Lost Factor 1971: Some Songs Are Like a Broken Yo-Yo

Like 1982, the very first year we calculated in our “Lost Factor” series, 1971 was a year of transition at pop radio. Two years earlier, facing the growth of FM album rock radio, top 40 radio went softer and more bubblegummy than ever. Now AOR radio was unavoidable and stations such as John Garabedian’s WMEX Boston were more aggressively looking for the songs that would restore rock cred to the format. 

But 1971 was also the early ‘70s epicenter of teen idols, who were cycling quickly around this time from Bobby Sherman to David Cassidy and the Partridge Family to Donny Osmond and his brothers (with the more credible Jackson 5 against all comers). Teen acts had been with us from the beginning, of course, but not since the early ‘60s had they seemed so particularly stigmatized, something that was probably a product of the rift between pop and progressive rock.

Then there was “Chirpy Chirpy Cheep Cheep” by Mac & Katie Kissoon, the good version of the Italo-pop bubblegum song that charted in America by three different artists. I know at least one or two friends who would admit liking “Chirpy,”, but they’re all within a few months of me in age. I’ve helped put together all-‘70s Weekends for stations who have cheerfully played “The Night Chicago Died,” the Bay City Rollers, the almost-as-Euro-goofy “How Do You Do” by Mouth & Macneal, and still drawn the line at Mac & Katie. Not surprisingly, it received no spins at BDS monitored radio stations last week.

Delving into the early ‘70s moves us into late ‘60s/early ‘70s bubblegum territory for the first time (although ‘70s pop detractors usually include any song they find sufficiently lacking in gravitas). It also moves us into the heart of early ‘70s Jesus Rock. “My Sweet Lord” by George Harrison gets some airplay at radio today, but a pair of songs from Jesus Christ Superstar are No. 1 and No. 3 among 1971 hits in their “Lost Factor” — the score that calculates the distance between hit status then and obscurity now. (Read more about its specific workings here.) Neither song received even a temporary bump when a live version of Superstar was broadcast last year. 

Here are the top “lost factor” hits of 1971, based on points for their standing for the year divided by the number of plays they receive now. In parenthesis is the “lost factor,” followed by the number of spins the songs received in the U.S. and Canada according to BDS in the week prior to my calculations. 

1. Murray Head & Trinidad SIngers, “Superstar” (lost factor 75, spins for the week 0)
2. Donny Osmond, “Sweet and Innocent” (69, 0)
3. Helen Reddy, “I Don’t Know How to Love Him” (51, 0)
4. Osmonds, “Yo-Yo” (50, 0)
5. Partridge Family, “Doesn’t Somebody Want to Be Wanted” (48, 0)
6. Donny Osmond, “Go Away Little Girl” (47, 2)
7. The Bells, “Stay Awhile” (44, 1)
8. Daddy Dewdrop, “Chick-a-Boom (Don’t Ya Just Love It)” (34, 2)
9. Mac & Katie Kissoon, “Chirpy Chirpy Cheep Cheep” (30, 0)
10. Andy Williams, “(Where Do I Begin) Love Story” (29, 1)
11. Beginning of the End, “Funky Nassau” (26, 0)
12. Osmonds, “One Bad Apple” (25, 4)
13. Bobby Goldsboro, “Watching Scotty Grow” (23, 1)
14. Judy Collins, “Amazing Grace” (21, 0)
15. 8^th Day, “She’s Not Just Another Woman” (19, 2)

In the top 15 for the year, we find:

• Six songs that are super-soft/MORish, including the last major hit for Andy Williams. Don’t feel too bad for him, though; the holidays are coming;
• Five songs by teen idols — four of them Osmonds-related. We haven’t shown individual breakouts for every year of the ‘70s, but we can tell you that there’s an Osmonds-related song every year between 1971 and 1976, except for 1973, when Donny Osmond was being challenged by the DeFranco Family and didn’t have a big enough hit. Even the Jackson 5 just miss the top 15 with “Mama’s Pearl”;
• Four songs that can be classified as bubblegum (including some overlap with the teen-idol songs).

As we’ve seen more as we move backwards through the decade, there are also a number of great early ‘70s R&B records that fall through the cracks now for a number of reasons — they weren’t top 10 songs in every market; Adult R&B radio is increasingly cutting off in the early ‘80s and not playing even the Earth, Wind & Fire late-‘70s — none of them related to quality. Beyond “Funky Nassau” and 8^th Day, you’ll also find Wilson Pickett’s “Don’t Knock My Love” (No. 23) and Denise LaSalle’s “Trapped by a Thing Called Love” (No. 35). 

Here are the songs with more than 100 spins for the previous week that now punch above their weight — getting the most monitored spins at broadcast radio, compared to their year-end placing for 1971. It’s notable that “Maggie May” was the No. 2 song of the year, and might have been even bigger if it hadn’t been a Q4 hit. (The “Lost Factor” is 0.27.) It got more than 460 spins in the week measured. By comparison, “Love Her Madly” was the No. 94 song of 1971; it needed just under 200 spins for its low “Lost Factor” of 0.03.

1. Doors, “Riders on the Storm”
2. Doors, “Love Her Madly”
3. Who, “Won’t Get Fooled Again”
4. Cat Stevens, “Wild World”
5. Rod Stewart, “Maggie May”

Still to come, the top “Lost Factor” songs of 1970-74 and the year-by-year tallies for the entire ‘70s.