An artist who scores US pop hits for a decade is exceedingly rare. How about 20 years? Even rarer still. And you can probably count on your fingers only the acts whose charting singles have stretched across three decades. For a few years there, it appeared that the Bee Gees might have to settle at the two-decade threshold. But they rose to the occasion once more with a song that found them recapturing their old glories with striking effortlessness.
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Bee Gees Rule, Part 1
The legendary Brothers Gibb, aka the Bee Gees, scored their first worldwide hit in 1967 with the song “New York Mining Disaster 1941”. At the time the song climbed the charts, the oldest brother Barry was 20 years old, while twins Robin and Maurice were just 17.
Right from the start, the brothers wrote their own songs. That ensured that the material would always keep coming and that they’d be recording stuff that suited them. Their first flush of success came from a period roughly consisting of the years 1967 through 1971. During that time, the British-born, Aussie-raised trio scored nine US Top 20 hits, four of which hit the Top 10.
In those days, the group concentrated on pop songs, mostly ballads, set apart by lush musical backing and the brothers’ incredible vocal harmonies. That style fell out of favor for a while, however, during which time the Bee Gees scrambled to regain their commercial relevance. When they finally managed that, they did it in a big way.
Bee Gees Rule, Part 2
The Bee Gees’ second surge of massive popularity came when they embraced more danceable music, timing this move right as disco began to soar. Barry Gibb’s falsetto vocals acted as a lethal weapon, subduing American radio.
During one stretch in the late 70s, six straight Bee Gees singles went to the top of the pop charts in America. That’s not even taking into account the hits that the brothers were writing and/or producing for others. Yet just as suddenly as they rose to those peaks, they fell just as quickly once fans turned on disco at the end of the 70s.
The Bee Gees scuffled through the 80s. They managed just a few minor top 40 hits in the decade. But they ended it strong with “One” in 1989, their first US Top 10 hit in a decade. Considering the comebacks that they’d already managed, could they possibly have one more left in them?
One More Burst of Hit Harmony
In 1997, after a few fits and starts with their record label rejecting one proposed album, the Bee Gees released the album Still Waters. The album found them working with several top producers, including Russ Titelman. Titelman was at the boards for the song “Alone”, written by all three brothers.
The brothers built up the track from bagpipe sounds that Maurice managed to coax out of a synthesizer and a programmed groove devised by Barry. The elements of their longtime success remained evident, with falsetto vocals from both Barry and Robin and a fantastic melody.
“Alone” went to No. 28 on the US pop charts and did even better in other parts of the globe. Not bad at all, considering it came a full 30 years after their first hit of that magnitude. One more time, the Bee Gees proved their resilience and talent on the highest levels of the music world.
Photo by Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images
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