Sunday Showcase May 23, 1976

I'm off to visit 1976 this time around.

Our journey this day is into the Bicentennial year where a former star of Your Hit Parade graces the cover of the Sunday Showcase. I had not heard of Snooky Lanson before reading this issue as Your Hit Parade's heyday was long before I was born, but he had a lengthy and successful career in entertainment including being a pitchman for Crown Ford.

Snooky with a jazzy take on Heartbreak Hotel

100 Oaks Shopping Center (yes, that's right - it was not called a mall officially during this point in time, but the ad does state "all this week in the Mall" which is strange) is saluting radio all week. All of the big Nashville stations were participating with remote broadcasts and live performances. 

100 Oaks Office Tower promo film which shows the shopping center

The mid-Seventies was the peak for customizing vans and here's a cool advertisement from Middle Tennessee's largest showroom and inventory of custom van parts: C & S Custom Vans. 

If you really wanted to kit the floor of your van out you might want some shag carpeting or perhaps you need it for your whole house. Shag carpet was another culture marker which peaked in the Seventies. I think the carpet makers and vacuum cleaner companies were all in on it together. 

We continue on with the fads of the Seventies with the ultra popular Earth Shoe which could be picked up at Green Hills Village Shopping Center/Lower Mall. Remember, just because a shoe looks like the Earth shoe doesn't mean it works like the Earth shoe.

After I've kitted out my custom van and bought some new Earth shoes I might head over to the Women's Building at the Fairgrounds and check out the Mysterious Rhinestone Cowboy David Allen Coe in concert on May 29th. I met David Allen Coe once. He was a very tall, large man.

The Top 10 Records in Nashville for this week are once again that great hodgepodge of Seventies music with all kinds of styles to choose from. Radio and society in general had yet to be demographic-ed and segmented to death. I loved "Boogie Fever" as a 9 year old kid and still love it today. Paul McCartney & Wings are on the local chart for the 2nd week with "Silly Love Songs" which went on to be the best selling single of the year in the US. Two television themes are in the top 10 with Happy Days and Welcome Back, Kotter represented. I loved both of those shows. 

Pratt & McClain 

Welcome Back to that same old place you laughed about

Silly

Sylvers on The Midnight Special

You could boogie all night at Tuff Rocks Disco located in Tusculum Square. There were only 2 ads for it when I did a general search so I don't know if it lasted long. I like the ad and name of the disco. I assume Troy Shondell was the vocalist who had put out some records for Liberty and Sunset Records among others.

Perhaps commercial pop radio and disco wasn't your bag. KDA-FM was bringing progressive rock giants Yes to Municipal Auditorium on June 1. 

Yes live in Nashville June 1, 1976

We end the Sunday Showcase review this week by planning to get the heck out of Nashville and head to Atlanta to see ZZ Top's World Wide Texas Tour. This was the tour where they brought the livestock. I guess if you were going to fill a baseball stadium in the Seventies you needed to go big on your promotional material as this full page ad attests. I bet quite a few people from Nashville made the drive down on that day.

ZZ Top live in Maryland November 1976

World Wide Texas Tour report