Why couldn't Morris Albert maintain success after "Feelings"?

[Arthur Talarico]

This weekend I started listening to Morris Albert's songs. He has excellent songs! I can't understand why he couldn't maintain his success in the US after "Feelings". He released two albums after this in the USA: "Morris Albert" (1976) and "Love and Life (1977), but they did not achieve much sales.

 

[Michael Hagerty]

This weekend I started listening to Morris Albert's songs. He has excellent songs! I can't understand why he couldn't maintain his success in the US after "Feelings". He released two albums after this in the USA: "Morris Albert" (1976) and "Love and Life (1977), but they did not achieve much sales.

Morris was a victim of his own success.

"Feelings" (the single) was a slow climber---by the time it got into the Top 10 in Billboard, it had already been on the Hot 100 for 18 weeks. By that late date, most records are leaving the chart. It was 25 weeks old by the time it fell out of the Top 40---eight weeks---two months---older than the next oldest song still in the Hot 100.

People were seriously burned out on "Feelings" by the end of the chart run. And the single's sales didn't spread to the album, which barely cracked the Top 40. Maybe a second hit from the album would have done the trick.



And "Sweet Loving Man" was that single (man, that's an awkward fade).

Radio (especially Top 40) yawned. It got some traction on Adult Contemporary---but not enough to send listeners scurrying to the record store to pick up the LP.

There's an old showbiz saying: "Leave them wanting more." If "Feelings" had only been around ten weeks, people might have wanted to hear more from the artist who recorded it.

 

[rockdoctor]

I never heard anything by Albert after Feelings. It was truly overplayed in this area and people I know did like it. It did spend a tremendous amount of time in the Hot 100 but the followup single did not get any airplay on the stations I listened to at the time.

 

[Harry]

That "Feelings" song worked its way into the history books as an overplayed hit that wore out its welcome and is now in the "made fun of" category. It would go along with:

Seasons In The Sun - Terry Jacks
Honey - Bobby Goldsboro
You Light Up My Life - Debby Boone
We Built This City - Starship
Muskrat Love - America and Captain & Tennille
Billy, Don't Be A Hero - Bo Donaldson and the Heywoods
You're Having My Baby - Paul Anka
Escape - Rupert Holmes
Tie A Yellow Ribbon - Tony Orlando & Dawn
Delta Dawn - Helen Reddy

A few of things bother me about some of the songs on that list.

- Morris Albert's "Feelings" is often lumped in with Herb Alpert because a large part of the "masses are asses" crown can't tell the difference between Alpert and Albert.

- The Poppy Family's excellent record of "Which Way You Going Billy?" is often put down because those same "masses" confuse the "Billy" songs.

- I'm an admirer of Rupert Holmes and think the negative judging of "Escape" is unwarranted, but that's just me.

- I also don't have a problem with the Starship record and find it a great track to listen to once in awhile. I'll allow that it may have been played too much in the day.

 

[Rudy]

- I'm an admirer of Rupert Holmes and think the negative judging of "Escape" is unwarranted, but that's just me.

I never thought of it negatively--it was just another song I liked on the radio at the time. And there were others I could think of during that time that I either didn't care for, or were overplayed more than "Escape."

- I also don't have a problem with the Starship record and find it a great track to listen to once in awhile. I'll allow that it may have been played too much in the day.

I must have missed that one as I know what the song is, but never listened to stations that would have played it. Certainly nothing I'd skip in a playlist or tune a station from. I reserve that for anything Journey ever recorded though. (Although that's a more personal reason--my ex's favorite band. Even my youngest hates Journey. 🤣)

 

[Michael Hagerty]

That "Feelings" song worked its way into the history books as an overplayed hit that wore out its welcome and is now in the "made fun of" category. It would go along with:

Seasons In The Sun - Terry Jacks
Honey - Bobby Goldsboro
You Light Up My Life - Debby Boone
We Built This City - Starship
Muskrat Love - America and Captain & Tennille
Billy, Don't Be A Hero - Bo Donaldson and the Heywoods
You're Having My Baby - Paul Anka
Escape - Rupert Holmes
Tie A Yellow Ribbon - Tony Orlando & Dawn
Delta Dawn - Helen Reddy

A few of things bother me about some of the songs on that list.

- Morris Albert's "Feelings" is often lumped in with Herb Alpert because a large part of the "masses are asses" crown can't tell the difference between Alpert and Albert.

- The Poppy Family's excellent record of "Which Way You Going Billy?" is often put down because those same "masses" confuse the "Billy" songs.

