1974 Top Thirteen

Finally, at fourteen, I was allowed to go to the Friday night disco in my friend's village hall and it felt so-oo glamorous and exciting. Proper grown up with all the older kids, including my first proper boyfriend.
Glam Rock was still around, but for me this was when the soul stuff I loved started turning into disco with Disco Tex, KC and the Sunshine Band and George McCrae's unforgettable Rock Your Baby.
Somewhere in between we had the likes of Cockney Rebel, The Rubettes and Mud. C'mon, own up to putting those thumbs in your belt hooks to do the classic box-step to Tiger Feet.

1) Bachman-Turner Overdrive - You Ain't Seen Nothin' Yet -12-1974
2) The Hollies - The Air That I Breathe - 03-1974
3) George McCrae - Rock Your Baby - 07-1974
4) R. Dean Taylor - There's A Ghost In My House - 06-1974
5) Slade - Everyday - 04-1974
6) Paul McCartney & Wings - Band On The Run - 07-1974
7) David Bowie - Rebel Rebel - 02-1974
8) Queen - Seven Seas Of Rhye - 04-1974
9) Golden Earring - Radar Love - 01-1974
10) Ringo Starr - You're Sixteen - 03-1974
11) The Stylistics - You Make Me Feel Brand New - 08-1974
12) The Chi-Lites - Homely Girl - 04-1974
13) Terry Jacks - Seasons In The Sun - 03-1974


So much good music, I could have added at least half a dozen more.

Mud - Tiger Feet - 01-1974
The Hues Corporation - Rock The Boat - 05-1974
Cozy Powell - Dance With The Devil - 01-1974
Johnny Bristol - Hang On In There Baby - 09-1974
Eric Clapton - I Shot The Sheriff - 08-1974
Cockney Rebel - Judy Teen - 06-1974
Lynsey De Paul - No Honestly - 11-1974
Disco Tex & The Sex-O-Lettes - Get Dancing - 12-1974
The Drifters - Kissin' In The Back Row Of The Movies - 07-1974
Bryan Ferry - The In Crowd - 06-1974
Hot Chocolate - Emma - 03-1974
KC & The Sunshine Band - Queen Of Clubs - 09-1974
Andy Kim - Rock Me Gently - 09-1974
Robert Knight - Love On A Mountain Top - 01-1974
Mud - The Cat Crept In - 04-1974
Alan Price - Jarrow Song - 06-1974
Suzi Quatro - Devil Gate Drive - 02-1974
Charlie Rich - The Most Beautiful Girl - 04-1974
The Rubettes - Juke Box Jive - 11-1974
Santana – Samba Pa Ti - 09-1974
Leo Sayer - One Man Band - 06-1974
Elton John - Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds - 12-1974
Gary Shearston - I Get A Kick Out Of You - 10-1974
The Sparks - This Town Ain't Big Enough For Both Of Us - 05-1974
Jim Stafford - Spiders & Snakes - 05-1974
The Sweet - Teenage Rampage - 01-1974
The Three Degrees - When Will I See You Again - 07-1974
Stevie Wonder - He's Misstra Know It All - 05-1974

70s Food

At the start of the seventies, my folks owned a newsagent so, as you can imagine, I formed a very close relationship with chocolate.
How many of these do you remember? I think Mars Bars, Twix and Kitkat are still my favourites, although nowadays, I only allow myself one piece on a Friday, because they have no calories on that day.

As I remember, we used to have a weekly delivery from the "pop man" who would bring every imaginable flavour - I remember Dandelion and Burdock being a favourite.

