Saturday, June 19, 2010

Unfairly Forgotten Song #8: Shakedown by Bob Seger

You wouldn't think a popular song from the soundtrack of a movie such as Beverly Hills Cop II would be listed as a "forgotten song".  You wouldn't think that a song that hit number one on Billboard's Hot 100 would be listed as such.  (Or, at least, I wouldn't think so.)  And yet, when the word "shakedown" hit the public discourse as the result of Congressman Joe Barton*, at least one person (that I knew of) was not familiar at all with this song, so I figured it deserved to be dug out.

"Shakedown" was actually written for Glenn Frey, but Bob Seger stepped in when Mr. Frey lost his voice just before the recording session.  This was Mr. Seger's only number one single (it also hit number one on the Album Rock Tracks chart, per the song's Wikipedia entry**) and his next-to-last top 40 hit overall.  And, as is usual for songs I list as "forgotten songs", I don't think I have ever heard a station in Austin play this song in many years of living here.  Actually, for that matter, I haven't heard this song on the radio anywhere since it hit the charts back in 1987.



*Whether what the government has been doing to companies like BP is a shakedown is not a topic of discussion in this post...it only inspired the choice of this song.

**Note: most information in "forgotten songs" entries comes from the always-reliable Wikipedia; as such, its veracity may be questionable.

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