A novelty tune, about our favorite topic, popular radio of the ’60s, ’70s…
Mark Dinning/Top 40 News, Weather & Sports (2:21)
“Top 40, News, Weather and Sports” is a novelty tune recorded by Mark Dinning in 1961, released on MGM Records. It’s a lighthearted, humorous follow-up to his massive 1959-1960 hit “Teen Angel” (which reached #1 on the Billboard Hot 100 and is remembered as a classic “death disc” tearjerker about a girl who dies retrieving her boyfriend’s class ring from a wrecked car).
This track flips the script to something fun and silly: it’s a novelty song about a teenager trying to do homework while tuned into a radio DJ show that crams everything together—”Top 40, news, weather and sports”—in rapid-fire style, poking fun at the all-in-one radio formats popular back then. The lyrics capture that sleepy, distracted late-night vibe of a kid half-listening to the radio while scribbling schoolwork, with the catchy, repetitive chorus hammering the title phrase.
Written by: John D. Loudermilk (a prolific Nashville songwriter known for hits like “Tobacco Road,” “Indian Reservation,” and others).
1965 The format change takes place... Robert W. Morgan Scotty Brink Gary Mack Don Steele…
Jim Acosta, the former CNN anchor who now hosts his own podcast since leaving CNN…