Set menus were much more common at home - a hang on from the fifties after rationing finally stopped. Fish on Friday - usually from the chippy, or occasionally a "Chinky do" - we made our own dim sum by ordering half a dozen dishes from the local Chinese restaurant. Sunday was traditionally a roast, even in the summer - I can remember lazing on the back lawn with a small glass of sherry while the joint roasted. Saturday saw dishes created from scratch using fresh ingredients – almost every recipe started with slicing an onion, and we had around a dozen different recipes we'd alternate. Quickest was bacon, onion and potato casserole, all the way through to a complex moussaka. Making a béchamel sauce from scratch was a real skill.
On weekdays, we were more likely to open tinned vegtables with chops or a Fray Bentos pie - you opened the flat tin and the pale pastry rose to many times its thickness, turning golden brown.
So many things came in tins from peaches and pineapple to semolina and hot dog sausages. No such thing as sell-by dates, we had enough tins in the cupboard to outlast a siege, and you only chucked them away if the lid began to bulge. And only then after opening them to make sure they weren't still edible.

Those were the days! And yet, we had far fewer food allergies and eating disorders. The advent of Homepride cook-in sauces in 1974 meant one could do coq-au-vin or chicken in white wine sauce with very little prep. The early jars were a real treat, although we never understood the thing making them so tasty was a bunch of added salt and sugar.

Dinner parties: the fondue set was a must, along with cheese & pineapple hedgehogs, cheese straws, Twiglets, cocktail sausages, vol-au-vents and garlic mushrooms. No party was complete without a Quiche Lorraine (tomato and bacon), and people were inspired by holidays abroad - adding pizza, gazpacho and paella, and meals from Indian and Chinese restaurants, with Homepride helping to make chicken curry or sweet and sour pork.

Eating out. Anyone who was there in the 70s will remember the classics: Prawn cocktail or Melon for starters, Mixed Grill or Steak, Black Forest gateau or lemon meringue pie. It was rare to find a vegetarian option, the attitude was "just don't eat the meat."

1973 Top Thirteen

As you can tell by the long list of also rans, this was when I really began to develop a massive love affair with music - mostly the rockier side of pop with oodles of Queen, Bowie, ELO, Fleetwood Mac etc. Still hanging on to a stack of soul and a goodly amount of boppy ones - what can I tell you?
I AM a dancer.

These are my top thirteen:
1) Stevie Wonder - Living for the city -11-1973
2) Wings - Live And Let Die - 06-1973
3) Thin Lizzy - Whiskey In The Jar - 02-1973
4) David Bowie - Sorrow - 10-73
5) Ike & Tina Turner - Nutbush City Limits - 10-1973
6) Roberta Flack - Killing Me Softly With His Song - 03-1973
7) Bobby Goldsboro - Summer (The First Time) - 08-1973
8) David Essex - Rock On - 09-1973
9) The Isley Brothers - (Who's) That Lady - 10-1973
10) Barry Blue - (Dancing) On A Saturday Night - 08-1973
11) Lynsey De Paul - Won't Somebody Dance With Me - 10-1973
12) Hot Chocolate - Brother Louie - 05-1973
13) Billy Paul - Me And Mrs. Jones - 02-1973

And just bubbling under:
David Bowie - Life On Mars - 07-1973
Manfred Mann's Earth Band - Joybringer - 10-1973
Mott The Hoople - Roll Away The Stone - 12-1973
David Bowie - Drive-In Saturday - 04-1973
The Rolling Stones - Angie - 09-1973
The Sweet - Blockbuster - 01-1973
Nazareth - Bad Bad Boy - 08-1973
The Detroit Emeralds - Feel The Need In Me - 03-1973
Drifters - Like Sister And Brother - 09-1973
The Electric Light Orchestra - Roll Over Beethoven - 02-1973
Fleetwood Mac - Albatross - 06-1973
Stealer's Wheel - Stuck In The Middle With You - 06-1973
Focus - Sylvia - 02-1973
Status Quo - Caroline - 10-1973
Free - All Right Now - 08-1973
Paul McCartney & Wings - My Love - 04-1973
Roxy Music - Street Life - 12-1973
Carly Simon - You're So Vain - 01-1973
Leo Sayer - The Show Must Go On - 12-1973
The Sweet - Ballroom Blitz - 09-1973
10cc - Rubber Bullets - 06-1973
First Choice - Smarty Pants - 08-1973

