Our family recently got a new car, and like most new cars these days, it came loaded with Sirius satellite radio. I really don’t listen to the radio very much (way too many podcasts to keep up with), but occasionally Sirius serves up a slice of nostalgia from “70s on 7” that hits the spot — which is exactly what happened yesterday afternoon when I was treated to a little bit of “space disco” from 1977.
Meco’s “Star Wars Theme/Cantina Band” was hugely popular in the late 70s, and I must have heard it at least a thousand times. It hit number 1 on the Billboard 100 (per Wikipedia), CBS Sports played it during their NFL coverage, and I probably even owned it on 8-track. But despite all that popularity, I had completely forgotten about the tune until it started playing over the radio the other day.
My only regret about the experience is that my kids weren’t in the car to appreciate it with me. But the song is available on YouTube (above) and Spotify and Meco’s album Star Wars and Other Galactic Funk is available through Amazon (physical CD only, no digital version), so the kids were fortunate enough to hear it when they came home from school. I’m not sure they enjoyed it as much as I did.
The experience of remembered nostalgia is a curios one, and it makes wonder who else out there remembers this song. And if you do, have you played it for your kids yet? (If not, you really should.)
I have Sirius in my truck and I flip between the 70s, 80s, and 90s channels quite frequently. I had my oldest (8) with me when I happened to flip to the 70s and caught the very early part of the song. My son picked up on the song within about five seconds of that opening. It’s hard to miss. The Cantina theme was also easily recognized, and he correctly called it that the R2D2 sound wasn’t quite right. It’s a cool song that brings back memories.
#1?! I’d forgotten about this song until the last year. I think we came across it after my wife noticed the Star Wars episode of Donnie and Marketing.
Reminds me of Bill Murray… https://youtu.be/QqedbxGxfgE
That song was at the intersection of a few years where everything was disco (5th of Beethoven) and everything was Star Wars.