March 22, 2011

Today in Frankie Valli Music History: March 22, 1975

March 22nd, 2011

On March 22, 1975, Frankie Valli hit Number One on the Billboard Hot 100 Chart with “My Eyes Adored You.” The song stayed in the top spot for one week and remained on the chart for 23 weeks.

This song, written by the Four Seasons long-time producer and co-writer, Bob Crewe, and Kenny Nolan, was a sentimental ballad that Frankie recorded during his years at Motown in the early 1970s. Motown sat on the track for a year and a half without issuing it. Finally, when Frankie’s contract ran out in 1973, he bought back the master for $4,000.

Right about that time, Larry Uttal was organizing his new label, Private Stock. He needed a first release, and called Bob Crewe. At a dinner party, Crewe played the song, explaining that it would make a good B side for something else. Uttal disagreed; that tune was an A side all the way.

“My Eyes Adored You” was shipped to radio stations in October 1974. It started to get a little play in November, breaking out in various parts of the country. It wasn’t until after Christmas, though, that the record broke wide open. By March 1975, it was the top pop song in the country.

5 Comments »

  1. It took a couple of months before “real” Top 40 stations started to play it. It was being played by a lot of traditional Adult Contemporary stations, especially FMs that were once Beautiful Music, and quite a few AM stations that had been Top 40 but changed to Adult Contemporary in the late 1960s to early 1970s.

    It didn’t break into true Top 40 stations much until mid January. If you look at the ARSA site, you’ll see that it started to break Top 40 at many of the the same stations and markets that the early Four Seasons records did.

    The slow breakout into Top 40 is why it took 18 weeks to get to #1 Hot 100, a record for the longest at that time.

    Comment by Ted Hammond — March 22, 2011 @ 4:46 pm

  2. FV and his music never ages…timeless!

    Comment by sharon wardlow — March 22, 2011 @ 6:02 pm

  3. This song brings back such incredible memories. It was on Saturday, Nov. 30 when my father and I first heard this song. We hadn’t heard from Frankie in a while and were touched by his beautiful re-entry to the charts. I also remember in March, 1975, listening to Casey Kasem’s Top 40 and hoping that Frankie would best Minnie Ripeton’s “Lovin’ You” and La Belle’s “Lady Marmalade” (also written by Kenny Nolan, by the way) for the top spot. He did, and the rest is history, of course.

    Comment by Howard — March 23, 2011 @ 8:51 am

  4. Always good to reminisce about this song – it’s such a great song – the melody is so infectious. I remember seeing Frankie in concert in late 73 or early 74 and he would sing “My Eyes Adored You” without any fanfare or introduction and I would say that’s a nice song with a catchy melody. It sought of grew on you and eventually it grew on everyone else as Ted points out above and it became a number one song. “My Eyes Adored You” is truly Frankie’s come back song, and a testament to staying with what you believe in. Without “My Eyes Adored You” there may not have been a 4 Seasons’ resurgence with “Who Loves You” and “December ‘63.”

    According to co-writer Kenny Nolan, the original words he had a dream about were “Blue Eyes in Georgia…They’re the only eyes I ever loved, my eyes in Georgia.” The next day when he was putting a demo of the song on cassette “Blue Eyes in Georgia” became “My Eyes Adored You.” A few years later, Kenny Nolan recorded a song by himself called “I Like Dreamin’” and had a big hit with it with basically the same melody.

    Comment by David Cace — March 23, 2011 @ 5:09 pm

  5. “My Eyes Adored You” has musical tonal progressions, instrumentation, and lyrical themes that are reminicent of “You’re Ready Now”, “Save It For Me”, and “Big Man In Town”, and that is how the song quickly recaptured the ears of all their early fans. They were the ones who heard it first. Give those earlier songs a listen, along with MEAY and you’ll hear it.

    Comment by Ted Hammond — April 3, 2011 @ 11:12 pm

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