“American Top 40” is a Vital Chapter of Music History
In an opening sequence of Episode 1 of the Apple TV+ docuseries, “1971: The Year that Music Changed Everything,” the sounds of Marvin Gaye in a recording session for “What’s Going On” are intermingled with street scenes of the early 70s. Archival news footage reminds us that Americans were still dying in Vietnam in 1971, a year after President Richard Nixon’s decision to invade Cambodia led to protests on college campuses. The most well-known of these was the uprising at Kent State University that left four students dead and nine others wounded after being shot by the Ohio National Guard.
Indeed, Gaye’s album was a war protest, too. For Gaye, like many others, it was personal. His brother, Frankie, served as a radio operator in Vietnam and sent letters home that described the horrific scenes and criticized America’s ongoing involvement. The idea of churning out another upbeat pop song or love ballad, courtesy of the Motown assembly line, did not jive with what Gaye saw happening in the world around him. All of this serves to set the tone for the opening of “1971.” It is serious. Chaotic. Tumultuous.
And then a familiar voice breaks in and says, “Elvis Presley and this next singer are the only two solo acts to have 12 top ten records in the past ten years. With ‘What’s Going On,’ here’s Marvin Gaye.”
If you ever turned on a radio or television in the 1970s or early 1980s, you have heard that voice before. It is instantly recognizable. The voice belonged to Casey Kasem and that tidbit about Elvis and Marvin Gaye was one of thousands of bits of trivia offered up to the listeners of “American Top 40.”
Just a year removed from its July 4, 1970 debut on fewer than 10 radio stations across the nation, “American Top 40” was still a novelty in 1971. That the creators of the “1971” series, which is based on the book, “1971: Never a Dull Moment” by David Hepworth, would use this AT40 clip in this way is more than a clever segue into trivia about Gaye and the most important album he ever recorded. To use it at the beginning of a series of documentaries that set out to prove the value of popular music in 1971 is a testament to AT40’s place in pop culture. It is an acknowledgement of how AT40, the most famous countdown show ever broadcast, weaved itself into music history.
The idea of a weekly Top 40 radio show when giants such as Jimi Hendrix, The Who, Led Zeppelin, and The Rolling Stones roamed the Earth seems like insanity, even now. Top 40 alluded to pop songs on AM radio, which was hardly an inroads to respect in the era when there were already thinkpieces being written by pundits and critics lamenting the decline of rock’s creativity. Kasem himself said that in the early shows, he was trying to not sound “too bubblegum.”
Indeed, Kasem’s delivery changed over the years, something that is very noticeable now that iHeart Radio offers a 24/7 dose of Kasem on its Classic American Top 40 channel. Fans of the show are able to identify the general era of the broadcast simply from the tone of Kasem’s voice. In the first year or two, Kasem gives off a very FM underground radio vibe, taking care to not sound too upbeat but still leaving listeners feeling like they were about to be privy to very important information. By contrast, his disco era delivery matches the music that dominated the charts, as if he were mere feet from the disc jockey turntable and had to shout to be heard.
An important element of the show’s success is that AT40 capitalized on both the personal and the communal experience that not just listening to music, but being a fan of music can be. Rooting for our favorite songs became a sport and if Andy Gibb’s “Shadow Dancing” made it to #1, I played my part in making that happen by buying his record. Whether you were listening on the car radio or while sprawled on your bed with a transistor near your ear, you shared in the drama of finding out how many “notches” a song climbed or fell. Songs that made it to #1 were literally introduced with a drum roll. If the song was one of your favorites, it could be exhilarating to hear that it had made that long journey up the Billboard Hot 100. If it was a song you did not like (“You Light Up My Life”? Again?), it could be a major disappointment that could only be wiped away by the next show. It was a weekly competition that would seemingly last as long as Americans would buy records.
Of course, Kasem himself was why many listeners tuned in. His was one of the most heard voices in the country due to his work in commercials and cartoons. Many Gen Xers likely heard him as Shaggy on “Scooby Doo, Where Are You?” while they dug into their bowls of cereal on Saturday mornings before they ever tuned in to AT40. Yet, Kasem made AT40 seem like the most vital news of the week. He brought an ethos to the countdown and the trivia teasers that elevated AT40 beyond a mere list of record sales. His trademark “Long Distance Dedications” became a vital source of communicating gratitude, regret, and, especially, love across the miles.
