Welcome to "Beach Music". Huh, you ask? Well, let me explain it, but first, here is the story on how I became familiar with it.
For me, it goes back to the early summer of 1981. I was 24 years old and was about to complete my third year working at Prudential Insurance in Roseland. Although I had some friends that I hung out with, going to clubs or Jersey Shore excursions, I was pretty much a loner. My luck with women was, to stay the least, not present. And I really didn't have any friends from work (it would take several more years before I would have a great circle of friends there). So pretty much whatever I did, I did alone.
Thus, I planned a solo road trip to Florida, taking a week and a half off from work to just hang out, explore and enjoy things at my own pace. It was the Saturday after Memorial Day and the first day featured myself taking in a PGA Golf Tournament in Bethesda, Maryland, then staying at a hotel in Virginia. The following day was down I-95 through North and South Carolina, stopping at the tried-and-true tourist trap, South of the Border, which I had played a Par 3 course (yes, I was into golf back then!), and staying that night further down in that state. I had top 40 radio on during the trip and pretty much was attuned to the hits of the day, such as Rick Springfield's "Jessie's Girl", Neil Diamonds, "America", and many others.
By Day 3, I settled in Daytona Beach, Florida where I spent four days. I had been to Daytona three times in the prior five years, including twice during Spring Break, and once during a post college graduation road trip with two friends. I was by myself this time, but I had also met a girl from Indiana at a club situated on the town's Ocean Pier. I hung out with Terri much of the time, including going to Disney's Magic Kingdom for one day.
After leaving there, I went south to visit my grandfather down in Miami Beach then made my way up to central Florida for the night. That was followed by visiting a cousin outside of Atlanta. It was then I heard the sad news: My Grandmother Sheldon, who lived in Elizabeth (next to Roselle Park where I lived, and who was ill when I left, had passed away at the age of 82.
Needless to say, I cut off the rest of my trip and left my cousin's early the next morning and drove straight home. And that is where this story begins.
Leaving around 7 AM, I traveled on I-85 which traversed much of South Carolina, and then North Carolina. As it was a Sunday, much of the radio stations down there would have special programming. One station announced that they were playing "your favorite beach music". Beach music? Well, this Jersey Boy, when you think of that term, visions of Beach Boys, and Jan & Dean come to your head. Or perhaps The Chanteys, Dick Dale, and the Surfari's.
But beach music was none of these styles. It was now in the afternoon and I was still going through North Carolina, heading to Virginia when the station I was listening to was playing nothing but beach music. But what I was hearing was many R&B songs, including some with a bouncing rhythm and melody. Many of them were feel-good songs. Some examples were Brenton Wood's "Gimme Little Sign", J.J. Jackson's "But It's Alright", "Under the Boardwalk" by The Drifters, and many other R&B gems. Interspersed were some newer songs that had that same good-time beat to it.
Some of the music I've heard before, some were "new" to me, but, during a day where my grandmother's passing was heavily on my mind and in the midst of an twenty hour drive home, it brought to me a diversion, at the least from the issues I was facing. Probably more that the other parts of that trip, I remembered that the most, I think. That evening as I got to Viriginia, and getting tired and stopping at rest areas in Maryland and Delaware, I was just faced with the task of getting home, which I did by 3 AM that Monday morning, and I was there for my grandmother's wake that day.
As for Beach Music, I started reading articles on it. Record World magazine, an industry trade which I responded to, had an article on this genre, which apparently was enjoying a revival.
The whole concept of beach music developed around Myrtle Beach South Carolina and parts of the "Grand Strand" that stretched into North Carolina (although the music was ultimately popular from Virginia Beach to Jacksonville). In the late 1940's, "race records" (as they were called back in those segregated times) evolved into what we call Rhythm & Blues (R&B). The beat (which would soon influence the creation of rock n' roll) was seen as an alternative to the vocal standards which were popular with white audiences in that day. Dance clubs, and jukeboxes along the Carolina coasts started playing this kind of music; it was a way for white audiences to be exposed to mostly African-American singers and groups.
