Artists/bands that were once quite popular, yet nowadays are mostly ignored in canonical history books

Surprised nobody has mentioned Bread. Huge in the early 1970s but almost never mentioned today.

man, now i really wanna order in Sund4r's textbooks, cause i feel like i'm turning into one of those people i would be "um, ACTually"-ing on the New Jersey thread

How many of you have heard of a band called the Buckinghams, much less could name any of their songs? They had five major U.S. hits in the late 1960s, including a chart-topper, but are utterly forgotten today. Actually, they've been totally forgotten for a few decades now.

Ph.D and Jim Diamond who had big AOR blue-eyed soul hits with 'Should Have Known Better' and 'I Won't Let You Down'. I guess they were never considered cool though

I’d heard “30 Days” a couple times on “classic rock” radio (not since the early ‘90s, though), but got into Humble Pie from loving the Small Faces. The first two records (especially Town & Country), the Fillmore dealie, and Rock On are all pretty great. Never dug into the post-Frampton stuff.

For better or worse — mostly worse — Paul Stanley has said that seeing Steve Marriott at those Fillmore shows was the primary inspiration for his onstage approach.

loading up a Buckinghams hits comp now - i def remember Kind of a Drag from "oldies" stations when i was a kid, curious if any of their other hits ring a bell. feel like there's a whole swath of Parent-Unobjectionable Crossover Pop-Rock that, lacking rock cred, never had a shot at getting canonized by rockists in the first place. The Association, The Monkees, and Three Dog Night come to mind among the biggest sellers --- but i'd thoroughly expect to find all three in textbooks with the level of thoroughness Sund4r has revealed!

Bread also seem like they'd have to merit inclusion; if you were discussing that *kind* of music and where it went from the 60s to the 70s, they'd be perfect for the role. popularly, i'd say they have an even lower public profile today than the three bands i just mentioned. however i bet a robot trawling facebook could find thousands upon thousands of mid-to-late Boomers sharing youtube clips of even minor Bread songs and proclaiming that this takes them back to such good times etc. iow i doubt they are forgotten, they just haven't been effectively or systematically passed on.

"I Won't Let You Down" is a massive tune but tangential to the thread direction now. Didn't Jim Diamond do "Hi Ho Silver" too? Also great

I ONLY know Humble Pie and Bread bc of books is the thing. I listened to Bread's most popular songs on Spotify yesterday just bc I'd never heard them. They were closer to something I'd listen to than I expected tbh, echoes of John Denver? Now I know the original of "Guitar Man", which Ben Monder did on his last album.

xp the only version of 'I Won't Let You Down'* on Spotify is awful and sounds like a bad karaoke version of the song I grew up with

*which, since I was little simply assumed was sung by a black US female artist and had no idea was a British male singer - see also 'Everybody's Got to Learn Sometimes' by the Korgis

Bread is at least popular enough today for there to be a Bread tribute band.

And it’s called Toast:
https://youtu.be/QVVf9MSxBiI

someone needs the roll of keeping the music alive

where are the crust punks when you really need them

they all like lizzo now

I feel like Humble Pie was on that tier of 10 Years After, Cactus, Savoy Brown, James Gang etc

James Gang, speaking of a fucking amazing band that doesn't get enough credit

Ahem, somebody started a Buckinghams thread way back when which was sparsely attended but it was all good company: The Buckinghams - C/D?

I used to hate when the AM DJ would announce Bread on the radio unless it was "Guitar Man." Speaking of the Ben Monder cover thereof, Come On-a This Thread:Skronky Jazz Guitar Versions Of Country Pop Classics

Bread kind of epitomized a certain strain of soft rock of the '70s, iirc. There's some local radio station I discovered here that plays tons of deep cuts from basically the '50s to the '80s. So I've heard multiple songs from, like, BJ Thomas and the Bee Gees and, yeah, John Denver and all sorts of stuff. The other day I heard an Eric Carmen song, "Make Me Lose Control," from the '80s I hadn't heard since the time it was a hit. Anyway, this station plays all sorts of stuff that probably fits this thread. Here's the website: https://www.metv.fm (Now Playing: SHEENA EASTON Morning Train (Nine To Five) (1981)).

"Make Me Lose Control" gets some love here: Eric Carmen solo

Listening to Humble Pie this morning, thanks thread! Here's a thing I totally didn't know:

Current members:

Zoot Money – keyboards (2001–2002, 2019–present)
Nigel Harrison – bass (2019–present)
Andy Summers – guitar (2020–present)
Graham Bonnet – vocals (2020–present)

wow! nigel harrison from blondie? the man who wrote 'union city blue'?

