Our humble music review factory will reach its one year anniversary in just a few days. An initial gusher of articles which kicked off the site occurred on June 27, 2006. Granted, one year isn’t a lot of time for most going concerns, but somewhere I read that the typical life of a blog is only five months, so we figured this is something worth popping a cork over.
Besides, we never won any awards and we don’t get a lot of daily hits (although it’s trending in the right direction). Our longevity is about the only thing we can hang our hat on until our genius is finally understood.
So, I wondered what can be done to mark the event. Lessee … the “anniversary” … that I’ve got “on my mind” … “this is our first year” … I “need a little help from above”…
Pretty soon that long-lost 8-track from Little River Band’s Diamantina Cocktail was playing in my mind, repeating the third song over and over again. It was a hit on the radio, too. If you were listening to Top 40 around 1977-78, you know all about “Happy Anniversary,” which narrowly missed the Top 10 at that time.
For those of you who weren’t around, “Happy Anniversary” was one of those snappy, mildly country-ish pop tunes laden with rich harmonies that sounded like soft California rock at it’s finest –except that these blokes were from Down Under. The deal-sealer is that funky undercurrent; the popping bassline not only works with the Nashville elements of the song, it makes the song downright irresistible.
The upbeat tone of the Little River Band’s “Happy Anniversary” belies that fact that it’s about a busted relationship, but hey, it’s got that funky bassline, so everything’s good. In fact, the album from which this ditty came from, the aforementioned Diamantina Cocktail is arguably the best CSN album that Crosby, Stills and Nash never made.
I might not be the biggest Little River Band fan out there, but the first few albums in particular were pretty solid – which is about the same you can say for a lot of the better classic rock bands, when you think about it.
But back to the inspiration for featuring “Happy Anniversary”: We thank you, dear readers, for your visits.
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