Did you ever see the animated video for "Dark Lady"? It was done for the S&C Comedy Hour, and totally freaked my 7 year-old self out when I saw it back in '74... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H_TpBnJFTkA
My favorite topic, thank you for a great write up of the queen with a pro-Sonny bent. Highly recommend revisiting her 1975 album Stars if you haven’t recently.
No Cher memories, but your anecdote about the graffiti on her subway poster reminded me of one I saw a few years later on the “When Harry Met Sally” poster with Meg Ryan and Billy Crystal facing each other, towering over a Manhattan landscape. Meg: “Let’s keep this a platonic relationship”; Billy: “OK, I’ll be Plato and you can be the little boy”
I miss those days of unbridled Id, written on the subway walls…
Hahaha, that's great. I spied my other favorite bit of subway graffiti in December 1979 — there was a poster for Steve Martin in "The Jerk," and someone had scrawled "Off" under the title. Predictable, yet beautifully succinct!
Comments from the peanut gallery written on posters was a whole form back then! Another thing about that When Harry Met Sally poster is that there was a running back and forth conversation between Harry and Sally, written by different people at different times
Thanks for this. I enjoyed it. Never a huge Cher fan myself, my best friend since childhood was.i think i was a bit jealous of her slim, trim beautiful body as I fought a pudgy adolescence. My friend had all of Cher's albums, and I listened to them while in her presence many times. No one can deny her impact on culture, music and fashion. My best friend died a couple years ago.And hearing Cher now reminds me of her. I must have heard Gypsys, Tramps and Thieves five hundred times on her little turntable in her basement in the early seventies. Thanks again.
Your love of Cher puts you permanently as One of The Good Ones! I LOVE HER. Honestly, though I love Madonna, CHER paved the way. Oh, my Cher jam is BELIEVE, AutoTune be damned!
I heard that song too many times at the gym... but I still have fond memories of seeing my downstairs L.A. neighbor dancing to it in his living room by himself with his arms raised above his head...
Love this Dan! Your connection to Sonny & Cher in the 70s sounds a lot like mine. We watched their variety show every week. My mom had the great albums "All I Ever Need is You" and "Live." I wore those out! I also started buying Cher's solo records. I was in love with her! "Take Me Home" may be my favorite Cher song (the album is pretty good too.) It may be the most "Cher" of anything she's done.
Brilliant write-up Dan! We can never have enough Cher with a career like hers. I laughed out loud at “My parents were the first couple I knew who got divorced, Sonny and Cher were the second” 😁
What always amazes me about her catalogue is how it contains both some real stinkers, Shoop Shoop Song anyone? 😁, and at the same time some absolute gems. And yes, I could definitely go with Take Me Home, but it’s probably her Geffen period that I loved most. Love And Understanding might actually be my favorite Cher song.
I can never tell if she just was getting really bad advice about which songs to do, or if she just had really broad tastes and was up for trying anything.
The explanation probably lies in her career trajectory. Like you said yourself, there were periods in the seventies when she simply stopped having hits, and that wasn’t the only time it happened. She changed record companies frequently, often because contracts weren’t renewed. I remember the whole Warner period, where Warner US dropped her, only for her to resurface on East West, Warner’s secondary European label. We used to joke about it, “being shown the front door, then sneaking back in through the back.” Of course, once Believe became such a massive success, nobody complained anymore.
But when you look at how her catalogue is spread across nearly every major label and several smaller ones, it’s clear this pattern had happened before as well. I think she was determined to keep the success going, whatever it took, even if that sometimes meant recording material that was a bit more questionable.
"My parents were the first couple I knew who got divorced; Sonny and Cher were the second."
Nice one. If that were the first line, maybe paraphrased, of a song, I'd be hooked.
It was confusing for us kids, right? "How do these happy TV stars get divorced?" and later, "They're on TV together... again? But they're not married. Is that legal?"
Thanks for the memories. We were watching the Sonny and Cher show when I went into Labor with Lindsey! Now I know that you and Becs were in on it all as well. I am still a fan. 80 years old...the lady knows how to live!!!
Not to give the AI bots that are watching us all any ideas, but your school friend now makes me really want to see Cher in all white opening a show with "Love on the Rocks"
I think she won some kind of award for "Mask." One of my all time favorites for sure.
She was nominated for a Best Actress Golden Globe for that one, but didn't win. She did when the Best Actress Oscar for Moonstruck, though!
Great piece Dan. Love her to bits. Hard to pick a favorite but Dark Lady is definitely up there, probably follows by Turn Back Time.
Did you ever see the animated video for "Dark Lady"? It was done for the S&C Comedy Hour, and totally freaked my 7 year-old self out when I saw it back in '74... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H_TpBnJFTkA
I don’t recall that. I will check it out. Thanks!
Holy shit, that is crazy. I can certainly imagine that being disturbing at 7.
Right???
My favorite topic, thank you for a great write up of the queen with a pro-Sonny bent. Highly recommend revisiting her 1975 album Stars if you haven’t recently.