Limmie and the Family Cooking - You Can Do Magic - ??-1973

Kiki Dee - Amoureuse - 0??-1973

The Doobie Brothers - Long Train Running  - ??-1973

Stevie Wonder - You Are the Sunshine of my Life - ??-1973

My 1970s Movies

Although back in 1970s UK, we called them films, not movies - but you know how much I love a little alliteration! When choosing my top three from each year, I based many of these films on my current tastes – pretty sure I wouldn’t have enjoyed Telly Savalas’ band of misfit soldiers at 10 years old. But heck, it had Clint Eastwood, as did many of my faves from the 70s.
You may think the following lists woefully incomplete, but the majority of others getting a mention were ones I’ve heard of – not necessarily the highest grossing or critically acclaimed. And you’ll notice a bunch of musicals and horror among the action and rom-coms.

1970 – Two Mules for Sister Sara, Kelly’s Heroes, MASH.

Airport, Love Story, The Aristocats, Ryan’s Daughter, Catch-22, The Owl and the Pussycat, The Railway Children.

1971 – Shaft, Dirty Harry, Get Carter.
Klute, Play Misty for Me, Duel, Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory, Fiddler on the Roof, Diamonds Are Forever, Walkabout,
Escape from the Planet of the Apes, Bedknobs and Broomsticks, The Beguiled, A Clockwork Orange.

1972 – Sleuth, What’s Up Doc, The Poseidon Adventure.
The Godfather, Last Tango in Paris, Silent Running, Cabaret, Frenzy, The Getaway, The Way of the Dragon, The Mechanic, Conquest of the Planet of the Apes, Deliverance.

1973 – Live and Let Die, The Sting, The Three Musketeers.
The Exorcist, Enter The Dragon, The Way We Were, Jesus Christ Superstar, The Day of the Jackal, Magnum Force, The Wicker Man, American Graffiti, High Plains Drifter, Papillon, Serpico, Paper Moon, A Touch of Class, Badlands.

1974 – Death Wish, Thunderbolt and Lightfoot, Blazing Saddles.
Murder on the Orient Express, The Man with the Golden Gun, The Towering Inferno, The Land That Time Forgot, The Great Gatsby, Confessions of a Window Cleaner, The Odessa File, Texas Chainsaw Massacre.

1975 – One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, Monty Python and the Holy Grail, The Rocky Horror Picture Show.

Jaws, The Stepford Wives, The Man Who Would Be King, The Return of the Pink Panther, Tommy, Funny Lady, Shampoo, Rollerball, Three Days of the Condor, Rooster Cogburn, Shivers.

1976 – Carrie, Bugsy Malone, The Slipper and the Rose.
A Star is Born, The Outlaw Josey Wales, The Eagle Has Landed, The Man Who Fell to Earth, Marathon Man, The Omen, Logan’s Run, King Kong, Rocky, Taxi Driver, All the President's Men.

1977 – Saturday Night Fever, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, Star Wars.
Smokey and the Bandit, The Spy Who Loved Me, Goodbye Girl, A Bridge Too Far, The Hills Have Eyes. The Deep, The Gauntlet Annie Hall, Black Joy.

1978 – Grease, Invasion of the Body Snatchers, Every Which Way but Loose.

Superman, Death on the Nile, Halloween, Blue Collar, Heaven Can Wait, The Wild Geese, Battlestar Galactica, Convoy, Coma, Damien: Omen II, The Boys from Brazil, The Deer Hunter, Midnight Express.

1979 – Alien, Life of Brian, Star Trek.
Mad Max, 10, Moonraker, Kramer vs. Kramer, The Amityville Horror, Escape from Alcatraz, Time After Time, Apocalypse Now, All That Jazz, Being There.


Hands up if you remember trying to get into an X-rated (18+) film when you’re only thirteen. For me, that was Enter the Dragon and, guess what? My (strict) mum and dad took me to see it!
The old film ratings changed on 1st July 1970, with the A rating going from 11+ to 8+, an extra level AA for 14+ and the X rating going up from 16+ to 18+.