Search / 15 posts tagged Seasons in the Sun

Part one of a grisly series. The teenage death song, or “splatter platter,” was popular in the late 1950s and early ’60s. I define the teenage death song thusly: A teenage death song is a song about a teenager dying for reasons related  in some form or fashion to his or her love of another teenager, who is often, but not always, the narrator of the song.

We live in a weird world, kids. And, I suppose, this tame blog is part of it. All blogs are. Random stuff, almost impossible to verify, that should be taken with a boulder of salt whenever “real issues” are being preached. A few lives ago, when I was still sports editor of the San Bernardino Sun, I hired a desk guy from the Victorville Daily Press.

So over at Gwen's blog she's been building a list of 70's radio hit songs. Here's another AM radio hit from the 1970's to add to the list - the cheesy classic "Seasons in the Sun"* by Terry Jacks. *If I'm ever about to die, then I find out I'm going to live and I have a friend that has kind of

It’s hard to be a good guy and a good reporter. I’ve known more than a few good people, in journalism. But they tended not to be rise-to-the-top reporters or editors, and they often got stepped on during the career scramble. Because “good” held them back. I’ve known some very good journalists.

Remember this? The Seasons in The Sun series … in which I’m trying to write about one former sports co-worker for the 33 years (or parts of years) I spent at the San Bernardino Sun? By no means do all the interesting folks get in. There were too many.

I've been tagged by my good friend, Willow at the The Willow ManorThis is a fun, if difficult (at least it was for me - I was wracking my brains all night on this one!) little meme about music. The catch is, it's not your favourite songs that everybody knows about and likes; it's the songs you don't want to admit to liking or at least find a bit embarrassing to own up to.

What a handsome crew! Here is the group photo taken at the Sun Sports Reunion at the Paris Hotel in Las Vegas, July 20-21. Photo courtesy Gil Hulse, and taken by either Jean Leyva, Gayle Pollard or Cathy Bui. From left, top: Cindy Robinson, Mike Terry, Gil Hulse, Jim Schulte, Mike Davis, Steve Dilbeck, Nick Leyva.

First thing to know about Albert Bui: He named himself. If Albert wasn’t born in South Vietnam, his parents certainly hadn’t been in SoCal long when he appeared in this world. As he related the story, Young Albert liked watching the Bill Cosby cartoon show, and was amused by one particular character: Fat Albert.

A few years ago, the Canadian recording group “the Poppy Family”  came up with a hit in “Which Way you going, Billy?” Written by Terry Jacks, (He of “Seasons in the Sun” fame, the top40 cover of Rod McKuen’s poetry) the admittedly syrupy tune wound it’s way into the top 40 here in the ’states in 1969.

Who can predict who will be memorable? You work a few feet from a person for five years, believe you know a fair amount about them, they leave … and five years after that … it’s hard to remember their faces. Or three salient non-work facts about them. But sometimes people can be so unremarkable … as to be remarkable.