Doctor Don

Doctor Don Weekday mornings 7-10am on WDGY
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Playing the Hits of the 60s, 70s & 80s

07/23/2025

Music notes for July 23:

The late singer-songwriter Tony Joe White born this date. He’s best-known for his 1969 #8 hit “Polk Salad Annie”. He wrote “Rainy Night in Georgia” which was a major hit for Brook Benton in 1970.

Happy birthday one-hit wonder Englishman David Essex who took “Rock On” to #5 in 1973.

2009 - On the afternoon of tonight's concert at First Energy Park, Lakewood, New Jersey, Bob Dylan was picked up by a young policewoman who had been alerted of a man who was 'acting suspiciously'. The police officer drove up to Dylan, who was wearing a blue jacket, and asked him his name, but she did not recognise him. When he was unable to produce any identification, Dylan was driven to his hotel where staff were able to vouch for him.

1989 - Ringo Starr kicked off his first tour since the break-up of the Beatles with a show in Dallas. His backup band included guitarist Joe Walsh, organist Billy Preston, Bruce Springsteen's saxophonist Clarence Clemons and Dr. John.

1984 - The Cars released 'Drive' from their Heartbeat City album as a single. Upon its release, 'Drive' became The Cars' highest charting single where it peaked at No.3 on the chart. The song is associated with the 1985 Live Aid event, where it was performed by Benjamin Orr during the Philadelphia concert.

1968 - The Jackson 5 audition for Motown Records, with 9-year-old Michael singing lead and doing some sweet dance moves on James Brown's "I Got The Feelin'." The label signs them three days later.

07/22/2025

WDGY’s Doctor Don presents the Top 5 songs this week in 1970:

1 (They Long To Be) CLOSE TO YOU –•– The Carpenters
2 MAMA TOLD ME (Not To Come) –•– Three Dog Night
3 BAND OF GOLD –•– Freda Payne
4 2THE LOVE YOU SAVE –•– Jackson 5
5 MAKE IT WITH YOU –•– Bread

HIGH DEBUT OF THE WEEK: AT #50 — 25 OR 6 TO 4 –•– Chicago

IT WOULD PEAK AT #4

07/22/2025

Music notes for July 22:

Happy. birthday Don Henley of The Eagles. His solo hits include “The Boys of Summer”, “All She Wants to do is Dance” and “Dirty Laundry”.

The late Bobby Sherman born this date. He passed way just one month ago.

2024 - Duke Fakir, the last remaining founder of The Four Tops passed away. He was with the group for over decades.

1967 - The Vanilla Fudge rock cover of "You Keep Me Hangin' On" peaks at #6 as the band play their first concert, supporting The Byrds at the Village Theater (later the Fillmore East) in New York City.

1963 - The Beatles first US album, Introducing The Beatles was pressed by Vee-Jay Records, who thought they had obtained the legal rights from EMI affiliate, Trans-Global Records. When it was finally released in January, 1964, Capitol Records would hit Vee Jay with an injunction against manufacturing, distributing, advertising, or otherwise disposing of records by the Beatles. After a trial, Vee-Jay was allowed to release any Beatles records that they had masters of in any form until October 15th, 1964. After that time, they no longer had the right to issue any Beatles product.

07/21/2025

Music notes for July 21:

Happy birthday Cat Stevens.

1983 - Diana Ross plays a free concert in New York City's Central Park on a rainy day. She has a good attitude, claiming the rain "feels good" and saying, "It took me a lifetime to get here, I ain't going nowhere." Positive thinking cannot save the show, however, and it is stopped and rescheduled for the next day.

1973 - Jim Croce's "Bad, Bad Leroy Brown," named for a fellow National Guard soldier who went AWOL but got caught when he came back for his paycheck, hits #1. Two months later, Croce dies in a plane crash.

1970 - The Carpenters' "(They Long To Be) Close To You" hits #1.

1969 - The Beatles started work on the John Lennon song 'Come Together' at Abbey Road studios in London. The track became the opening song on The Beatles Abbey Road album and was later released as a double A-sided single with ’Something’, which twenty-sixth No. 1.

07/20/2025

Music notes for July 20:

Happy birthday Carlos Santana. Santana appeared at the 1969 Woodstock Festival and were featured in the Woodstock film and soundtrack album vastly increasing the band's popularity before the release of their first album, The bands second album, Abraxas, (1970) spent six weeks at No. 1 on the Billboard chart and remained on the charts for 88 weeks. He was inducted into the Rock Hall of Fame in 1998.

Happy birthday Kim Carnes who had the 1981 No.1 single 'Betty Davis Eyes' which became the best-selling single of the year in spending nine weeks at No. 1. She began her career as a songwriter in the 1960s, writing for other artists and working as a session background.

