Friday, January 27, 2012

This day in music - January 27, 1970: The Partridge Family's "I Think I Love You" hits #1


The Partridge Family
When I decided to have some fun with this feature, I told myself I wouldn't impose my own opinions about what was good music and what was "less good." For all sorts of reasons, different artists and songs mean things to other people beyond the understanding of some of the rest of us. Clearly the fact that The Partridge Family had a #1 hit with "I Think I Love You" means that a lot of people went out and bought the record. I can respect that.

The Partridge Family was a television sitcom that aired between 1970 and 1974 on ABC and has lived on in syndication for a long time after that. The basic idea for the show was that a widowed mother and her five children would embark on a music career. This allowed for normal family-type hijinx, with a couple of pretty teenagers (David Cassidy and Susan Dey) in the cast to occupy the hormones of any peers who might be watching.

And then there was the obligatory song in each episode always somehow woven into the plot. As for the music, only David Cassidy, who sang lead, and Shirley Jones (the mother), who sang backup, were featured on the recordings.

One of the more obscure pieces of information about the song "I Think I Love You" is that it made The Partridge Family the third fictional group to have a #1 hit (after The Chipmunks and The Archies). To give the man his due, "I Think I Love You" was written by veteran American songwriter Tony Romeo, who also wrote for a lot of other people.

I remember watching The Partridge Family as a kid. It seemed to pass the time as well as anything else. I doubt the show ever did anyone any real harm, and as pop music goes, it wasn't the worst.


(Cross-posted at Lippmann's Ghost.)

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1 Comments:

  • Speaking of fictional groups...how about the Monkees. Though they were musicians they were not very good ones and were backed by real musicians on live tour and studio tracks were mostly augmented, if not entirely played, by real musicians. When they were recruited they did not even have assignments as to which instrument which Monkee would play. They were a total creation designed for a television series. I would have to consider them at least as fictional as the Partridges and clearly had number one hits.

    By Blogger manapp99, at 12:58 PM  

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