1977 - 1978

Greetings fellow travellers, hope the sunshine isn't too much of a shock for you all?

The title of our lesson today is pretty much self explanatory, it is a reflection of one year in the life of the Guru, and that year is a period that ran from mid 1977 to mid 1978.

Don't fret pet, I'm not going to go through the whole year - it is just that recent events have had me recalling those years when I was a teenage Guru and this period was quite an important time in many ways.

It was a little over a week ago that I attended the concert that I reported in my last blog and of course one of the main attractions of that concert was the music of John Williams, specifically the music of Star Wars.

Star Wars was released across the US in May 1977, here in the UK we had to wait until December but in the meantime Meco released the Star Wars theme as a disco track and I must admit it was played an awful lot in our 5th Form Common Room during breaks and the lunch hour.

I can't recall how many times I actually went to see the film after it was released but it was enough to qualify me as a fan, and as I was already a Trekkie this only added to my geek status.

I will never tire of watching the films (Episodes 4-6 of course) and the music is never off my playlist - both the disco version and the original soundtrack version.

1977 was a great year, not only did we have Star Wars and Close Encounters Of The Third Kind, there was also Saturday Night Fever, A Bridge Too Far and The Spy Who Loved Me.

The music of that era was to my liking - never really understood why the music of the 1970's is thought so bad. OK, we had David Soul and Leo Sayer but then we also had Fleetwood Mac, Abba, Stevie Wonder, and all the great dance tracks from the likes of Thelma Houston, The Village People and Donna Summer.

Punk was really getting started - I didn't join that party because I was not angry at anything - I was living a very contented life and so my musical taste reflected that.

Although the film of Saturday Night Fever didn't appear in the UK until the beginning of 1978, we had been hearing the soundtrack on the radio for sometime and I really did love that soundtrack because again it fitted my mood...I should admit that eventually I even bought a pair of white shoes which were proudly worn on the dance floor at various venues including Cinderella Rockerfella's in Lincoln.

Luckily Mrs B was not present at these occasions and I do wonder what she would have thought as I danced myself dizzy.

These were great times to be a teenager, and I suppose the death of Donna Summer and Robin Gibb have brought these memories to the forefront of my mind - adding to the great memories of the films we queued, and queued to see.

I'm glad I was born when I was and where I was, I had a very happy childhood and I was exposed to some great cultural influences - and how wonderful that the brightness of those times is captured forever in film and on disc and in our hearts.

Meco - Star Wars

Donna Summer - I Feel Love

Night Fever - The Bee Gees