Hit Parade: What a Fool Believes, Part 1

Slate Culture Feed

Slate Podcasts

Arts, Music, Tv & Film

4.2 • 2K Ratings

🗓️ 13 August 2021

⏱️ 58 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

In the late ’70s and early ’80s, a scene and a sound cropped up on the West Coast: polished, perfectionist studio musicians who generated sleek, jazzy, R&B-flavored music. About a quarter-century later, this sound was given a name: Yacht Rock. The inventors of the genre name weren’t thinking about boats…well, unless the song was Christopher Cross’s “Sailing.” Yacht Rock was meant to signify deluxe, yuppified, “smooth” music suitable for playing on luxury nautical craft. Whatever you call it, this music really did command the charts at the turn of the ’80s: from Steely Dan to George Benson, Michael McDonald to Kenny Loggins, Toto to…Michael Jackson?! Believe it: even Thriller is partially a Yacht Rock album. This month, Hit Parade breaks down what Yacht Rock was and how it took over the charts four decades ago—from the perfectionism of “Peg,” to the bounce of “What a Fool Believes,” to the epic smoothness of “Africa.” This episode was released in August 2020 exclusively for Slate Plus listeners. Sign up for Slate Plus now to get episodes in one installment as soon as they're out. You'll also get The Bridge, our trivia show and bonus deep dive. Click here for more info. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	At Eon Next, we believe life's better when you know you can get your hands on discounts
0:05.5	across a range of home energy solutions, like boilers and solar panels, so you can treat
0:10.4	your home to a bit of future-proofing.
0:12.8	We think that makes energy a little bit better, and that's why we're always working towards
0:17.6	helping you get more out of your energy.
0:20.2	So visit eonnext.com today.
0:22.4	Discounts available to Eon Next customers in 30th of December 2023, Teas and Seas, eligibility
0:27.2	criteria and geographical restrictions apply.
0:30.2	Hey there, hit parade listeners.
0:32.8	What you're about to hear is part one of this episode.
0:37.0	Part two will arrive in your podcast feed at the end of the month.
0:41.4	Would you like to hear this episode all at once the day it drops?
0:45.9	Sign up for Slate Plus.
0:48.0	You can try it for a month for just one dollar, and it supports not only this show, but
0:54.0	all of Slates acclaimed journalism and podcasts.
0:58.1	Let's go to slate.com slash hit parade plus.
1:01.9	You'll get to hear every hit parade episode in full the day it arrives, plus hit parade
1:07.9	the bridge, our bonus episodes with guest interviews, deeper dives on our episode topics,
1:14.9	and pop chart trivia.
1:16.6	Once again, to join that's slate.com slash hit parade plus.
1:21.7	Thanks, and now please enjoy part one of this hit parade episode.
1:28.9	This podcast contains explicit language.
	...

Please login to see the full transcript.

Previous episode | Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Slate Podcasts, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of Slate Podcasts and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.