You must have been Miss Pennsylvania with all your bedroom attitude

Continuing my trip back through the 1977 album charts.

26/06/77 : Coming Out - The Manhattan Transfer

I know I know some Manhattan Transfer stuff but I'm unable to bring it to mind - my general impression is that they do kinda weird popular music, like a US version of The Brotherhood Of Man.  So let's just say my expectations aren't sky high...

Yeah, kinda weird popular music is an accurate description - popular with grannies, I suspect.  Some of it is quite funky/R&B with a distinct Motown feeling to it and then you stumble across "Chanson D'Amour" and "Scotch And Soda" (both written in 1958), "The Speak Up Mambo" (1955 - and in Spanish) and "Poinciana" (1936).  It's not an unpleasant sound (and I actually quite liked "S.O.S.") but it's generally all a bit bizarre, for its variety as much as anything and it's hard to imagine people were actually buying this in 1977 - particularly with that album cover to scare people off.

We're at #16 on their second week of a five week run, which came after a ten week run during which it peaked at #12 - all very bizarre.  The top five this week were A Star Is Born, The Muppets, The Beatles, Johnny Mathis and ABBA and the highest new entry was Berni Flint (#47) and you get ten points if you can tell me what he's most famous for.

Wikipedia has a whole four sentences on the album, but it does manage to surprise me on two fronts.  "Chanson D'Amour" got to #1 in the UK for three weeks and "Zindy Lou" has Ringo Starr on drums and Dr John on piano - what were they doing on this?  The group's entry is much longer and tells me that they've had four different incarnations and each one has had a different style, which must have made for some interesting album listens for the fans at times - but they're still going 53 years after they formed and Tim Hauser has been there all along.

"Customers also listened to" Take 6, The Real Group, Basia and Street Corner Symphony - and I can tell you nothing about any of them except that Basia was in Matt Bianco.  And there's very little I can tell you about The Manhattan Transfer except that I will not be searching out any of their other albums.

And Berni Flint was (and still is), quite obviously, most famous for having the longest consecutive run of wins on Opportunity Knocks - he won it for TWELVE weeks in a row.  And apparently he's still active on the after-dinner circuit if you're interested...

19/06/77 - Surprisingly enjoyable
03/07/77 - Probably not his finest

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