The predominant dance to this music was "the Shag", sort of a slowed-down version of the Jitterburg, and people in the 1950's started coming to the pavilions along North Myrtle Beach and along the strand to dance to these songs. R&B music was still very popular into the 1950's and '60s when the bouncy good-time beat was added to this genre. Motown artists like Mary Wells, and Martha & the Vandellas contributed songs in this style. Other groups like The Coasters, The Platters, The Drifters, The Isley Brothers (specifically during their mid 60's Motown period) and The Tams produced these types of songs well into the 1960's. Even white "blue-eyed soul" acts got into the genre, including The Swingin' Medallions, Bob Kuban & the In-Men and Bill Deal & the Rhondels, which had hits in the latter half of the 1960's, as the beach music sound came to a head during this era.
The sound carried well into the 1970's as acts like The Tymes ("Ms. Grace" from 1974 is a great example) and The Trammps, "Zing Went the Strings", and "Hold Back the Night", a top 40 hit from 1976, kept this phenomena going. White funk act Wild Cherry, best known for their 1976 hit, "Play That Funky Music", also had a song "1 2 3 Kind of Love" that had that beach music beat to it; that song still is popular in that circuit.
Beach Music finally went into some decline in the 1970's because of both hard rock/heavy metal, and disco, which started dominating the clubs. However, once disco petered out around 1980, there was a revival along the Carolinas in the 1980's, which was most likely responsible for the specialty shows that sprouted up along that region that I had seen.
Although much of the 1980's beach music arose out of "nostalgia' (as much of sixties music was revived during the nostalgia of the eighties), there were some new groups that remake the classics, or recorded new songs in that style, such as the Embers.
Following my 1981 road trip, I took another road trip the following summer, which brought me to West Virginia, Gatlinburg Tennessee (including the Knoxville World's Fair that year), and ultimately landing me in Myrtle Beach, the capital of beach music. And sure enough I hit the clubs when I was there. Although much of it were the usual party songs that you'd encounter everywhere else, they did throw in several beach music numbers like "More Than Just a Number in my Little Red Book", thus beach music was still alive and well.
During the mid-1980's I listened to a station out of Trenton, NJ, WKXW, "Kicks one-oh-one-and-a-half", which is now New Jersey 101.5. Back then, it was an adult contemporary format but on Sunday evenings, a DJ named Norm Latham had an oldies show where he'd play songs from the late 1950's in the first hour, then the 1960's and early '70s during the remainder of the program. Much of the songs played were doo wop, and R&B in nature, some of them very local (to Trenton and Philly) hits that I hadn't heard of that I loved, which reminded me somewhat of beach music. It was the summer of 1984 and Latham did talk about the phenomenon that was Carolina beach music and played many examples of it. In fact, the station played all beach music during Labor Day of that year, and only time that I believe a Jersey station saluted a music style to its south. Although it never caught on in the Garden State, we have the Jersey Sound at our own shore, with artists like Bruce Springsteen, Southside Johnny, and others, which had incorporated much of the soul and R&B that made up the Carolina genre.
The eighties were also popular for producing "coming of age" movies set in the early 1960's, like "Dirty Dancing", "Stand on Me", "The Flamingo Kid" and others. In 1989, the movie "Shag" came out, which followed several young adults just out of school in Myrtle Beach. As you'd expect, the movie's soundtrack included many of the classics. A new song by a newcomer (from New Jersey, nonetheless) named Tommy Page, called "The Shag" was a good attempt at capturing the essence of that vintage period. Although the song, his debut, was not a hit, he did turn to the teen-idol/boy band genre with "I'll Be Your Everything", a collaboration by the then-hot New Kids on the Block, and it was #1 in early 1990. Page then went to the other side of the record business managing various acts and record labels, before passing away early this year.
Since then, there have been many compilations of beach music gems, some very obscure (similar to the plethora of 1960's Garage Rock bands (some of which can overlap as beach music, check out Frankie & the Damons' "Here Comes My Baby"), and some well known. Beach Music actually continues today, and although that type of music is no longer dominant, song which just happen to have that beat, are played on beach music shows or formatted radio stations in the Carolinas. Published each week is the "Beach Music top 40", which usually consists of artists popular back in the day (General Johnson, of the R&B group Chairmen of the Board of "Give Me Just a Little More Time" fame) has some songs in the survey. Also with some new tribute groups like Midnight Allie, a local band from that region who currently tops that chart. Some recent artists like Michael Buble and Sheryl Crow have had songs on this list as well.
