“Shannon” by Henry Gross (1976, #6)

One person’s view:  “The most obvious flaw of the song is Henry Gross’ singing.  Dear Christ, that falsetto on the chorus.” – Nerd with an Afro

The public’s view:  2.58 / 5.00

Hello again, and welcome to the Bad Top Ten Hits blog.  I’m not Casey Kasem.  Every week we’re seen on great screens in the 50 states and around the world, including:  Linda Biffwater’s iPad in East Orange, New Jersey; the point-of-sale system at the Jack in the Box in Ogden, Utah; and a bot in Singapore that downloads our entire site 22 times an hour to feed an AI-powered content generator that will replace this blog and all other sources of human creativity.  It’s good to have you with us.

Now we’re up to our long distance dedication.  It comes to us from a man in Hawthorne, California named Carl Wilson.  Here’s what he writes:  “Dear Bad Top Ten Hits.  Recently there was a death in our family.  She was a little dog named Shannon.  Last Wednesday, Shannon slipped out of our yard and was run over by a car.”

Wait a minute.  Who is picking these goddamn songs?  This is turning into the most depressing website on the planet!  Last week was a pregnant girl getting shot by her own goddamn father, and now I gotta talk about a fuckin’ dog dying!  You know, they do this to me all the time.  I don’t know what the hell they do it for.  I want somebody to use his fuckin’ brain and make a goddamn concerted effort to find some bad top ten hits that don’t make me want to stick my head in a microwave and push the popcorn button.  Isn’t there any more shittiness from the Osmonds that we can dredge up instead of this?  This is ponderous, man, fuckin’ ponderous.

Sorry for that detour.  Back to the letter:  “I think it was a Buick.  She was pretty much pancaked, but we were able to save her collar.  Can you please play ‘Shannon’ by Henry Gross and dedicate it to our unfortunate furry pal?  It was Shannon’s favorite song, because she was the only one in the house who could hear the chorus.  Love, Carl.”  Carl, here’s your long distance dedication.

I can understand why “Shannon” appears on a lot of lists of bad ‘70s hits.  It’s gooey and sentimental, and the tempo is just slow enough to be disagreeable.  When he reaches the chorus, Henry Gross forsakes his pleasant Fogelbergesque vocals and hits some high notes that do not exist in nature.  All of this is in service of a truly alarming set of lyrics about a dog drifting out to sea, never to return.  Outside of “Shannon”, I’ve never heard of such a thing happening to a domestic animal.  Occasionally there might be a news story about a human having too many beers, falling asleep in an inner tube, and getting rescued three days later by the Coast Guard.  Dogs, however, have enough innate common sense to know their limits when frolicking in the ocean.  The people of the mid-1970s were already worrying about gasoline shortages, shark attacks, and whether pieces of Jimmy Hoffa might turn up in their TV dinners, and then this song also infected everyone with an unfounded fear for their dogs’ safety.  Thanks a lot, Henry.

Nonetheless, much like the titular canine, I am going to swim against the tide in my review of “Shannon”.  While there’s nothing I particularly love about this record, there is plenty that I like.  I like Gross’s soothing guitar.  I like the melody of the verses, which is enjoyable enough that other songs have repurposed it.  (See Freddie Jackson’s “You Are My Lady”, for example.)  I like that we aren’t directly told that Shannon was a dog, so we have to use our fuckin’ brains and infer this fact like we’re Sherlock Holmes or something.  It makes us feel smart when we figure it out.  The extreme falsetto limits the replay value, but it also helps distinguish the song from its peers.  If I ever have to assemble a playlist of songs inspired by the untimely demise of dogs, cats, and goldfish belonging to the members of the Beach Boys, I will put “Shannon” near the top of that list.  I will call this collection of music “Pet Sounds”.

And there you have it.  Tune in next time for a Bad Top Ten Hit that will make “Shannon” – and even the Osmonds – seem like a delightful memory.  Until then, keep your feet on the ground and keep reaching for the earplugs.  You’re going to need them.

My rating:  6 / 10