…what’s the first thing to pop into your mind? (And, for some context, were you alive during the decade, and if so, approximately how old were you?)
(I just woke up from a very weird dream during a nap, and somehow this is what the dream was about.)
Anyway, for me – gas prices – ! – and I was in my late teens and early 20s during the '70s (and didn’t own my first car till after the decade was over – hm…)
The first thing that springs to mind is sparklers and steamers. I was born in 1971, and my single most vivid memory of “the 70s” is of the gala barbecue my great aunt threw for the bicentennial.
Pet Rocks and Mood Rings, unfortunately. And I was there (10-20 years old).
You’d think I’d be focusing on **The Braless Look ** and Hot Pants.
Babies, driving, divorce, drugs, insanity, and the coldest winter in history.
I was 33 when it started.
None of this qualifies as “pop culture” references, though, except maybe the drugs.
Tris
Ugly clothes.
Can I say something about pet rocks and mood rings? I’ve seen those two things a hell a lot more often in looks back at the pop culture of the '70s than I ever saw them in real life in the '70s.
Orange, brown, and yellow.
I was born in '77, so that may explain why the memories are skimpy.
white suits/ disco balls / bee gees
President Ford, bicentennial coins and simple arithmetic.
Oh, and I was in kindergarten.
You didn’t spend enough time in Spencer’s Gifts, man.
Disco, polyester, national malaise, pretty good movies, kind of a grimy and depressing time, ugly concrete buildings, hippie chicks with long hair…
I was born in 1980.
Led Zeppelin, The Godfather, bell bottoms, head shops, better porn.
The orange vinyl beanbag that I had as a small child. I was born in '76.
Born in '65, so the '70s were pretty much my “Wonder Years”. I remember Nixon hearings preempting Bugs Bunny in the afternoon. Vietnam. Streaking. Disco (shudder). Leisure Suits. The Bicentential. The '72 Dolphins. The Steelers. The Cowboys. John Wayne movies at the theatres…
Disaster movies: ships capsizing, buildings burning, aircraft blowing up or colliding with other aircraft, LA quaking. Always with an all-star cast.
Disco everywhere: on the radio, in fashions, at the movies.
The last great gasp of Top 40 AM radio. Enough room on one station for all kinds of music: bubblegum pop, hard rock, crossover country, singer-songwriter stuff, and a few other genres that only live on today in Rhino collections. Entreaties to be the seventh (or tenth or nine hundred and third) caller so you can win tickets to Supertramp or the latest McCartney and Wings album. DJs with pseudonyms like “Jungle Jay,” who could yak on as long as necessary over top of a beginning of a song but miraculously stopped when the vocals started. Endless commercials for zit cream.
Décor in orange and brown. I was 7-17 during the decade, but my first thought would be as to colours. Then I’d think about music, TV, films …
A guy in a burnt-orange leisure suit doing The Point At The Ceiling on a hardwood dance floor beneath a sparkling ball.
And I was born in 82, so it’s a little skewed.
boys. smoking pot. sex in the back seat of a 69 Chevy.
oops, was that my outloud voice?
I graduated HS in '73. 70s to me are Anti-Vietnam War demonstrations, Nixon/McGovern, Watergate, marijuanna everywhere, Allman Bros, Grateful Dead, and Little Feat.
This slowly turned to KISS, disco, yuppies, and cocaine.
I think the late 60s to early 70s was one of the best times in US history.