Date: July 10, 1976
Weeks: 2
I think everyone but the most ardent fan of 70s music would agree that this is a pretty lousy song from all angles.
The lyrics are a coded reference to having sex in the afternoon. Except it's really not that coded. I appreciate that I have the benefit of 35 years of lyrical analysis behind me, but how was anyone fooled into thinking this song was about anything else? "Gonna find my baby, gonna hold her tight, gonna grab some afternoon delight." I guess that's kind of vague, but then there's "We could make a lot of lovin' 'fore the sun goes down." And it's not that I object to the obvious sex reference, but I feel like that's all there is to this song. It's about cleverly getting away with something, except it's not that clever. Once the meaning is know to you, the song doesn't have anything else clever to say.
The music is bland and boring. Strummy acoustic guitars, the lightest drum I've ever heard, and the ever-present 70s string section. I don't know if that chirping bird on the version I linked is actually on the original single, but if so this may be the most aggressively pleasant song I've ever heard. And I'm not a fan of aggressively pleasant.
The vocals are similarly aggressively pleasant, but they're not even that pleasant. Doing vocal harmonies well is hard, and the Starland Vocal Band isn't good at it. Most of this song is really jarring and unpleasant because I just don't enjoy the voices.
I will say that there is a good moment in the chorus of this song. When they sing "Skyrockets in flight. Afternoon delight," the song clicks. There's a nice guitar tone in there that I wish the song made more use of. And the vocal harmonies right there even work well. It's a nice moment, and it's rightly the centerpiece of the song, since it features the title. It makes me think I like the song more than I do, that the rest of the song has been building to a good moment. But unfortunately, it's not good enough to make up for the rest of the music.
My verdict: Don't like it. Maybe if it was less 70s in its sound, maybe if the lyrics were about something more than getting away with saying something naughty on the radio, or maybe if the singing was just better, this could be a good song. But it's not.
Yeah, the harmony doesn't work well there. But is it supposed to be a coded reference? Seems pretty obvious to me, and I wouldn't think they would need to be coded about it to get radio play. After all, Simon and Garfunkel's "Cecilia" had the line "Making love in the afternoon to Cecilia up in my bedroom," and that reached number 4 on the charts in the early 70s.
ReplyDeleteAnd now I must go listen to "Cecilia" which is a much better song. :)