What's your favourite song from the 1970s?

[SiHart]

Prog! Punk! Glam! Disco!
The 70s had them all!

But what is your favourite song and album from the 1970s?

Si xx

[WhiteCrowNZ]

Where are you going with this Si?

Hmm - although I quite like Slade's Coz I Love You ... it's gotta really be Marc Bolan and the T Rex - 20th Century Boy

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qpmU4xnmxlQ&feature=fvst



And honourable mention to Steve Harley - Make Me Smile

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fxoke4yuWlI

[Dino]

Well the ulitmate 70's album is Dark Side Of The Moon. Still. After hearing stuff from other bands. There wasn't a Hendrix or Beatles for the 70's.
Pink Floyd were all you needed until Punk. Led Zeppelin once got compared to the Beatles, but that was only in album chart placings.
Pink Floyd were the heirs to Sgt. Pepper productions and experiments. Pink Floyd ran with it all the way to Wish You Were Here in 1975.
But Dark Side wins for being a four way group collaboration. They've worked together before, but if you didn't know any of their other stuff, Dark Side Of The Moon is really all anyone needs to hear?
And best of all, Pink Floyd didn't release any singles unti 1979, so that leaves best single wide open.

Life On Mars. Glam prog punk vocal MOR piano croon. Basically everything that was in the charts at the time. I'd like to find out what Lennon and McCartney said when they heard this. I hope they said "F***!"

[SiHart]

The song was easy. For me it's got to be ABBA's Dancing Queen. A truly classic slice of pop.

As for the album... well that's more difficult. There's many albums I like, many I listen to fairly frequently but is there one I keep coming back to? I'm tempted by Voluez-Vous by ABBA, but I think the one I come back to and really like is Diamond Dogs by David Bowie. He's at his most theatrical, there's some astounding songs and a cool atmosphere to the album. My favourite of his work, and my favourite of the 70s.

Si xx

[Anthony Williams]

For me, it's got to be Victim of Changes, by Judas Priest. A proggy and epic piece of rock that influenced so much going forward.

Here's a clip of it live from 1983: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hXqb_3fR6Ok

Ant x

[Si Hunt]

For songs I think I'd have to choose something by my beloved Queen - perhaps a lesser known number called "Take My Breath Away" from the "Day At The Races" album. It's got quite the saddest piano melody I've ever heard, though this may be because the song was used to soundtrack clips of Freddie Mercury in a tribute to him years later to great poignant effect. But regardless, it's still a loving, lamentful, yearning song about the object of someone's desires. Now, I can't ever hear it without thinking about Freddie.

The best album of the seventies was of course "New Harvest, First Gathering", my favourite Dolly Parton album. It kicks off with the jaunty "Light Of A Clear Blue Morning" - actually this piano-led original version is not the best, as she remade it twice in later decades, each time improving it. But it remains the ultimate "new start" song to give you strength, as highlighted by the second verse:

"It's been a long long time
Since I've known the taste of freedom
And those clinging vines
That had me bound, well I don't need 'em

I've been like a captured Eagle,
you know an Eagle's born to fly.
Now that I have won my freedom,
like an Eagle I am eager for the sky."

Then there's "(Your Love Has Lifted Me) Higher and Higher" which is like a great disco anthem, but done with country fiddles. How is it not an X-Factor staple? It's one of a few covers, but it's still great. Then there's the Dolly original "Applejack" which is a live favourite to this day, and my favourite "Beauty Lives In Memory".

"Beauty Lives In Memory" is about a woman shut in a room who every day puts on all her make-up and her wig and it turns out that years ago her handsome prince left her alone, so she stays in the room dreaming of him every day as she grows old. Then one day she sees him at her door, her head spins, and she falls down dead! I just love this kind of Dolly song - the classic image of a young woman shat on my an evil handsome stranger who then dies of lonelyness. She'd re-do it decades later with "Mountain Angel", but this is still fine. CD re-issue a few years back meant I could replace my crackly vinyl rip of this great song.

Si.

[Simon R]

We must mention "Wuthering Heights" by Bushy.

It never gets old no matter how many times you hear it.

[Andrew Curnow]

Oh crikey, there are so many songs from the 70s that make me nostalgic when I hear them - some probably are actually classics, but many are probably actually a bit rubbishy. The first single I ever bought was during the 1970s, but it was the Smurf Song which even I can't bring myself to nominate as my favourite.

I do have a really soft spot for Take A Chance on Me, although I'm not sure why. It's not even ABBA's best, but I do really like it. Also, for different reasons, I Am Sailing by Rod Stewart and Mull of Kintyre, are big favourites.

[Andrew Curnow]

Actually one more, which never seems to get played now and is probably a bit 'twee', but which has very good lyrics and a good tune, is Matchstalk Men (the song about Lowry).

[Stephen Morgan]

A single choice is an easy one for me, it's 10cc, I'm Not In Love. Those lush harmonies, instrumentation and lyrics always take me back to long, hot summer days of 1975, and still send shivers down my spine. It was my favourite single then, and it still is now.
As for an album, that's a bit harder. There are so many good albums from the seventies, and it depends on my mood as to what I can say is a real favourite.

Kate Bush The Kick Inside,
Bowie Hunky Dory/Alladdin Sane/ Ziggy
T.Rex Electric Warrior/The Slider
ABBA Arrival
Carpenters Horizon
War of the Worlds
Any of Queen's seventies albums (Si, You Take My Breath Away is awesome)

The list is almost endless as there were so many good albums in the seventies, I'm really hard pressed to pick an out and out favourite.