Uploaded April 2026 | Updated September 2026, 2 weeks ago
Today, we put one of rock’s greatest years, 1970, under the microscope and explore songs that we all know and love but failed as hits. There’s a story about Gregg Allman, who was so excited to lay down a song that came into his head, he got high and broke into a closed recording studio in the middle of the night. But he was struggling to find that one lyric to finish it, and it was his roadie who gave him the perfect lyric. But did he do right by him and give him any royalties for it? We’ll find out. Plus John Lennon, who was annoyed by his wife and made that annoyance into the classic song Across the Universe, except for the fact that when he recorded it, he couldn’t hit the high notes, so in a bizarre idea, he went outside the recording studio and selected 2 fans to record those high notes. He regretted it for the rest of his life, calling the song crap, but it has become an all-time classic, and finally, the classic rock song that came from an angry wife’s pissed-off rant. It’s a special episode of NEXT on Professor of Rock.
Get your tickets to Professor of Rock Live featuring John Fogerty
playatgila.com/show/an-exclusive-evening-of-stories-and-songs-with-john-fogerty
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Executive Producer
Brandon Fugal
Honorary Producers
22Unchained, Thomas Halterman, Keith Novak, Yvonne Fus, Jeffrey Thorn
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Subscribe to the Professor of Rock Podcast
Apple: apple.co/445fVov
Spotify: spoti.fi/42JpfvU
Amazon: amzn.to/44b5D6m
iHeartRadio: bit.ly/444h8MO
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Patreon: bit.ly/ProfessorofRockVIPFan
Merch Store: professor-of-rock-lsn-shop.fourthwall.com
Instagram: bit.ly/Instagram_Professor_of_Rock
#classicrock #70smusic #ledzeppelin #70srock
Hey Music junkies, Professor of Rock, always here to celebrate the greatest songs and the greatest artists of all time. Make sure to subscribe, like, share, and comment. Today, we are spotlighting one of the greatest years in music history to count down the 10 greatest songs from 1970 that were never hits. They ended up being celebrated tracks, but you wouldn’t have known it from their chart history when they were released back in 70.
Coming in at #10 on Non-Hit 1970 Countdown, it’s “Midnight Rider” by the Allman Brothers Band: “Midnight Rider” by the Allman Brothers Band came together really fast. It was written in about an hour at a farmhouse in Macon, Georgia, that the band was renting. Despite coming up with the concept of a restless outlaw, fleeing from the law very quickly, finishing the track turned into a wild, very Allman Brothers kind of escapade. Gregg Allman was absolutely psyched about the song he was working on. He was so fired up he deseperatly wanted to get it recorded as soon as possible. Although it was very late, Gregg called the producer & engineer that they were working with, and they both told Gregg to “go to bed” and “wait until the morning.”
Gregg would not wait, so he grabbed roadie Kim Payne and the two of them actually broke into the Capricorn Sound Studios around 2am, smashing a window to get inside, so they could lay down a rough demo before anyone stopped them, and… before Gregg forgot the lyrics. One of the song’s most memorable lines came out of pure frustration: Payne, stuck on night duty listening to Gregg play the same unfinished tune over and over while high as a kite, finally snapped and blurted out, “I’ve gone past the point of caring, some old bed, I’ll soon be sharing.” Gregg immediately knew that was the missing lyric and kept it. True to his word, he gave Payne a cut of the song—5% of the royalties—which turned that late-night annoyance into a pretty great payday for Kim Payne. “Midnight Rider” was first featured on the Allman Brothers album Idlewild South, but it was not released as a single, and one of those non-hit classics.
“Midnight Rider” was always important, and deeply personal for Gregg, so he recorded a version for his solo album Laid Back, and “Midnight Rider” finally made it to “hit status,” peaking at #19 on the Billboard Hot 100 in ’73:
We’re spotlighting 10 Non-Hit Songs from 1970 at #9 I have. Black Sabbath who had three very notable, “non-hits” that year, starting with “Paranoid” Like “Midnight Rider,” “Paranoid” was another iconic rocker that was conceived very quickly. It was written in less than 30 minutes as a last-minute “filler" track, because the band didn’t have enough material for the Paranoid album. Tony Iommi came up with that stunning riff during a lunch break. Geezer Butler wrote down some lyrics about being depressed and paranoid while smoking pot...