Song that have hit my SNS chart that are good modern examples are "The Walk" by Mayer Hawthorne, and "Coming Home" by Leon Bridges. Both songs hit the top spot on SNS.
Finally, this summer, Sirius XM satellite radio's Channel 13 is "Carolina Shag" which is all beach music for the summer. It includes vintage R&B, obscure songs from that era as well as some new music that is genre-ready. I will be featuring this music frequently on my Facebook timeline this summer. Definitely give it a listen, and, even if you didn't grow up in that era or region of the country, you can romanticize what it was like being on the beach there and shagging and listening to this music.
CURRENT SLICE: Back to the current day, Miley Cyrus continues at the top with "Malibu" (speaking of a beach on the other side of the continent), for a fourth week, with the jazzy retro "It's Time" a distance behind at #2. Foster the People loses its bullet at #3, while The Hounds of Winter advance to #4. LP's "Lost In You" holds at #5. Trapdoor Social flies into the top 20 with "Winning As Truth". POP ETC, from Berkeley, CA also had their first top 20 with "Routine". Portugal.The Man has its fifth top 20 with "Feel It Still" and Jake Owen, his second with "Good Company".
Fitz & the Tantrums' latest "Fool" moves from 47-30 and is the Mover of the Week. Tennis has the top debut "In the Morning I'll Be Better", going for their fourth top 10, with "Origins" reaching #1 in 2012, but vintage act Blondie also debuts (Deborah Harry, incidentally was seen at last month's Mermaid Parade at Coney Island), along with Grizzly Bear, who have had two top ten's including "Yet Again" which reached #1 for two weeks, also in 2012. Arcade Fire, The National, The Bleachers also debut. The Bleachers song, "Don't Take the Money", a top 10 current alt-rock hit, has had two SNS songs to their credit, their highest being "I Wanna Get Better", #42 in 2014.
Scenes ‘n’ Soundwaves 100
July 9 / 16, 2017
| This Week | Last Week | ARTIST-Title | Weeks on List |
| 1 | 1 | NUMBER ONE:
"Malibu"●
(Single Only)
(4 weeks at #1)
|
7 |
| 2 | 2 | Nick Waterhouse - It's Time | 6 |
| 3 | 3 | Foster the People - SHC | 7 |
| 4 | 6 | The Hounds of Winter - I Get You | 10 |
| 5 | 5 | LP - Lost on You● | 13 |
| 6 | 4 | Keith Urban f. Carrie Underwood - The Fighter● | 18 |
| 7 | 10 | Dan Auerbach - Shine on Me | 5 |
| 8 | 13 | Alison Ireheta and Halo Circus - Band-Aid | 7 |
| 9 | 16 | Michelle Branch - Hopeless Romantic | 6 |
| 10 | 15 | Parquet Courts - Human Performance | 16 |
| 11 | 8 | Little Steven - Soulfire | 9 |
| 12 | 32 | TOP 20 IMPACT OF THE WEEK:
"Winning
As Truth"
Album: Trapdoor Social
|
5 |
| 13 | 12 | The Palms - Push Off● | 18 |
| 14 | 7 | Thomas Rhett - Star of the Show | 12 |
| 15 | 18 | Twenty-One Pilots - HeavyDirtySoul | 12 |
| 16 | 23 | Pop Etc - Routine | 7 |
| 17 | 9 | Kings of Leon - Reverend | 12 |
| 18 | 26 | Jake Owen - Good Company | 5 |
| 19 | 24 | Portugal. The Man - Feel It Still | 14 |
| 20 | 11 | The Big Takeover - Love Understands | 11 |
|
|
Songs
with the greatest increase in favorite points over the prior week.
● Songs
with 25 or more plays on my iPod.
▲ Songs with 50 or more
plays on my iPod.
The “Scenes ‘n’ Soundwaves 100” is a list
of current and recent song playlist which I am listening to.
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