OK Solberg: 00:00

I want to again welcome you to The 405 Coffee Break. Guys, get you a cup of coffee, glass iced tea, tall cool glass of Kool Aid. Let's see what's happening.

OK Solberg: 00:08

Spring wheat $6.78 a bushel. I'm gonna quote you a 523lb steer calf. 67 head of them sold at PAYS in Billings on September 2, just a few days back, 523lbs brought $4.54 a pound, and 71 head of 100lb lambs brought $3.10 a pound at PAYs on August 31, just a little over a week ago. But guys there's more, much more.

OK Solberg: 00:48

Okay, okay. Yesterday we flashed back to what was it 1966 and heard about Tommy James and the Shandells. Today we will flash back again but not quite that far. Today we'll go back to the year 1969 and yes, that was a very inspirational year.

OK Solberg: 01:08

We have the moon landing, we have Woodstock and the music industry is booming hit after hit after hit after hit. And then there was a song that wasn't a hit. It kinda just sat there.

OK Solberg: 01:23

It raised its head and disappeared into the vast expanses of musicism. Now the song I'm talking about was sung by Roberta Flack, and the title was The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face. Now guys, it was a slow song, and you probably know it. Many of you do.

OK Solberg: 01:45

Hard to keep up with other songs of the era since it was so slow, hard to keep up with the Rolling Stones, Honky Tonk Woman or Proud Mary by Credence Clearwater Revival or really hard to keep up with Elvis Presley in the ghetto.

OK Solberg: 02:03

Well, put it beside Johnny Cash, a boy named Sue. Right? So it just kinda faded into nowhere. It got played and then it got forgotten. See Roberta Flack's producer even thought the song was way too long and too slow. He encouraged Roberta to speed it up and shorten it a bit.

OK Solberg: 02:26

But Roberta Flack refused. Her attitude was essentially that she wasn't interested in compromising the performance just to manufacture a hit. So well, the song sat there and didn't get played much and it looked like that was the fate of that particular song.

OK Solberg: 02:47

But funny thing is, there was a man not known for his music as much as for his movies and well, his name was Clint Eastwood. Well, a couple of years had passed and Clint Eastwood is now not just a star in a movie, he's gonna direct his 1st movie ever and he was gonna star in it as well and the movie was titled play Misty for Me.

OK Solberg: 03:13

Eastwood wanted to use Roberta's song for one intimate romantic scene in that movie. When he asked her, she said, well, you know, maybe it's too slow. Clint Eastwood reassured her it was just right, exactly what he was looking for for that particular scene in that particular movie.

OK Solberg: 03:34

Clint Eastwood paid her $2,000 for the use of that recording. Roberta's song was recorded in 1969. It went nowhere. Eastwood's movie came out in 1971, and all of a sudden more people heard it, and it was woven in where it belonged with a romantic scene on the big screen and guys that song exploded.

OK Solberg: 04:02

Kapow Atlantic Records records rushed out a single and Roberta Flack's recording spent 6 consecutive weeks at #1 on the Billboard Hot 100 in 1972. What about that then? And I think there's a lesson in that for all of us.

OK Solberg: 04:22

And no, you and I probably won't be recording a song or making a movie in the near future, but the lesson is still important and then it's this. If you believe in an idea enough to think this is a really good something, don't let a few naysayers take the wind out of your sails.

OK Solberg: 04:39

Good is good no matter what some people say. So here's to all the people out there that think they have a good idea, a poem, a plan for an invention, a transcript for a novel. And you heard people say, well, don't quit your day job.

OK Solberg: 04:55

Guys, don't let it get you down. If you think it's good, sometimes it takes a while for the right someone to hear it and then it's off and running and it won't be back.

OK Solberg: 05:07

Let me close with a verse from Ecclesiastes 3 verse 1. For everything there is a season and a time for every matter under heaven. Ecclesiastes 3:1

OK Solberg: 05:21

Remember that, for everything there is a season. Can you make money selling snow boots? Sure you can. Just don't get too excited in the month of July. For everything, there is a season.

OK Solberg: 05:36

So until next time, as you go out there, remember now, don't be bitter.