Unexpected Positive Song Reaction...

[mrjim123]

I almost hate to say it because the song is disliked by many because it is overplayed; but, from my experience the song most likely to fill the dance floor is Mustang Sally . As many times as I've played it though I still like to lbring dat funk.

 

[2saddleslab]

Yes, Dancing in The Moonlite. Never was anything I would have been interested in when it was released in 1970 but it's fun to play and always nice to hear the positive reactions.

Per @Low Down Brown, Grandma's Hands always goes over well too. Everybody loves Bill Withers whether they recognize the song or not.

 

[Gervais Cote]

Girls got the rhythm from AC/DC.

We were playing songs for dancing in a rather old crowd (45 up to 75 ish !) and we gave it a try. To our surprise, the dance floor got full of "old" people dancing the best they could.

 

[Jazzdogg]

"Grandma's Hands" by Bill Withers and a D-wight Yoakam bit where we did "Fast as You > Little Sister". Got loads of compliments from those. I was in one group that used to cover Beastie Boys "Sabotage". People usually came out of their seats for that one.
I was in a jazz group about 20 years ago that performed what we described as "wallpaper" or background/dinner music. We did lots of 80's stuff like Total Eclipse of the Heart, Land Down Under, Time After Time, etc. We made a killing in tips with that stuff. I loved the moment of realization some folks would have halfway through their dinner conversation when they suddenly stop and turn to us and shouted, "Are you guys playing freakin 'Africa' by Toto?!"

That's jazz?

 

[Low Down Brown]

That's jazz?

No. Read it again.

 

[J Wilson]

Back in the day, we'd roll Billy Swan's 'I Can Help' into the sets. We took it for what it was, basically a songwriter's demo with that God-Awful Farfisa organ droning through it, nothing special.

People would fill the dance floor.

Go figure . . . but then it often seemed the tunes WE though were cool would send them to the bathroom, and the throwaways would get 'em going. Takes a while to read a crowd . . . .

 

[shadven]

I play in a classic country / outlaw country band. We end the night with a punky version of The Talking Heads’ Psycho Killer. The room always goes nuts.

 

[shadven]

I know that song is in the "break mix" folder of music I play during our breaks. We've kind of discussed how audience members sing along to it but never seriously considered it. Maybe I'll bring it up.

Our surprise audience appreciated song is "Baby Blue/Badfinger." No one dances and when we first played it we thought maybe it was a dud. But everyone enthusiastically applauds and comments on it so we've kept it. Based on that we just added "No Matter What" as well.

My old band played both songs. It was a deep -cut crowd pleaser.

 

[tothemax]

The one that used to leave me scratchin' my head was "Fooled around and fell in love" by Elvin Bishop. I'm sure it amazed him as well when you look at his bio. But the crowds always loved it... Same with "Stepping Stone" by Paul Revere and the Raiders (and the Monkees, it's really not a bad tune).
I started listening to "The Bridge" on Sirius XM - great source of golden oldies that are good set additions. A couple that I think would be cool to add are "These Eyes" and "Undone", both have nice bass lines...

​

 

[ole Jason]

That song now resides archived in my head as George Costanza's answering machine message on Seinfeld. ("Believe it or not George isn't home.." )

lol same

That's jazz?

I mean, you could make that argument if you really wanted to. Jazz was all about playing popular songs of the time for much of it's history.

 

[Rip Van Dan]

I know that song is in the "break mix" folder of music I play during our breaks. We've kind of discussed how audience members sing along to it but never seriously considered it. Maybe I'll bring it up.

Our surprise audience appreciated song is "Baby Blue/Badfinger." No one dances and when we first played it we thought maybe it was a dud. But everyone enthusiastically applauds and comments on it so we've kept it. Based on that we just added "No Matter What" as well.

Anyone who watched the series "Breaking Bad" will recognize immediately that was the song played on the final episode. I played with a group in VA who played that song and it was so well received that we added two more Badfinger songs - "Come and Get It" and "No Matter What".

 

[2112]

Freebird

Stairway

Possum Kingdom

 

[InhumanResource]

Katrina & The Waves - Walking on Sunshine

Yikes! Always got them hopping on the floor but I loathed playing it.

That one kills pretty reliably

 

[ezstep]

Save the Last Dance for Me
New Orleans Ladies

 

[Bag of Lazers]

I don't do covers, so all our songs are ignored equally.

 

[trevcda]

Girls got the rhythm from AC/DC.

We were playing songs for dancing in a rather old crowd (45 up to 75 ish !) and we gave it a try. To our surprise, the dance floor got full of "old" people dancing the best they could.

I had just come off the road from a Top 40 band into a variety band and was playing an Eagle Lodge where I sang My Sharona by The Knack, thinking there was no way they were going to dance to that. Wrong. They squeezed in some kind of line dance to it and I quickly learned that those people can and will dance to anything that sounds good. New found respect for that bunch.

My most recent "I can't believe that worked" song was Just Remember I Love You by Firefall. We were screwing around in rehearsal when the guitarist started strumming a few chords that sounded vaguely familiar, so I started singing it. A couple runs later we had a new song for the list and the next performance it killed! Big time nostalgia for some of the middle aged ladies in the audience. We've since picked up a couple more Firefall songs (It Doesn't Matter and Livin' Ain't Livin') although no one has had the cajone's to try Strange Way, yet. I blame it on the lack of a flutist!

 

[covermego]

We learned Benny Hill's "Ernie - The Fastest Milkman In the West"

Whoa! I had to look and see where you are located! - I'm not sure if that was much of a hit in the US, but back when it was on "top" in the UK, my Aunt and Uncle lived there and they sent me 45's of several popular songs over there. "Ernie" was in there.....man, I had also forgotten that it was Benny Hill that recorded it! I'm thinking around 1971....
Some of the other popular songs (top 50, I think) they sent across the Atlantic were:
"Jeepster" by T. Rex
"Johnny Reggae" by The Piglets
"Gypsies Tramps and Thieves" by Cher
"Alone Again, Naturally" by Gilbert O'Sullivan
"Tweedle Dee, Tweedle Dum" by Middle of the Road
"I'd like to teach the World to Sing" by The New Seekers
"Tokoloshe Man" by John Kongos
....Hmmmmmm..... hard for this old guy to remember the rest, lol.

Thanks for bringing back those memories!

 

[fig]

...Brandy...

40+years of playing and I never played that song in a band or at home. Always liked the song and the bassline, just never learned it until...

This year. One of the fill-in players is now the regular bass player in my old band and I'm the fill-in guy now. So I got tasked for 2 gigs. I knew most of the songs, band leader sent me some added new songs to learn, including Brandy.

I was surprised how well it went over and had to play it twice the second night, per request. Fun boppy bassline to play, too.

I play in a classic country / outlaw country band. We end the night with a punky version of The Talking Heads’ Psycho Killer. The room always goes nuts.

Hello, Tampa, from the city across the bay LOL

My last band was modern country/southern rock/occasional old country band. One guitar player and I came from a rock background. He arranged it with the band leader for us to play something out of genre, like Rush or Kiss. One or two songs per night, just 'cause. It was fun, unexpected, and roused the audience. Yeah, Rush's Freewill on flats works if you play with conviction LOL.

 

[dalkowski]

I've always wanted to do this one

"Really Love to See You Tonight" is a fairly regular earworm in this ugly ol' noggin.

 

[lbbc]

Yup....Crazy Love by Poco