“Billboard,” was and is the music industry’s premiere trade magazine. Its Hot 100 charts are time capsules storing the changing musical tastes and, especially, what radio stations were most willing to put on the air in any given week or year. Radio airplay went hand-in-hand with records sales in the 70s and 80s. Through it all, there was never a hint that Kasem had a favorite song or even genre of music. If he had one, he never admitted to it. In an interview with an Australian journalist in 1984, four years before the end of his first run as host of AT40, Kasem said that if he did not like a song in the Top 40, he did not assume it was a flaw in the music. He assumed he was missing something and “just because I don’t see the significance, that doesn’t mean that there isn’t something there to enjoy.” 1
AT40 always remained true to its source. It was policy from the very beginning to play every song that “Billboard” listed in the top 40. That might mean a “lyrics alert” in a memo to the affiliates from producer Tom Rounds. Such was the case in his May 25, 1973 memo regarding Paul Simon’s reminiscence about all the “crap” he learned in high school in “Kodachrome” (#28 for the June 2nd show), and in the memo which warned that the March 31, 1979 episode featured Sting’s musings on prostitution in “Roxanne” by The Police, (debuting at #40 on April 7th.)
Some affiliates took it upon themselves to simply edit out some of the songs that might be deemed objectionable, such as Chuck Berry’s #1 hit in 1972, “My Ding-a-Ling.” The show helped out the affiliates that opted out of playing the song by adding in a one-second pause to the vinyl recording it shipped out. At least one station, WCFL in Chicago, opted to not only play the offending song but to edit out the pause. AT40 producers saved everyone trouble with the FCC by editing out the word, “shit” from Bob Dylan’s “George Jackson” in 1972.
It even meant staying true to its source and format in October 1973, when J.J. Jordan, program director at WGRQ in Buffalo, New York talked to Rounds about the problem of “music balance” in the first hour of the show. This lack of balance was brought on by the increasing number of R&B songs that were appearing in the lower third of the Top 40. A review of the Billboard charts of the fall of 1973 reveals that singles such as “Stoned Out of My Mind” by The Chi-Lites, “I’ve Got So Much to Give” by Barry White, and “Midnight Train to Georgia” shared chart space with “You’ve Never Been this Far Before” by Conway Twitty, “Bad, Bad Leroy Brown” by Jim Croce, and “Why Me” by Kris Kristofferson. Whether or not the appearance of country songs in the Top 40 was of equal concern to Jordan is not known, although it definitely was a concern to country music purists. However, even if a radio station is beholden to a format, as most are, the Top 40 is not. Country, countrypolitan, R&B, rock, bubblegum, glam, metal, disco, hip hop: They were all part of the Top 40 and, therefore, part of the show.
Another adjustment that affiliates had to make was in the time allotted for the show. When AT40 hit the airwaves, it was still standard operating procedure to keep songs under three minutes if you wanted any chance at getting some radio play. This was largely dictated by the .45, which generally only had enough space for three minutes per song. As technology improved, so did the potential song length. In 1978, the average length of singles was approaching four minutes, meaning the episodes of AT40 had to increase from three to four hours in order to have enough time to play all of the songs.
In 1982, ABC Radio Network purchased Watermark, Incorporated and, therefore, AT40, which was by then a worldwide radio staple. With the sale, the mom and pop shop feel of Watermark was replaced by the corporate environment of ABC. It was with ABC that Kasem had the contract dispute that led him to leave the show in 1988. This ushered in the Shadoe Stevens years. For many listeners, though, it was the end of the true AT40, despite the fact that Kasem resumed hosting in 1998, before turning over the reins for good to Ryan Seacrest in 2003.
“Keep your feet on the ground and keep reaching for the stars.” Kasem had been using that phrase since the mid-50s and it became his signature sign-off for each AT40 episode. It was a very Casey Kasem thing to do. He felt compelled to provide a bit of philosophical advice for listeners — especially the younger ones — rather than simply say goodbye. Coming from anyone else, it might have sounded a bit corny but it sounded just right coming from Kasem. It was all part and parcel of making a countdown show more than a list of songs. Like the music profiled in the “1971” series, American Top 40 was not simply holding up a mirror and reflecting the culture of the era, but it would prove to be an integral part of it.
- Matthew Bolton,“King Kasem.” The Age, (Melbourne, Australia), June 14, 1984.
Sources
Battistini, Pete. American Top 40 with Casey Kasem (The 1970's). Bloomington, IN: AuthorHouse, 2005.
Battistini, Pete. American Top 40 with Casey Kasem (The 1980s). Bloomington, IN: AuthorHouse, 2010.
Bolton, Matthew. “King Kasem.” The Age, (Melbourne, Australia), June 14, 1984.
Whitburn, Joel. The Billboard Book of Top 40 Hits. New York: Random House, 2010.
