 number one hit "Fallin' In Love", African-reggae vibes in "Black Superman-Muhammad Ali", by one-hit wonders Johnny Wakelin And The Kinshasa Band, and the Australian group Jigsaw with one of their few hits to enter the American charts, "Sky High", to name a few. Truckers will get a kick out of C.W. McCall's CB craze song "Convoy", which inspired a hit movie of the same name. This collection of '70's songs just wouldn't be complete without the sugar-coated disco vibes of Hot Chocolate's "You Sexy Thing". "At Seventeen" by Janis Ian is just average, and Austin Roberts' "Rocky" is just plain boring. Dwight Twilley's "I'm On Fire" rocks the house down, so you better not crank this number up too loud, or your house will look like a pile of rubble! I found David Geddes' "Run Joey Run" to be quite asinine (in laymen's terms, that means stupid). For those of you into '50's nostalgia, there's Pete Wingfield's "Eighteen With A Bullet". "Saturday Night", by the Bay City Rollers, is just OK. Some of the great songs on this CD more than make up for the mediocre ones. Still a good buy.