American Top 40 PastBlast: 8/25/79

Even though I had the radio on a lot in the late 70s/early 80s, there were still plenty of tunes I heard only on AT40. In many, even most, of those cases, they would be on the chart only a very few weeks. Nonetheless, some became very dear to me very quickly–often it would take just a listen or two to know I REALLY liked a song.

This one could be the best exemplar of the phenomenon. Here, it’s in the middle of a three-week, 39-38-37 run. It played in my head from time to time after that but I don’t know that I heard it again until I rescued a copy of the album Strange Man, Changed Man from a cutout bin a few years later. It’s a fabulous power pop tune, criminally underappreciated. And hey, it’s even got Mike Oldfield playing the tubular bells!