70s Tunes Take Us Back

  • Why save these memories?

    Several years ago as I began to think about turning 70, something about it sounded familiar and comforting. I grew up in the 70s and loved that crazy turbulent decade. In my heart, wouldn’t I always be a 70s girl?

    I could go back and revisit that time with the sound of Marshall Tucker, Heard it in a Love Song. I was running up the front steps with my girlfriends to the Fred Tap, a bar in my hometown. There was a band that night, the place was packed and the old wood floor was rocking. I loved that song. The flute at the beginning, then “If I ever settle down, you’d be my kind.” The songwriter was a male, but that lyric was the soundtrack to my own dating life. Because the 70s invited women to reject settling down and that song celebrated being free.

    During college, music defined our happiest times. A group of my St. Olaf friends drove to see Elton at the St. Paul Civic Center on Halloween night in 1974. Someone knew the way. It was the era of his big glasses and jumping up on the piano. Kiki Dee played with him. The concert began with a fog-filled stage and Funeral for a Friend, but Crocodile Rock was my favorite.

    A friend gave me Springsteen’s Born to Run album for my birthday and I can still remember taking the cellophane off and playing it.

    There are literally hundreds of tunes that take me back. Maybe we all had tender goodbyes to the sound of Todd Rundgren’s Hello It’s Me. Fleetwood Mac and Van Morrison songs are within me forever.

    As decades have passed and I realize how precious those times were, I decided to ask my good friends about their song memories. This collection is a place we can all return to as time goes by and we just feel like going back.

    In the middle of the project my aunt Susan Rewoldt introduced me to research that underscores the importance of music as the decades go by.

    If age dims our senses, these songs may be the very last of what we remember.

    This project is a birthday gift to myself, and in a way, some insurance that I will stay a 70s girl.

    I have loved every conversation with these good friends and thank them for sharing their songs.

    MJ Smith

    Turning 70 Nov. 29, 2025

  • Girls of the 70s recall songs burned into the memory of growing up

    Girls born between 1948 and 1966 experienced junior high, high school and/or college years with the soundtrack of the ‘70s.

    This is the songbook of their growing up.

    Where were you?

    Who were you with?

    What were you eating?

    What did it smell like?

    Which band?

    What were the words you will never forget? 

    What were you wearing?

    How did you feel?

     

    Sing it for me.

     

  • Nights in White Satin

    Sandy Sieg

    Bettendorf, IA

    This takes me back to Les and Em’s drive-in in Guttenberg. I worked there four years in high school, first in the back putting condiments on the burgers and then making ice cream and finally outside as a car hop. There was a jukebox and it was always rocking pop songs including Stairway to Heaven

    I spent my graduation money on a stereo. It was the kind with speakers and I took it to Luther. i played Uriah Heep.

    Nights in White Satin was a song memory from high school. My prom dress was yellow with lace and it was so pretty!!

    Back then, my friends went to Lakeside very Saturday. It’s just what we did, and we found a little bit of freedom. We danced to early Chicago hits, like 25 or 6 to 4. I still go to Chicago hits on Spotify.

    Music was a huge part of my life as I was in choir, band and jazz band. The Carpenters were big and I remember one of their medleys from Jazz Band.

    Nights in White Satin

  • Hummingbird

    Liz Piccone Bryde

    Cedarburg, WI

    It’s vivd. I was standing near the seawall on Long Island Sound with my sister Mary. We were in summer dresses and the song is Hummingbird by Seals and Croft.

    We were probably 16 or 17 and headed to a beach party.

    My music history is wrapped up in family as I had older siblings. We were a Burt Bacharach family, really raised on him. Some of his songs still bring me to tears, including A House is not a Home.

    Another memory is the group America and the song Horse with no Name. We were living in the Manor house. On my birthday, my brother Steve was playing it on the guitar…he knew I loved the song and he also knew that I was going to receive the 45 as one of my presents from my parents.

    I was a big Carol King fan especially Tapestry. I sang that song a lot to my children when they were growing up as well as now for my three grandchildren. My son, TJ surprised me when he chose Tapestry for our mother-son dance at his wedding.

    This 70s songbook project is special as my sister Catherine also turns 70 on November 29th.

