ONE HIT WONDERLAND: "The Night Chicago Died" by Paper Lace

Death From Above 1979 did OK.

Max Eliaser

i shouldnt have watched this, its still stuck in my head several days later

surasshu

And /The Sting/ was 1973, while /The Godfather/ was 1972 (and /The Boy Friend/ was 1971). There was clearly a wave of '20s-'30s nostalgia going around this time. (Obligatory reminder that in 1974 1924 was 50 years ago and 1934 was 40 years ago, while now 1969 is 50 years ago and 1979 is 40 years ago.)

Leo Comerford

A great return to the time capsule episodes!

RumRay

About Vietnam, could this mean there's a future episode in the making about Paul Hardcastle's 19?! Like, i can't think of a hit more oddball on that subject

Larry

Wow...you riffed a lot of music I grew up on. I went to elementary school listening to the Oldiez channel. I like quite a bit of this stuff...

Tim Betts

I want to see a OHW episode on TATU.

Matthew

I don't think I'll ever have the cash to dive for a OHW request (if those are even ever offered again, lol), but truly, I would love to see the Todd go even OLDER in his reviews, as far as footage and Billboard statistics will allow him to go. Current record holder (by my count) -- 1962's "Monster Mash" d:

Phoenician

Where I live, the long-standing FM oldies station slowly evolved to very-late 70s to mid-90's, prompting a new FM radio station to fill the 50s-70s gap with advertising mocking the other station's transition. Which, you know, was kinda clever, when all that happened seven-odd years ago >__>

Phoenician

The drummer/lead vocalist looks like James Cameron with a wig on and oh God I can’t unsee it.

Meaghan

I had never heard of this song until about 5 years ago. It's such an odd song that I'm glad did an episode about it. I kind of enjoy it.

Josh Liller

I found this song familiar even though i had never heard of it before and both me and parents were not around or in the US in the 70s. This is because i am very familiar with the Spanish cover song that plays at the end of your video. Listening to La Noche que Chicago Murio as a child always made me wonder what the hell it was supposed to be about. As baffling as it is, at least you can shake your butt to this version. Turning popular English hits into Spanish covers is totally a thing, and i've been following this glorious phenomena as an adult.

Adriana Perez Landa

1) I guessed before even watching this that you'd get a joke about the band in there. 2) "Dancing in the Moonlight" by King Harvest? It's proven surprisingly durable for something that should have been totally disposable. 3) Maybe I'm just defending 1974 because that's when I was born, but any year that has "Rock Your Baby", "Until You Come Back to Me (That's What I'm Going to Do)", "Love's Theme", "You Make Me Feel Brand New", "Band on the Run", peak Stevie Wonder, and peak Elton John has *something* going for it...

Kristopher Bluth

Oh! Fuck this! Reminds me of that awful Bugsy Malone film from around the same time. I recommend it for you Todd just for how bad it is 😉

Larry

That's kind of unfair on Paper Lace. "The Night Chicago Died" is really terrible, but it's not worse than "Grandma Got Run Over by a Reindeer".

Timur Hahn

i came here to say this! this is why i know the song LMAO. the soundtrack and picks from high fidelity are incredible

surasshu

I kind of like their over-enunciation. A song whose lyrics I can actually understand! And I really like how the drummer sings the first line. That "ni-iii-iight" is very catchy. The kazoos though... yeah, they're awful.

I think the song make a lot more sense if you think it's from the perspective of the kid. What might simply have been a car crash became this glorious night where his daddy defeated the evil armies of Al Capone. Trying to look at it too litterally kinda miss the point I think. The song is still not great though.

Bruno Sauvagnat

Never even heard of this one before and I can see why, it's REALLY bad, like probably the worst song you've covered on this show so far. The next OHW i'd really like to see you cover is this one:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pu1aQvm5MrU Personally I think Chicago the band were still pretty damn good from the 80s onwards.

RedBedroomRecords

Just as a P.S. you don't pronounce the "-ham" in Nottingham, speaking as a local of the area (Sherwood forest is only a 10 min drive away). That's true for pretty much all British cities with a -ham in the name, the h is silent, so you just pronounce it all as one word. I hear a lot of Americans trip up on that.

Brandon H

Great episode, I had no idea that Billy Don't Be A Hero was sung by an entirely different group in America. I grew up listening to my Grandparent's 70's collections so I'm familiar with a lot of these songs, I'd love more dumb 70's OHWs.

