Bing Crosby gained fame for recording probably the most sold song ever recorded, White Christmas. Penned by Irving Berlin and recorded by Crosby, it blew away the standards for a hit. That was in 1942. He made movies, recorded more hits, and enjoyed a career that lasted to the end of the 70′s.
Starting in the late 60′s, Bing started doing Christmas specials. He usually had very family oriented performers and the shows were, for lack of a better word, very safe. Imagine my, and I imagine most of the world’s surprise, when in 1977, for Christmas, David Bowie appeared on the show with Bing. He talked about his boy, joked, and otherwise acted as safe as Roy Clark would have. It was SHOCKING! Together they performed Peace On Earth/Little Drummer Boy, which was very beautifully done. They fit and countered perfectly. Later in the show, Bowie introduced ‘Heroes’ to the public in the form of a video ( not a normal move in those days ).
I was stuck in a small hotel room with my entire family somewhere in Florida during that Christmas. We were all in one room the night Bing’s special previewed. I had to turn the tv around backwards and cover the entire thing with a blanket to keep the light from bugging my parents. I knew I wasn’t going to be able to hear it very well ( I have never had much hearing ), so I took a cassette recorder and crammed it against the tv so I could play it back later. The tv sent as much sound out the back as it did the speaker, so my dad started yelling and cussing about 2/3 through Heroes. I treasured that recording until it eventually disintegrated. I bought the album, only to find out the song was actually about twice as long as the video, and the video cropped out the best part, “Maybe we’re lying, so you’d better not stay. But we would be safer, just for one day”.
I enjoyed that Bing Crosby special more than any other, even if I couldn’t hear much of it. The one person who never got to see the special was Bing himself, he died before it was aired.
Without any further delay or distraction, here’s that performance:
Davy Jones and the Lower Third recorded a few songs, they went nowhere, there was no tv. I am guessing at some point a disgruntled drunk teen girl whined during a show that they needed to play Last Train to Clarksville. Not to be confused with a super-hot group, the lesser known Davy Jones changed his name and his image:
was one of the seminal party albums when I was, well, too young to be partying.
was the only time I ever saw Bowie perform. Peter Frampton played lead. It was perfect. Flawless. Amazing to hear. Although I had considered Frampton a party staple, I grew to respect his talent during that concert.
. I loved that flick so I had to check it out. Here’s the scene in question:
. Even got him hanging out with Mick Jagger and The Village People. Given the other historical references in the sequence, it strikes me as being a little odd, and a little out of place.
—has been in development for exactly five years. Though engineers initially feared the mission might 
period and other outer-space-related work has been a major influence on NASA’s direction since the early 1970s. “Those familiar with NASA’s previous, more conventional research and exploration sensibilities are going to be in for quite a shock. Many are likely to be confused and threatened by the boundary-pushing nature of the project.”