2011 - Never-before seen photographs of The Beatles' first US concert in Washington DC sold in New York for more than $360,000 ($516,000 today). Mike Mitchell, of Washington, was 18 at the time and took photographs just feet away.

1971 - The Carpenters show Make Your Own Kind Of Music started a six week run on NBC-TV. A key concept of the series involved the alphabet. In the first week, Herb Alpert introduced the show, standing next to a big letter "A." During each week's show, the cast would work its way through the alphabet, ending the program with the letter "Z.

1970 - The Carpenters appear The Dating Game, where they perform "(They Long To Be) Close To You" and each select from three suitors. They never actually go on their dates.

1968 - Jane Asher announced on the national British TV show, Dee Time, that her engagement to Paul McCartney was off. Paul reportedly was watching at a friend's home and was surprised by the news.

1965 - Bob Dylan released 'Like A Rolling Stone.' At 6:13, it's twice as long as the average pop song, but it nonetheless becomes Dylan's first big hit peaking at No. 2 became and his most popular song.

07/19/2025

Music notes for July 19:

1989 - Residents of Washington, Connecticut formed a ‘Roll the Stones Out of Town’, action group after they were unhappy with The Rolling Stones and their entourage setting up in the town for rehearsals for their forthcoming tour. Residents said it was like the army had moved in and taken over, with security guards stopping locals and asking them what they were doing there.

1986 - Genesis went to No.1 on the singles chart with 'Invisible Touch'. Genesis became the first band and foreign act to have five singles from one album reach the top five on the Billboard Hot 100, with 'Invisible Touch' being their first and only song to reach No. 1 on the charts. The same week, the band's former lead singer Peter Gabriel was at No.2 with 'Sledgehammer'.

1985 - The Legend of Billie Jean, starring Helen Slater and Christian Slater as teens who become accidental outlaws, debuts in theaters, boasting the hit theme song "Invincible" by Pat Benatar. The teen flick receives mixed reviews but goes on to become a cult classic, despite Benatar calling it "one of the worst movies ever made."

1975 - Paul McCartney and Wings went to No.1 on the singles chart with 'Listen To What The Man Said', his fourth No. 1. It would go on to sell a million copies. Wings also had the No.1 album chart with 'Venus And Mars'. Paul McCartney's fourth No.1 album since The Beatles.

1966 - The theme song to The Monkees TV series is recorded at RCA studios in Hollywood. The only Monkee to participate is Micky Dolenz, who does the vocal - the rest of the musicians are session performers.

1954 - Sun Records released the first Elvis Presley single, 'That's All Right', a cover of Arthur Crudup's 1946 tune 'That's All Right, Mama'. Only about 7,000 original copies were pressed, but the disc became a local hit in Memphis.

07/18/2025

WDGY’s Doctor Don presents the Top 5 songs this week in 1976:

1 AFTERNOON DELIGHT –•– The Starland Vocal Band
2 KISS AND SAY GOODBYE –•– The Manhattans
3 I’LL BE GOOD TO YOU –•– The Brothers Johnson
4 MORE, MORE, MORE (Part 1) –•– The Andrea True Connection
5 MOONLIGHT FEELS RIGHT –•– Starbuck

HIGH DEBUT OF THE WEEK: AT # 79 — GETAWAY –•– Earth, Wind and Fire

IT WOULD PEAK AT #12

07/18/2025

Music notes for July. 18:

Happy birthday Martha Reeves as is Motown’s Martha & The Vandellas.

Happy birthday Dion. He had 39 Top 40 hits in the late 1950s and early 1960s as a solo performer and with the Belmonts. In 1968 re had a big hit with “Abraham, Martin & John”.

1980 - Billy Joel held the top position of both the albums and singles charts. His album Glass Houses contained his first and biggest No.1 hit, 'It's Still Rock 'n' Roll to Me.'

1969 - During sessions at Abbey Road studios, Ringo recorded his vocal to 'Octopus's Garden', for the Abbey Road album. Starr had written the song when he 'quit' The Beatles the previous year and was staying on actorPeter Seller’s yacht in the Mediterranean.

1964 - The Rolling Stones score their first hit when their cover of Buddy Holly's "Not Fade Away" peaks at #48 on the Hot 100.

1964 - The Four Seasons started a two week run at No.1 on the singles chart with 'Rag Doll', the group's fourth No.1. Co-writer Bob Gaudio said that he got the inspiration for the song from a young girl in tattered clothes that cleaned his car windows at a stop light.

07/17/2025

Music notes for July 17:

2011 - Bruce Springsteen made a surprise appearance at a tribute to Clarence Clemons at the Wonder Bar in Asbury Park, N.J. The boss played a 45 minute set to an intimate crowd of 400. Clemons who died on June 18th of this year was a prominent member of Bruce Springsteen's E Street Band, playing the tenor saxophone with him since 1971. Springsteen and Clemons had first met at the Wonder Bar in Asbury Park.

