Song on the Radio - Misplaced Pages

Al Stewart on Song on the Radio
"I was kind of making fun of Arista Records" who had "asked for a mid-tempo ballad with a saxophone...They wanted a song that could be played on the radio, very tongue-in-cheek I wrote...'Song on the Radio'. I thought they'd I was actually joking, but of course they didn't & ...put it out as a single made the Top 30, the joke was on me because I screwed up a preposition" - referring to the opening lines "I was making my way through the wasteland/ The road into town passes through" which ends with a preposition - "Worse, I used the same word twice in the same sentence."

Al Stewart on Song on the Radio

"I was kind of making fun of Arista Records" who had "asked for a mid-tempo ballad with a saxophone...They wanted a song that could be played on the radio, very tongue-in-cheek I wrote...'Song on the Radio'. I thought they'd I was actually joking, but of course they didn't & ...put it out as a single made the Top 30, the joke was on me because I screwed up a preposition" - referring to the opening lines "I was making my way through the wasteland/ The road into town passes through" which ends with a preposition - "Worse, I used the same word twice in the same sentence."

"Song on the Radio" was released in January 1979 as the second single from the Time Passages album, following the title cut which had been a top ten hit on the Billboard Hot 100 as well as being afforded a ten week tenure at No. 1 on the Billboard Adult Contemporary chart.

"Song on the Radio" would peak at No. 29 on the Hot 100 and rise as high as No. 10 on the Billboard Adult Contemporary chart.

In Canada, "Song on the Radio" also peaked at No. 29 on the national hit parade as ranked by RPM magazine whose Adult Contemporary chart afforded the track a peak of No. 3.

Chart performance

Weekly charts

Chart (1979)	Peak position
Canada RPM Top Singles	29
Canada RPM Adult Contemporary	3
U.S. Billboard Hot 100	29
U.S. Billboard Adult Contemporary	10
U.S. Cash Box Top 100	27

Year-end charts

Chart (1979)	Rank
Canada RPM Top Singles	187

References

Time Passages - Al Stewart|AllMusic
Al Stewart’s cast of characters - Boulder Weekly
"Al Stewart". Billboard.
"Al Stewart". Billboard.
"Al Stewart". Billboard.
"Al Stewart". Billboard.
^ "Image : RPM Weekly - Library and Archives Canada". Bac-lac.gc.ca. 17 July 2013. Retrieved 15 October 2016.
^ "Image : RPM Weekly - Library and Archives Canada". Bac-lac.gc.ca. Retrieved 15 October 2016.
Joel Whitburn's Top Pop Singles 1955-1990 - ISBN 0-89820-089-X
Billboard Adult Contemporary, March 24, 1979
"Image : RPM Weekly - Library and Archives Canada". Bac-lac.gc.ca. Retrieved 15 October 2016.

v t e Al Stewart
Studio albums	Bed-Sitter Images (1967) Love Chronicles (1969) Zero She Flies (1970) Orange (1972) Past, Present and Future (1973) Modern Times (1975) Year of the Cat (1976) Time Passages (1978) 24 Carrots (1980) Russians & Americans (1984) Last Days of the Century (1988) Famous Last Words (1993) Between the Wars (1995) Down in the Cellar (2000) A Beach Full of Shells (2005) Sparks of Ancient Light (2008)
Live albums	Live/Indian Summer (1981) Rhymes in Rooms (1992) Uncorked (2009)
Singles	"Year of the Cat" (1976) "Time Passages" (1978) "Song on the Radio" (1979) "Midnight Rocks" (1980)

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