Today, we put one of rock’s greatest years, 1970, under the microscope and explore songs that we all know and love but failed as hits. There’s a story about Gregg Allman, who was so excited to lay down a song that came into his head, he got high and broke into a closed recording studio in the middle of the night. But he was struggling to find that one lyric to finish it, and it was his roadie who gave him the perfect lyric. But did he do right by him and give him any royalties for it? We’ll find out. Plus John Lennon, who was annoyed by his wife and made that annoyance into the classic song Across the Universe, except for the fact that when he recorded it, he couldn’t hit the high notes, so in a bizarre idea, he went outside the recording studio and selected 2 fans to record those high notes. He regretted it for the rest of his life, calling the song crap, but it has become an all-time classic, and finally, the classic rock song that came from an angry wife’s pissed-off rant. It’s a special episode of NEXT on Professor of Rock.
Get your tickets to Professor of Rock Live featuring John Fogerty
playatgila.com/show/an-exclusive-evening-of-stories-and-songs-with-john-fogerty
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Executive Producer
Brandon Fugal
Honorary Producers
22Unchained, Thomas Halterman, Keith Novak, Yvonne Fus, Jeffrey Thorn
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Subscribe to the Professor of Rock Podcast
Apple: apple.co/445fVov
Spotify: spoti.fi/42JpfvU
Amazon: amzn.to/44b5D6m
iHeartRadio: bit.ly/444h8MO
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Patreon: bit.ly/ProfessorofRockVIPFan
Merch Store: professor-of-rock-lsn-shop.fourthwall.com
Instagram: bit.ly/Instagram_Professor_of_Rock
#classicrock #70smusic #ledzeppelin #70srock
Hey Music junkies, Professor of Rock, always here to celebrate the greatest songs and the greatest artists of all time. Make sure to subscribe, like, share, and comment. Today, we are spotlighting one of the greatest years in music history to count down the 10 greatest songs from 1970 that were never hits. They ended up being celebrated tracks, but you wouldn’t have known it from their chart history when they were released back in 70.
Coming in at #10 on Non-Hit 1970 Countdown, it’s “Midnight Rider” by the Allman Brothers Band: “Midnight Rider” by the Allman Brothers Band came together really fast. It was written in about an hour at a farmhouse in Macon, Georgia, that the band was renting. Despite coming up with the concept of a restless outlaw, fleeing from the law very quickly, finishing the track turned into a wild, very Allman Brothers kind of escapade. Gregg Allman was absolutely psyched about the song he was working on. He was so fired up he deseperatly wanted to get it recorded as soon as possible. Although it was very late, Gregg called the producer & engineer that they were working with, and they both told Gregg to “go to bed” and “wait until the morning.”
Gregg would not wait, so he grabbed roadie Kim Payne and the two of them actually broke into the Capricorn Sound Studios around 2am, smashing a window to get inside, so they could lay down a rough demo before anyone stopped them, and… before Gregg forgot the lyrics. One of the song’s most memorable lines came out of pure frustration: Payne, stuck on night duty listening to Gregg play the same unfinished tune over and over while high as a kite, finally snapped and blurted out, “I’ve gone past the point of caring, some old bed, I’ll soon be sharing.” Gregg immediately knew that was the missing lyric and kept it. True to his word, he gave Payne a cut of the song—5% of the royalties—which turned that late-night annoyance into a pretty great payday for Kim Payne. “Midnight Rider” was first featured on the Allman Brothers album Idlewild South, but it was not released as a single, and one of those non-hit classics.
“Midnight Rider” was always important, and deeply personal for Gregg, so he recorded a version for his solo album Laid Back, and “Midnight Rider” finally made it to “hit status,” peaking at #19 on the Billboard Hot 100 in ’73:
We’re spotlighting 10 Non-Hit Songs from 1970 at #9 I have. Black Sabbath who had three very notable, “non-hits” that year, starting with “Paranoid” Like “Midnight Rider,” “Paranoid” was another iconic rocker that was conceived very quickly. It was written in less than 30 minutes as a last-minute “filler" track, because the band didn’t have enough material for the Paranoid album. Tony Iommi came up with that stunning riff during a lunch break. Geezer Butler wrote down some lyrics about being depressed and paranoid while smoking pot...