1991 - Fourteen years after the deadly crash of Lynyrd Skynyrd's Baton Rouge-bound aircraft, the surviving members of the band, reunited under the name "Lynyrd Skynyrd 1991," return to the Louisiana city to kick off a new tour. Shirts sold for the event read, "Baton Rouge! After 14 years! We're finally here...

1974 - The Moody Blues opened what they claimed was the first Quadraphonic recording studio in the world. Quadraphonic sound was equivalent to what is now called 4.0 surround sound, uses four audio channels in which speakers are positioned at the four corners of a listening space.

1970 - The Guess Who perform at the White House for President Richard Nixon and his royal guests, Prince Charles and Princess Anne. They do not play their hit "American Woman," as they are asked to refrain from performing it "as a matter of taste."

1968 - The Beatles' fourth film, the animated fantasy Yellow Submarine, premieres in London. Although the four band members in the picture are voiced by professional actors, the band itself makes a cameo in the finale, leading movie audiences through the song "All Together Now."

1965 - King Records released 'Papa's Got a Brand New Bag' by James Brown, which went on to sell over 2 million copies and receive the Grammy Award for best for Best Rhythm & Blues Recording. 'Papa's Got a Brand New Bag' is considered seminal in the emergence of funk music as a distinct style.

07/16/2025

Music notes for July 16:

1983 - A mini-British Invasion. Twenty of the songs in the Top 40 are by British acts, the most since 1965. The Police are at #1 with "Every Breath You Take," followed by Eddy Grant's "Electric Avenue."

1981 - singer-songwriter Harry Chapin, who had success in the 70s with 'Taxi’, ‘W-O-L-D’ and a No. 1 ‘Cat’s In The Cradle’, was killed aged 38 suffering a cardiac arrest while driving on a New York expressway.

1977 - Shaun Cassidy's "Da Doo Ron Ron" hits #1. The song was first recorded by the girl group The Crystals in 1963. Cassidy's version changes the line "Someboday told me that his name was Bill" to "Somebody told me that her name was Jill."

1972 - Smokey Robinson performs his final show with The Miracles at the Carter Barron Amphitheater in Washington, DC. At the end of the show, Smokey introduces his replacement, 20-year-old Billy Griffin.

1969 - During recordings for their Abbey Road album, The Beatles worked on two new George Harrison songs, 'Here Comes The Sun' and 'Something.' Harrison was inspired to write 'Here Comes The Sun' when taking a day off from Apple business and spending the day walking around the garden at Eric Clapton's house.

1967 - Arlo Guthrie debuts "Alice's Restaurant Massacree" at the Newport Folk Festival. The song runs 18 minutes long and tells a true (but greatly exaggerated) story about how he was arrested one Thanksgiving morning for illegal dumping.

1966 - A supergroup is born as former Yardbirds guitarist Eric Clapton teams up with bassist Jack Bruce and drummer Ginger Baker of the Graham Bond Organization to form Cream. They break up just three years later, but leave a lasting impact that earns them induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1993.

07/15/2025

WDGY’s Doctor Don presents the Top 5 songs this week in 1981:

1 BETTE DAVIS EYES –•– Kim Carnes
2 ALL THOSE YEARS AGO –•– George Harrison
3 THE ONE THAT YOU LOVE –•– Air Supply
4 JESSIE’S GIRL –•– Rick Springfield
5 YOU MAKE MY DREAMS –•– Daryl Hall and John Oates

HIGH DEBUT OF THE WEEK: AT #64 — FIRE AND ICE –•– Pat Benatar

IT WOULD PEAK AT NUMBER 17

07/15/2025

Music notes for July 15:

Happy birthday one-hit wonder Alicia Bridges. She hit the top 5 in 1978 with the disco-themed “I Love the Nightlife”.

Happy birthday Linda Ronstadt. She was inducted into the Rock Hall of Fame in 2014. During her illustrious career she has recorded two dozen Top 40 hits along with 11 Grammy awards.

2009 - 45 years after he played at the Ed Sullivan Theater with The Beatles, Paul McCartney returns to the venue to appear on The Late Show With David Letterman. Earlier in the day, McCartney plays a few songs from the theater's marquee, surprising the onlookers in Manhattan.

1978 - The Rolling Stones started a two-week run at No.1 on the album chart with Some Girls the group's seventh No.1 album. It contained the top 5 hit “Miss You”.

1972 - Elton John started a five week run at No.1 on the Ualbum chart with his fifth studio album, “Honky Chateau.” The album, which marked the British artist’s first chart topper, took inspiration for its title from the 18th-century French chateau (Château d'Hérouville) in which it was recorded. Two the tracks from the album, “Rocket Man” and “Honkey Cat,” were released as singles. His next five albums also enter that orbit, going to #1.

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