I know, right? And Andy Summers! They're half a new wave band now.

i know that andy summers started off in zoot moneys band, and then they were both in the animals together. would be kind of into seeing them but, not really a graham bonnet fan tbh

Someone mentioned Mr. Big's Be With You song, I think it was in this thread. This morning I looked up the lyrics because I thought there was a phrase that I was misunderstanding because it was either really stupid or just incomprehensible. Nope. I understood the lyrics perfectly; they're just dumb.

Should Bread be classified with Yacht Rock? Or are they a little ahead of that curve, like America was?

neither are yachty, imho - just soft-rock/smooth southern California AM gold. they're too dialed in to a basic guitar-band format, and way too far removed from jazz.

Bread and America (who probably don't count cause Horse with No Name and Ventura Highway still pop up on the radio) make me think of Poco, whose records I always see it used bins and who are famous for having members go on to more successful bands, but I don't think I have ever knowingly heard a second of Poco music.

Too bad the Wikipedia entry on Humble Pie does not seem to have a membership Timeline, (even) Poco has one.

I still sometimes get Poco and Pure Prairie League mixed up in my head, because both are so omnipresent in used bins. In fact, I almost answered, surely you've heard "Amie" before I remembered, nope, that Pure Prairie League.

> "bar band" vibe have really faded out in terms of the pop culture

Yeah! Bruce, Huey and Mellencamp survive, but it was a much bigger component of what constituted mainstream rock.

Bar bandish stuff was funneled scenes that were specifically alt-country or actual country, Wilco vs Garth Brooks. Hard rock polarized towards metal, power poppy punk, post SRV guitarmag blues. Prog demanded Rush-like chops, none of this heartland Kansas fluff. Bands that don't fit into those subsequent streams, like J Giles or The Who or Styx just kinda fade, though the original fans still come out to the sheds.

Some of that bar band vibe became Michelob Rock, classic rock returning to the blues, which deserves its own thread but I never seem to have the time to do it

I really really love In Search of the Lost Chord. Bunch of acid novices let loose in a studio with raga and chamber instruments, making the most empty-headed glitter-eyed psych. A deeply silly record.

I still sometimes get Poco and Pure Prairie League mixed up in my head, because both are so omnipresent in used bins. In fact, I almost answered, surely you've heard "Amie" before I remembered, nope, that Pure Prairie League.

I still sometimes get Poco and Pure Prairie League mixed up in my head, because both are so omnipresent in used bins. In fact, I almost answered, surely you've heard "Amie" before I remembered, nope, that Pure Prairie League.

― soaring skrrrtpeggios (jon /via/ chi 2.0), Friday, August 14, 2020 10:48 AM (one hour ago) bookmarkflaglink

that makes three of us

so weird

Bread is at least popular enough today for there to be a Bread tribute band.

And it’s called Toast:
https://youtu.be/QVVf9MSxBiI

― Montgomery Burns' Jazz (Tarfumes The Escape Goat), Friday, August 14, 2020 5:52 AM (two hours ago) bookmarkflaglink

someone needs the roll of keeping the music alive

― Defund the indefensible (NickB), Friday, August 14, 2020 6:07 AM (two hours ago) bookmarkflaglink

where are the crust punks when you really need them

― Doctor Casino, Friday, August 14, 2020 6:10 AM (two hours ago) bookmarkflaglink

they all like lizzo now

― Paul Ponzi, Friday, August 14, 2020 6:15 AM (two hours ago) bookmarkflaglink

The puns are really baked into this discourse, huh?

jesus, what was the "big" Poco song?!

I also can't think of that band without thinking of Cheap Trick's Live at Budokan. Anyone else? "ALRIGHT, POCO!!"

"Amie" is one of those songs that sounds like a 100-year old standard.

You want forgotten? Eddie Rabbit! I knew the hit but for some reason didn't know there were lots of hits for lots of people, like this one:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_tvEvBUG8mY

"Songs that reference Subterranean Homesick Blues" should be its own category. This, "Wild, Wild, West," "Pump It Up" ... Oh, wait: songs which are or sound like pastiches of 'subterranean homesick blues'

Prog demanded Rush-like chops, none of this heartland Kansas fluff. Bands that don't fit into those subsequent streams, like J Giles or The Who or Styx just kinda fade, though the original fans still come out to the sheds.

