This is actually the song that
inspired this whole orgy of recollection over stuff I remember hearing on the radio
stations in Cincinnati when I was a kid.
It started a conversation with someone I
seldom speak to anymore, but who was likewise fascinated by the ephemera of musical
culture around that time, and has continued on into my marriage to Tony, who is only a
year and some change older, so he remembers it, too.
This song was exactly the kind of stuff that really appealed to pre-teens (or at least to isolated, lonely pre-teens) back
in the late-70s. The lyrics were upbeat and butt-simple, the music was well-played
and -produced, mildly progressive but not so progressive it wandered off the basic theorem
of 'ideal pop song.' This is the uber pop song, as far as I'm concerned.
Even now, when I hear the song, it makes me laugh. I can see the genesis of Jeff
Lynne's ELO (as opposed to Roy Wood's ELO, which grew out of Roy Wood's Move, which was an
entirely different thing ... just like Sid Barrett's Pink Floyd was different from Roger Waters's
Pink Floyd by a measure of magnitude). It's elevated just sufficiently over
bubblegum to wear well (which is good, because like all these songs, it got played to
death). Few people my age who care about music don't remember the song. Not
all of them like it, but most of them remember it.
The band, Pilot, never had another hit. The eponymous album that contained the song
that generated my love of guitar-based pop songs was produced by Alan Parsons. Bill
Lyall, the keyboard player, went on to work with Alan Parsons in the Project. Ian
Bairnson, the guitarist for Pilot, went on to work with Kate Bush and Mick Fleetwood
(among others less worthy of note), and Davey Paton also worked with Kate, as well as the
art-rock band Camel and everybody's favorite progressive malcontent-giant, Fish (now
known as Derek Dick, formerly of Britain's now-negligible Marillion). Sadly, Pilot
itself didn't even manage to cobble together another song to rival Magic, let
alone another hit. This was it, for them, though they actually recorded at
least one other set of songs.
I was sore aggrieved to hear it used in some phone service provider's ads for a
mobile-umbilical-cord package plan, or
something equally annoying/ephemeral, a few years back. But I'm constantly
aggrieved, anymore, when cool songs I like a lot are permanently superimposed with consumer
trash in my brain.
I hope Pete Townshend likes his personal computer.
I hope
Lenny Kravitz loves his sport-ute.
I hope Fatboy Slim receives sexual gratification from his BMW.
And hey, besides -- it was all worth it when I realized the Bee Gees' Gotta Get A Message
To You, which is about a prisoner facing execution who's attempting to get a message out to
'tell her he loves her' before he's put to death, was being used for a cell ad.
Because executions and cell phones are a winning combination, in my book.
Especially when I see moocow soccer moms in their Hummers, talking on those
electrical umbilical connections while they're driving 50 mph in the speed lane on the interstate; when they ring at the
climactic point of one of the few decent movies I've seen in the past ten years.
Which is to say, I'm glad to hear they cause brain cancer.
Never believe it's not so.