Oooh, good call — I love her version of "Mr. Soul"!
Thanks, Dan! What an icon! "Half Breed" and "Gypsies, Tramps and Thieves"!
Excellent choices, Michael!
No one ever accused Cher of being “prim”. Sonny at times. Mostly, I felt sorry for him. No matter what the pretended, she was always in Charge.
No Cher memories, but your anecdote about the graffiti on her subway poster reminded me of one I saw a few years later on the “When Harry Met Sally” poster with Meg Ryan and Billy Crystal facing each other, towering over a Manhattan landscape. Meg: “Let’s keep this a platonic relationship”; Billy: “OK, I’ll be Plato and you can be the little boy”
I miss those days of unbridled Id, written on the subway walls…
Hahaha, that's great. I spied my other favorite bit of subway graffiti in December 1979 — there was a poster for Steve Martin in "The Jerk," and someone had scrawled "Off" under the title. Predictable, yet beautifully succinct!
Comments from the peanut gallery written on posters was a whole form back then! Another thing about that When Harry Met Sally poster is that there was a running back and forth conversation between Harry and Sally, written by different people at different times
Thanks for this. I enjoyed it. Never a huge Cher fan myself, my best friend since childhood was.i think i was a bit jealous of her slim, trim beautiful body as I fought a pudgy adolescence. My friend had all of Cher's albums, and I listened to them while in her presence many times. No one can deny her impact on culture, music and fashion. My best friend died a couple years ago.And hearing Cher now reminds me of her. I must have heard Gypsys, Tramps and Thieves five hundred times on her little turntable in her basement in the early seventies. Thanks again.
Thanks for reading, Lori. Sorry about your friend...
Your love of Cher puts you permanently as One of The Good Ones! I LOVE HER. Honestly, though I love Madonna, CHER paved the way. Oh, my Cher jam is BELIEVE, AutoTune be damned!
I heard that song too many times at the gym... but I still have fond memories of seeing my downstairs L.A. neighbor dancing to it in his living room by himself with his arms raised above his head...
Love this Dan! Your connection to Sonny & Cher in the 70s sounds a lot like mine. We watched their variety show every week. My mom had the great albums "All I Ever Need is You" and "Live." I wore those out! I also started buying Cher's solo records. I was in love with her! "Take Me Home" may be my favorite Cher song (the album is pretty good too.) It may be the most "Cher" of anything she's done.
Right on, Dan! You and I definitely had similarly TV-obsessed childhoods — I'm sure we would have been friends back then, had we known each other!
For sure!
Love it! My mom was an extra in Witches of Eastwick too--- I wrote a feature on it for the Marshfield Mariner:-)
Brilliant write-up Dan! We can never have enough Cher with a career like hers. I laughed out loud at “My parents were the first couple I knew who got divorced, Sonny and Cher were the second” 😁
What always amazes me about her catalogue is how it contains both some real stinkers, Shoop Shoop Song anyone? 😁, and at the same time some absolute gems. And yes, I could definitely go with Take Me Home, but it’s probably her Geffen period that I loved most. Love And Understanding might actually be my favorite Cher song.
I can never tell if she just was getting really bad advice about which songs to do, or if she just had really broad tastes and was up for trying anything.
The explanation probably lies in her career trajectory. Like you said yourself, there were periods in the seventies when she simply stopped having hits, and that wasn’t the only time it happened. She changed record companies frequently, often because contracts weren’t renewed. I remember the whole Warner period, where Warner US dropped her, only for her to resurface on East West, Warner’s secondary European label. We used to joke about it, “being shown the front door, then sneaking back in through the back.” Of course, once Believe became such a massive success, nobody complained anymore.
But when you look at how her catalogue is spread across nearly every major label and several smaller ones, it’s clear this pattern had happened before as well. I think she was determined to keep the success going, whatever it took, even if that sometimes meant recording material that was a bit more questionable.
Cher is the ultimate rock and roll survivor- popular trends in music only seem to be validated if she does them (vis. the Autotune on "Believe").
(RIP Sonny. "Koko Joe" is a jam, especially the Righteous Brothers' version).
"My parents were the first couple I knew who got divorced; Sonny and Cher were the second."
Nice one. If that were the first line, maybe paraphrased, of a song, I'd be hooked.
It was confusing for us kids, right? "How do these happy TV stars get divorced?" and later, "They're on TV together... again? But they're not married. Is that legal?"
Yeah, very confusing — but the 1970s were a pretty confusing time to be a kid, in general!
I can’t always find the time for your pop–culture treasure-trash remembrances, but when I can, it’s always rewarding… Good times!
Thanks, Steve! They’re always here for ya when you’ve got the time!
Thanks for the memories. We were watching the Sonny and Cher show when I went into Labor with Lindsey! Now I know that you and Becs were in on it all as well. I am still a fan. 80 years old...the lady knows how to live!!!
Not to give the AI bots that are watching us all any ideas, but your school friend now makes me really want to see Cher in all white opening a show with "Love on the Rocks"
Hahaha! You know she’d nail it, too!