- I'm an admirer of Rupert Holmes and think the negative judging of "Escape" is unwarranted, but that's just me.

- I also don't have a problem with the Starship record and find it a great track to listen to once in awhile. I'll allow that it may have been played too much in the day.

Agree 100%, Harry!

I missed the first several years of MTV (I lived in a couple of apartment complexes in Reno and Las Vegas that had their own CATV systems, local stations plus HBO and Showtime), so what I didn't realize until later was that some good (or at least okay) songs got a bad rap from their videos. And "We Built This City" had a truly God-awful video:




The reverse was true, too---songs that probably wouldn't have gotten traction on radio airplay alone took off on the strength of their videos.

 

[Rudy]

Live Aid was a big one for me. We didn't have cable. I did try to *cough* "borrow" cable from the neighbor's house but couldn't get it to work. We did have some broadcast coverage on TV (in the morning and early afternoon on a local independent, and in the evening from one of the networks), but a radio station kept playing it throughout the day. A really big boost in awareness of many of these groups. Aside from this, the only way I saw videos was via the hour-long video shows that would air in the afternoon or after the news at night. So a lot of the overexposure to video didn't happen.

 

[Arthur Talarico]

On the other hand, Morris Albert continued to be successful here in Brazil until the mid-80s. This is due to the fact that Brazilian soap operas were made by Rede Globo. Soap operas were an absolute hit in Brazilian homes and their soundtracks were huge sellers. Morris Albert was part of many soundtracks, which guaranteed his success in the country for a while longer.

 

[Harry]

And "We Built This City" had a truly God-awful video:

I managed to grab a promo 45 for the song that has the "DJ" part toward the end, and the other side has the song with no DJ so that local stations could put their own insert there.

As for the video, well, it was the mid-80s, everything on TV was being made on the cheap and processed on videotape. It all looks awful these days, except anything that was processed on film.

 

[Mike Blakesley]

Most of the songs on Harry's list above fall into the same category for me: Songs I liked (or at least, didn't hate) when they first came out, but that I can barely stand now. There are a few that I hated very quickly -- "You Light Up My Life" (almost instant hatred), "Seasons In The Sun" (within about three listens), and "You're Having My Baby," which I hated as soon as a read the title.

I never liked "Feelings" from the moment I first heard it. I could not understand WHY it was hanging around so long.

There is one more song that deserves to be on Harry's list: "MacArthur Park." The version I liked at first, but now can't stand, is by Donna Summer. Almost any record she made (well, except "Love To Love You Baby," which was never any good to start with) is better than "MacArthur Park."

Humor writer Dave Barry once did a survey about which songs are the worst of all time. His main rule was they had to be songs that were popular. Here's part of that column for your reading and laughing pleasure.

But now for our survey results. Without question, the voters' choice
for Worst Song -- in both the Worst Overall AND Worst Lyrics category --
is ... (drum roll ...)

``MacArthur Park,'' as sung by Richard Harris, and later remade, for
no comprehensible reason, by Donna Summer.

It's hard to argue with this selection. My 12-year-old son, Rob, was
going through a pile of ballots, and he asked me how ``MacArthur Park''
goes, so I sang it, giving it my best shot, and Rob laughed so hard that
when I got to the part about leaving the cake out in the rain, and it
took so long to bake it, and I'll never have that recipe again, Rob was
on the floor. He didn't BELIEVE those lyrics were real. He was SURE his
wacky old humor-columnist dad was making them up.

The clear runner-up, again in both categories, is ``Yummy Yummy Yummy
(I Got Love In My Tummy),'' performed by Ohio Express. (A voter sent me
an even WORSE version of this, performed by actress Julie London, who at
one time -- and don't tell me this is mere coincidence -- was married to
Jack Webb.)

Coming in a strong third is ``(You're) Having My Baby'' by Paul Anka.
This song is deeply hated. As one voter put it: ``It has no redeeming
value whatsoever -- except my friend Brian yelled out during the birth
scene in the sequel to `The Fly' in full song, `Having my maggot!'''

Honorable mention goes to Bobby Goldsboro, who got many votes for
various songs, especially ``Honey.'' One voter wrote: ``Why does
everybody hate Bobby Goldsboro's `Honey'? I hate it too, but I want to
know WHY.''

Why? Consider this verse: ``She wrecked the car and she was sad; And
so afraid that I'd be mad, but what the heck; Tho' I pretended hard to
be; Guess you could say she saw through me; And hugged my neck.''