    My older 2 sisters were 70s girls and introduced me to Crosby Stills Nash and Young. The Harvest album was golden.

    Hummingbird

  • Baby let me drive your car

    Connie Dawson

    Altoona, IA

    There isn’t a dominant single song memory; but I had a VW bug in high school. We had lots of fun tooling around between Frederika and Tripoli, Waverly and Sumner; and I let my Fred Town girlfriends drive it. It was a stick.

    They listened to favorites like The Beatles and the Doobie Brothers.

    We went to concerts together including Fleetwood Mac, the Rolling Stones, and Elton John.

    We even wrote a 70s show parody for our town’s July 4th celebration and practiced Thanks for Being a Friend by Randy Newman.

    “How wonderful life is while you are in the world” is a lyric we share from the heart.

    Your Song

  • Color my World

    Deb Edwards Landau

    Cedar Falls, IA

    I went to Tripoli for high school and graduated with the class of 1972.

    I mostly remember songs from prom. Color my World first comes to mind. All the Chicago songs really.

    Color my World

  • Ring of Fire

    Donna Borcherding

    Boulder CO

    Norb and I would play oldies that took us back to the 70s and our time in Garnavillo. Lots of Johnny Cash like Ring of Fire. He loved music.

    Those were the best songs and the best memories.

    Ring of Fire

  • Time in a Bottle

    Ranae Wittenburg Schult

    Waverly, IA

    We listened to The Monkeys records at home. I grew up in Tripoli and remember all the Beatles songs from making homecoming floats in Tony Magnall’s garage, Paperback Writer, Money Can’t Buy me Love, I Wanna Hold Your Hand.

    I was in The Occasional Singers in high school. I sang Time in a Bottle by Jim Croce at weddings.

    I remember one time my Dad slipped into the back of the church during the ceremony just to hear me sing. I can still see him. He always told me to be humble and kind.

    Time in a Bottle

  • Mandy

    Carolyn Hoffmann

    Guttenberg IA

    We had records at home. My sister & I are only 14 months in age, and my dad would just shake his head when we had the music playing. 😊 Herman’s Hermits, Paul Revere, The Beatles. We played them on a hi-fi stereo.

    Later it was Barry Manilow’s Mandy. Six or severn of us from my PT class (only 20 in the class) went to his concert in St. Louis. None of us had much money, but we splurged and had a great time moving and singing along to his music. 🎶 

    You Light up my Life was sung by a dear sorority sister at our wedding. 

    Linda Ronstadt was a long-time favorite, Heat Wave, Your’e No Good, When Will I be Loved?

    Mandy

  • Oh Very Young

    Lynda Akers

    Guttenberg, IA

    The first memory that comes to me is Cat Steven’s Oh Very Young.

    The song summed up how I was feeling when my sister, Loretta, passed away from pancreatic cancer. She was 20 years younger than me. We are all only here a short time.

    Oh Very Young

    “Oh very young, what will you leave us this time
    You’re only dancin’ on this earth for a short while
    And though your dreams may toss and turn you now
    They will vanish away like your dads best jeans
    Denim blue, faded up to the sky
    And though you want them to last forever
    You know they never will”

  • Joy to the World

    Sue Osterhaus

    Guttenberg, IA

    I remember singing Joy to the World on the bus. 

    My brother had Herman’s Hermits records and my sister listened to The Monkeys. We played music while doing our Saturday chores. That is where I go back to, those songs making our house work fun.

    Joy to the World

  • Your Cheatin’ Heart

    Darla Dwyer

    Parker, CO

    I have memories of the Fred Tap and Dad playing Hank Williams songs on his steel guitar.

    Your Cheatin Heart was one.

    He and I played duets at home and we had a Hank Willians song book. I took piano lessons from Esther Backhaus with Carol Havercamp Zander.

    I remember tunes from high school dances and listening to The Beatles while building floats for homecoming. We also listened to 70s tunes at our class reunions sending us back to our teens and all the fond memories of growing up in a small town. I was just remembering the song “You’ve Got A Friend” as it reminds me of when MJ went to college. I knew that everything would be changing except that we were friends no matter what ❤️.

    Your Cheatin’ Heart