Phil Collins, Elton John, and Gloria Estefan dominated Adult Contemporary radio back in the 1980s and '90s, yet have disappeared from modern radio. Seemingly, the only time you ever hear them is at the grocery store or your local CVS. This blog remembers the music, the stories and the quirky characters from my days working in Adult Contemporary radio.
Now, when I have problems with my
relationships, which is most of the time,
I find out that it's better to take the
focus off myself and put it to others.
I don't wanna be around no kids.
I wanna go home and sit in my house
and look at the wall and listen to Sade.
- And that's fun?
- No, but that's where my head is at.
That's where I need to be. I don't wanna
paint. You can't paint my misery away.
Read more: https://www.springfieldspringfield.co.uk/movie_script.php?movie=boomerang
"Now when I have problems with my relationships, which is most of the time, I find that it's better to take focus off myself and put it to others."
"I don't wanna be around no kids. I wanna go home and sit in my house and look at the wall and listen to Sade."
"And that's fun?"
"No, but that's where my head is at. That's where I need to be."
-Halle Berry & Eddie Murphy in the 1992 movie Boomerang
Jazz was everywhere in the 1990s. Jay Leno enlisted jazz instrumentalist Branford Marsalis to lead the Tonight Show Band from 1992 until 1995. Elaine Benes briefly dated jazz saxophonist John Jermaine during the 1996 episode (entitled "The Rye") of Seinfeld. Another prominent artist of the smooth jazz scene is David Sanborn whose upbeat tune "Bang Bang" found a home on soft rock radio stations in 1992. Sanborn actually didn't appreciate his name being synonymous with smooth jazz.
It wasn't uncommon to hear soft rock songs from Whitney Houston, Phil Collins or Michael McDonald on Smooth Jazz radio stations. Chicago's former WNUA-FM prominently featured ballads that had fallen off the playlists of Adult Contemporary stations--especially in the station's twilight years before flipping to Spanish (and later Country).
Most people immediately name Delilah when they think about late night radio request shows and hosts, but those in Columbus and Chicago also will name John Symons and his "Love Notes" show. With his smooth baritone voice, Symons earned legions of fans in both markets for his years of playing love songs mixed with listener requests and dedications on the radio. Symons most recently worked for WLIT-FM in Chicago (coincidentally he replaced Delilah), but spent many years at cross-town rival Windy 100 (WNND-FM).
Just in time for the year 2000, Kenny G released Faith: A Holiday Album -- this was his second album comprised mainly of Christmas songs but also included "Auld Lang Syne". Being that it was the end of the 20th Century, his record company released a "Millennium Mix" of the instrumental that radio stations aired in heavy rotation. The song interspersed historical clips from the 20th Century while Kenny G wailed away on his saxophone. Happy New Year!
Originally called Catch 22, the Brit-pop band Breathe strung together a series of hits in the late-80s before ultimately breaking up in 1992. "How Can I Fall?" and "Hands to Heaven" are the bands two signature tunes, but "Say a Prayer" was another hit for the band -- it reached #3 on the Adult Contemporary Chart in 1990.
The first week in October of 2000 was a big one for Dave Koz and Montell Jordan. The duo's remake of the Wham! classic "Careless Whisper" entered the Adult Contemporary Chart. The following week, their saxophone-heavy tune dropped off the AC Chart and never returned. For Koz, his music would continue to find a home on the Smooth Jazz radio stations while Jordan will always have "This Is How We Do It" on his resume.
Kenny G's first big break was when Artista Records executive Clive Davis heard Kenny G perform a sax solo of ABBA's "Dancing Queen" in 1982. He went on to be the biggest-selling instrumental artist of all-time and now sells his own brand of saxophones.
Synonymous with the Smooth Jazz and R&B formats, Sade (pronounced "shad-day") also made her mark on the Adult Contemporary format with a handful of hits. One in particular is the sexy mid-tempo ballad "Paradise" that made the summer of 1988 a bit spicier.
One listen to Breathe's "Hands to Heaven" and you'll exhale a great big sigh of relief. This 1987 gem has "Adult Contemporary hit" written all over it: soothing vocals and the requisite saxophone solo.
I used to wake up to Chicago's B96, but somehow my radio's knob was turned and B96 was replaced by the previous station, 95.5 WNUA. WNUA was Chicago's Smooth Jazz station and was about as far as you can go musically in the opposite direction of B96. It took a day for me to realize that I was on the wrong station as WNUA woke me up with "It Ain't Over 'Til It's Over" by Lenny Kravitz.
John Mayer managed to score a hit on the Top 40, Rock, Alternative, Adult Contemporary, and Smooth Jazz charts in 2009 with "Heartbreak Warfare". Yep, somewhere between Dave Koz and Chris Botti there was John Mayer.
The descriptions of songs on YouTube are sometimes better than the content itself. For instance, would you consider "Song Bird" by Kenny G to be one of "the greatest songs of all time"? If you answered "no", then the person who uploaded "Song Bird" to YouTube would like to have a few words with you.
The sleepy ballad came from the band's successful We Can't Dance reunion album and reached #1 on the Adult Contemporary charts. The song later made its way onto Smooth Jazz radio stations when AC radio evolved from playing Genesis and Phil Collins music in favor of groups like Train and Maroon 5.
If we've learned anything about 1980's music, it's that no song was complete without the saxophone. In certain rare instances, songs even ditched the vocals in favor of all saxophone (a phenomenon known as: NBS or "nothing but sax"). Enter Kenny G whose hair looked much like that of Howard Stern and whose sound exemplified a new radio genre known as "smooth jazz". Kenny's instrumentals found their way into mainstream music starting with the song "Silhouette" in 1988.
Not too many artists compared with the talents of Luther Vandross during the 1980s and '90s. His voice set the standard for R&B music for an entire generation. You could spend hours listening to his music while yelling out the occasional, "Oh, I forgot how much I loved that song!" "Don't Want to Be A Fool" is one of those songs that AC stations passed onto Smooth Jazz stations. "Don't Want to Be A Fool" was a top 10 song on the Hot 100, R&B, and AC charts in 1991 with good reason. Actually, Luther managed to score at least one #1 song on the R&B charts from 1981 to 1994. Like Lionel Richie, Marvin Gaye, and Whitney Houston, Luther's music will play on for generations to come.