As one reader observed: ``Bobby never caught on that he could have
bored a hole in himself and let the sap out.''

A recent song that has aroused great hostility is ``Achy Breaky
Heart,'' by Billy Ray Cyrus. According to voter Mark Freeman, the song
sounds like this: ``You can tell my lips, or you can tell my hips, that
you're going to dump me if you can; But don't tell my liver, it never
would forgive her, it might blow up and circumcize this man!''

Many voters feel a special Lifetime Bad Achievement Award should go
to Mac Davis, who wrote ``In the Ghetto,'' ``Watching Scotty Grow,'' AND
``Baby Don't Get Hooked On Me,'' which contains one of the worst lines
in musical history: ``You're a hot-blooded woman-child; And it's warm
where you're touching me.'' That might be as bad as the part in
``Careless Whisper'' where George Michael sings: ``I'm never gonna dance
again; Guilty feet have got no rhythm.''

Speaking of bad lyrics, many voters also cited Paul McCartney, who,
ever since his body was taken over by a pod person, has been writing
things like: ``Someone's knockin' at the door; Somebody's ringin' the
bell; (repeat); Do me a favor, open the door, and let him in.''

There were strong votes for various tragedy songs, especially ``Teen
Angel'' (``I'll never kiss your lips again; They buried you today.'')
and ``Timothy,'' a song about -- really -- three trapped miners, two of
whom wind up EATING the third.

Other tremendously unpopular songs, for their lyrics or overall
badness, are: ``Muskrat Love,'' ``Sugar Sugar,'' ``I'm Too Sexy,''
``Surfin' Bird,'' ``I've Never Been To Me,'' ``In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida,''
``Afternoon Delight,'' ``Feelings,'' ``You Light Up My Life'' and ``In
the Year 2525'' (VIOLENT hatred for this song).

In closing, let me say that you voters have performed a
major public service, and that just because your song didn't make
the list, that doesn't mean it isn't awful (unless you were one of
the badly misguided people who voted for ``The Tupperware Song'').
Let me also say that I am very relieved to learn that there
are people besides me who hate ``Stairway to Heaven.'' Thank you.

P.S. Also ``I Shot the Sheriff.''

 

[Rudy]

That was hardly funny...just sounds like an old man after someone sh*t in his oatmeal.

 

[jfiedler17]

A few of things bother me about some of the songs on that list.

- Morris Albert's "Feelings" is often lumped in with Herb Alpert because a large part of the "masses are asses" crown can't tell the difference between Alpert and Albert.

- The Poppy Family's excellent record of "Which Way You Going Billy?" is often put down because those same "masses" confuse the "Billy" songs.

- I'm an admirer of Rupert Holmes and think the negative judging of "Escape" is unwarranted, but that's just me.

- I also don't have a problem with the Starship record and find it a great track to listen to once in awhile. I'll allow that it may have been played too much in the day.

Agreed about "Escape." I can occasionally tire of hearing it because it tends to be so overexposed (especially when he had other songs that were just as good that go completely ignored in comparison), but, that aside, I still think it's a really clever and well-crafted pop 45. And I'm similarly an admirer of Holmes' other work - his other Top 40 hits ("Him" and "Answering Machine") pop up only on rare occasions on the radio today, but I consider them just as good as "Escape" (I may like "Him" even better, actually). Also, he wrote one of my very favorite ballads of the back half of the '80s, The Jets' "You Got It All," which I absolutely never get sick of.

I similarly don't get why "We Built This City" - or, for that matter, Starship in general - gets such a bad rap. Personally, I've found that I like each incarnation of that band a little better than the previous one - the Balin-led years of Jefferson Starship appeal to me more than Jefferson Airplane; the Mickey Thomas-led years (i.e. "Jane," "Find Your Way Back," "Be My Lady," etc.) appeal to me more than the Balin years; and Starship (without the "Jefferson" in the name or Kantner in the lineup) appeals to me at least as much as - and maybe a tad more than - the last few years of Jefferson Starship. Some might call the evolution of the band a sellout, but, for me, I feel like they just steadily became a little less pretentious and a little more fun and lighthearted. That may make the later years of the band a bit less artistic per se, but their late-career 45s like "No Way Out," "Sara," "Tomorrow Doesn't Matter Tonight," "Nothing's Gonna Stop Us Now," "It's Not Enough," etc., were such well-written and well-produced sides - particularly as far as late-'80s adult-contemporary pop goes - that it's really hard for me to criticize the shift in direction.