John Sebastian - Welcome Back

It’s hard to believe now, but in a time where you either copped your media live over the air, in the theatre or at the store, it wasn’t an uncommon thing for TV theme songs to get ample amounts of radio play, and to even chart - ‘Welcome Back’ hit #1 in 1976, for example. Content was almost a controlled substance before we could carry it with us, consume it in any number of ways and pull it from the ether on a whim, and when those simple folks of 1976 heard something they liked on TV, and wanted to hear in on the radio as well. It’s almost cute. Television show theme songs rarely enjoy much more than ironic recognition nowadays, in these topsy-turvy times of facsimile copying machines and 10 speed bicycles, but believe it or not, ‘Believe It Or Not’ (Mike Post’s theme to ‘The Greatest American Hero’) hit #1 on the Billboard charts, for example. Nowadays, the only time you’ll hear the theme from a television show outside of its prescribed and rigorously enforced media laneway is when I hum the theme from Law and Order as I de-pants, which I understand is basically an ear-roofie for the ladies.

John Sebastian has enjoyed a great career, penned a wealth of tracks so memorable that they’re basically rock’n’roll canon, and also played Woodstock completely shitfucked and claims to not even remember it (points for that, pal!), and I hate to besmirch his legacy by choosing to showcase some song he wrote for TV instead of his many memorable hunks of harmony, but hey, it’s not my fault he wrote this easily digestible nugget of pop that clocks in at a mere 58 seconds. It’s like the tequila shot of songs.

An interesting bit of trivia - it is said that ‘Welcome Back, Kotter’ was originally entitled ‘Kotter’, and that it was John’s use of the term ‘Welcome Back’ in the theme song inspired the name change of the series itself. I’d also like to take this opportunity to welcome Deadly Death co-conspirator Ley “Bunny” La Ley Taylor back to Canada despite his best efforts over the last 30 days. Godbless and godspeed.

‘Eyyy! Mustache rides, two bucks!’