Brandon H

Loved this episode! Definitely a great way to finally return to One-Hit Wonderland and also the '70s! Not that the song was good or anything, of course. It's pretty amazing how much disposable cheese dominated the pop charts during the first half of the decade. It was such a pasty era for mainstream music that Perry Como had an unexpected comeback during that period after being a nonentity through the entirety of the '60s; too bad it didn't do anything to preserve his legacy in the long run as happened to Frank Sinatra and Tony Bennett. Also, HOLD UP, that one article you found stated 1963 is regarded as one of the worst years for rock music? Are you kidding me? That was when pop was finally starting to pull out of its 1959-1962 dark age; not only were the Beatles and the rest of merseybeat blowing up in Britain, but surf rock was also a legit trend on both sides of the Atlantic that was injecting some much needed fun into an industry that had gotten incredibly stale. Also, Motown soul was really starting to establish its identity, the Wall of Sound revolutionized production techniques, and even Lesley Gore was a far superior teen idol to her immediate predecessors (aside maybe from Helen Shapiro, who never made it big in America).

Jacqueline Sailer

This was from a year in which an Australian nun had a big hit with a rock version of the lord's prayer, so it's kinda a miracle music hot better as the decade went on

Foxylover92

There are still oldies stations but mainly on Sirius stations like the ones they have for each decade (70s on 7, 80s on 8, 90s on 9, Pop2K, etc.) as well as the stations dedicated to specific genres and artists (Classic Vinyl, Classic Rewind, The Bridge, Beatles Channel, etc.).

Surprised you didn't use that Jack Black snippet from "High Fidelity"

Thank you Todd for highlighting how cheesy and lame much of 70s pop music was. All of us who’ve grown up since the 70s have been given this false image of the 70s being all about rock, disco, funk, soul when much of that stuff didn’t even crack the Hot 100. But I also agree with the 70s being probably the best decade for music on and off the charts just for not how great a lot of the good stuff was but how there really wasn’t a drop off in quality through the decade even in a year like 1974, which I honestly don’t think is as bad as people say it is. As for the song, I don’t hate it as much as others but yeah it’s still a pretty cheesy song about a part of American history they didn’t fully understand. As a followup to this episode, you have to cover Billy, Don’t Be A Hero from Bo Donaldson & The Heywoods for the next One Hit Wonderland.

I only know it from one of those rock compilation infomercials.

Jon Heiman

Oh man, I always wondered if you would cover this song and assumed you hadn't because Paper Lace was not truly a one-hit wonder or something I wasn't aware of. Sadly, this was the song that got me to start liking music when I was a young child. What a horrible song and what a horrible year to start liking music. It has made me question my musical tastes ever since. Nowadays the nostalgia factor doesn't even grab me for this song, I just wince and move on if I hear it playing. But yeah, we forget a lot of the mediocrity of 70's music. I think its a defense mechanism.

having your lead singer be a drummer caps your potential stardom like nothing else

Michael Furey

This always appears on 70's compilations. My Grandma had a three-disc 70's compilation and this was right on the first disc, first thing you heard.

Josh Spicer

My mom owned every 70s music compilation. Didn't hear the Beatles until I was 16 but knew this trash and Lynyrd Skynyrd. Thanks for the flashbacks.

Cristina Youngren

I like it when he covers songs no one remembers. That's the best way to know what an era was really like. And sometimes they are actually catchy. Not this time though. All I want to do now is listen to The Band for some reason.

I kinda like this song... I think because the tone and narrative style reminds me of The Battle of Epping Forest by Genesis, a much better take on similar themes released the year before. I don't think its a ripoff though, because I don't think Paper Lace knew who Genesis was.

Specter Koen

Todd you beautiful bastard, I'm working late and I'm exhausted so thank you for brightening up my night.

AstarothLuLz

I only know this song from Jack Black plugging it in High Fidelity.

Callen

What's with all of the weirdly upbeat songs about dark subject matter? Did songwriters in that era just not understand tone? Like, it's one thing to do it for intentional dissonance, but so many of the ones mentioned here don't seem to realize how weird they're clashing.

Theo Gerome

I have no opinions, other than the way Todd pronounces the "-ham" in English placenames like actual ham is really distracting. Sorry Todd, still love you!

I kind of wish this song was more like Cop Killer given that Todd offhand mentions that song.

It's a 16th-Of-July miracle!

Bennett Billard

Shoutout to Zaporozhian cossacks from prehistoric British TV!

Vasyl Kerimov

The weirdly mismatched tone is the only interesting or cool thing about this song.

Max Eliaser

My instinct was that they had more hits than one. "Billy, Don't Be a Hero" was the other song I instantly remembered.

David S