Evidence Of America's Cultural Decline
Life was better in 1970--confirmed.
Every once in a while somebody here at Arthur magazine headquarters comes across a piece of information that blows our collective minds.
A few days ago, staff archivist/office mascot, Dave Snoobs, was rifling through the Funkadelic reissue CDs that came out a few years ago, when he found a reprint of Billboard magazine's "Top 50 Best-Selling Soul LPs" for the week ending December 12, 1970, tucked away on the CD tray for Free Your Mind And Your A** Will Follow. We've re-posted some of it below. Read it yourself, and prepare to weep for what our nation's culture has become in the intervening 38 years...
"Top 50 Best-Selling Soul LPs" for the week ending December 12, 1970--Billboard Magazine
2. Sly & The Family Stone's Greatest Hits
4. To Be Continued by Isaac Hayes
7. Temptations' Greatest Hits Volume 2
8. Still Waters Run Deep by the Four Tops
9. Chapter Two by Roberta Flack
10. Everything Is Everything by Diana Ross
11. Free Your Mind And Your A** Will Follow by Funkadelic
12. Indianola Mississippi Seeds by BB King
13. Spirit In The Dark by Aretha Franklin
14. We Got To Live Together by Buddy Miles
15. The Last Poets by The Last Poets
16. Pocketful Of Miracles by Smokey Robinson And The Miracles
17. New Ways But Love Stays by the Supremes
18. In Session by Chairmen Of The Board
19. Signed, Sealed, Delivered by Stevie Wonder
20. The Isaac Hayes Movement by Isaac Hayes
21. Didn't I (Blow Your Mind This Time) by Delfonics
22. I Am My Brother's Keeper by Jimmy & David Ruffin
23. Booker T & The MG's Greatest Hits
24. Workin' Together by Ike & Tina Turner
25. Burning by Esther Phillips
A few other notables from 26-50...
26. The Great Tom Jones I (Who Have Nothing) by Tom Jones
28. Wilson Pickett In Philadelphia by Wilson Pickett
29. Shirley Bassey Is Really Something by Shirley Bassey
31. Led Zeppelin III by Led Zeppelin
34. Very Dionne by Dionne Warwick
37. Grand Funk Lives by Grand Funk Railroad
39. Cosmo's Factory by Creedence Clearwater Revival
44. Band Of Gypsys by Jimi Hendrix, Buddy Miles & Billy Cox
45. Only For The Lonely by Mavis Staples
Oh, how we have fallen. Which begs a ton of questions, the main one being: Who let this happen?
Are they good?
Black music sucks big time these days (with very few bright exceptions - SHARON JONES for instance!