Wait, Kansas totally had prog chops? So did Styx?

I remember Eddie Rabbitt, if only for writing “Kentucky Rain.”

"I Love a Rainy Night" is a song co-written and recorded by American country music artist Eddie Rabbitt. It was released in November 1980 as the second single from his album Horizon. It reached number one on the Hot Country Singles, Billboard Hot 100, and Adult Contemporary Singles charts in 1981. The song succeeded Dolly Parton's song "9 to 5" at the number-one position on the Billboard Hot 100 pop singles chart—the last time, to date, that the pop chart featured back-to-back country singles in the number-one position.

jesus, what was the "big" Poco song?!

There wasn't one really? Back when my local AOR was more freeform and laid back their cover of JJ Cale's "Magnolia" got some play.

Idk, do you really think Kansas and Styx were at the level of Yes or Rush or KC, chops-wise? I never thought that. "Dust in the Wind" violin solo mostly sounds like some scalar exercises.xp

when I was big into Cake I had a friend who kept calling them "Bread" so it was amusing that they did in fact wind up covering a Bread song

Oh, Poco had "Crazy Love." That was actually a charting hit. xp

Poco belong to that wing of post-Byrds/Burritos/Buffalo country-rock that spawned a surprising number of "supergroups" where the uninitiated haven't heard of most of the people involved. In this case the key figures are two ex-Springfielders, Richie Furay and Jim Messina. I'm not sure, but my vague sense (someone please correct me!) is that a lot of these bands were sort of Dead-adjacent, in being the turn-of-the-70s equivalent of later jam bands: fandom was focused on instrumental interplay, live shows in college towns, and a kind of loose hangout/jammy vibe that comes through on record without the sense of Importance and Things To Say About Americana that critics found in The Band. Messina followed the same circuit in producing and mentoring songwriter Kenny Loggins, and it was to that same basic audience that Loggins & Messina first broke out (with the incredibly hooky "Vahevala"). The best, and/or most hit-like Poco song I know is "Hurry Up"; their debut single "You Better Think Twice" is also pretty good and probably sketches out their strengths and limitations most clearly.

Basically, my theory here is that Poco sold a lot of albums, explaining their used-bin presence, without actually breaking through in a Top 40, pop-culture way. You'd think that would be enough for them to be grandfathered in when AOR turned into Classic Rock, but like the Dead (apart from "Casey Jones"), they've been supplanted by bands that are related sonically but more often mustered hook-oriented, punchy, three-minute singles. Or, as I posted a few days back on another thread: If any reasonably competent 70s rock band with a cracking rhythm section and stronger hitmaking instincts than Richie Furay had recorded "Fallin' In Love" instead of The Souther-Hillman-Furay Band, it would have been among their best songs and greatest achievements. The Eagles, of course --- including ex-Poco player Randy Meisner - took the sound in a different direction and made untold millions.

In conclusion, the Pure Prairie League mixups make total sense to me - "Amie" took Poco's token slot in the rotation!

I always get Poco and Lobo mixed up. Lobo I think were the ones with "Me and You and a Dog named Boo."

I also confuse Poco and Orleans, mainly because "Heart of the Night", a top-20 hit for Poco, is about New Orleans.

Man I don't remember "Heart of the Night" at all, and I used to love Poco, have to go give it a listen. They gradually turned into soft pop by the late 70s though, maybe I just thought it was by Randy Vanwarmer or something.

Oh, THAT one! Yeah.

Very much in Vanwarmer vein, but I did kinda like it...

Great write-up, Dr. Casino!

Speaking of The Eagles, thought I remembered and saw out of the corner of my eye Timothy B. Schmit in the Wikipedia Poco membership timeline.

Speaking of Deadspace, think it's time to play the Commander Cody and His Lost Planet Airmen card.

There are a number of groups who seem like they'd fit in perfectly with Classic Rock radio, like Poco, Humble Pie, Rory Gallagher, Gabriel-era Genesis, but who didn't have US hit singles so they are forever ignored. The only exception to this I see is the Ramones, who get played on CR radio despite not really having hit singles.

"The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway" gets some rotation but it's the only Gabriel-era Genesis song I ever hear on the radio.

I'm pretty sure I never heard a Humble Pie song on American radio.

Sax solo on "Heart of the Night" is the same guy as "Year of the Cat!"