It was a different age. Back when people watched TV and had patience and thus themes from their shows made it onto radio. Back then people didn’t mind spending two minutes to watch the opening credits, it seemed, and hear a catchy tune which in the case of most sitcoms, seemed to fill in the entire backstory of the whole cast. (Case in point, check out the opening from the early-’90s hit The Nanny… it details the shop the nanny used to work in, her breakup with a boyfriend, why she knocked on her new bosses’ door… if they’d put out an extended version it would have probably listed her antipersperant of choice!).
Thus on this day in 1976, for the second time in the young Bicentennial year, the #1 single was a theme from a TV show – “Welcome Back” by John Sebastian. The theme from Welcome Back Kotter followed the theme from SWAT to the top of the charts and revitalized Sebastian’s career. He’d had fame in the ’60s with the Lovin’ Spoonful (“Do you Believe in Magic?”, “Summer in the City“) but hadn’t done much commercially in the ’70s until he got the call for the new Gabe Kaplan sitcom. He was commissioned to write a theme for the show after he was shown a pilot of it; rather like the later theme from Friends, it was written originally specifically for that purpose and was short – just under a minute in fact. When the public clearly loved the ditty, Sebastian added another verse and chorus and quickly it was put out as a single, with some pressings actually titled “Welcome Back Kotter” despite the character’s name not being used in it. Although the TV show, which ran four years is primarily remembered for introducing a young John Travolta to the world, the song is a little more ingrained into our culture. Sebastian says is a fave of his “because it bought me my house!” That was helped on a little by Canadian sales; it reached #2 there. Elsewhere the love for Sweathogs, and hence their theme song seemed less intense.
The same week, the theme from Happy Days , another teen-oriented comedy, was also in the top 20 and would eventually hit #5.