By 1974, Helen Reddy had conquered America. She had a handful of Top 40 songs, including the feminist anthem I Am Woman. She was hosting the Midnight Special on TV as well as the Helen Reddy Show. And of course, she was kicking out the Vegas jams with her lounge pop hits. It was easy to forget she was Australian – the first one to hit #1 and be a major talent in the US. And then came Angie Baby.
Written by Alan ‘Undercover Angel’ O’Day, it shot up to the top of the charts in December of 1974 and was the 2nd #1 that year with Angie in the title. I wonder if the producers of the TV show, Angie, in 1979 had Helen or the Stones to thank. It was also an odd choice for Helen, someone who preferred singing the glitzy show tune pop. Angie Baby was mellow and spooky, not a let’s-bring-the-room-down ballad, but I’m-gonna-freak-you-out slow jam. It kind of plays like any of the morose Lifetime movies combined with Without A Trace. Naturally, as a kid, I loved it.
It also has the get-out-of-my house-the-party’s-over appeal whenever I need to send people home. Seriously. Get this song. Put it on and really get into it. Folks will be jumping out of windows to get out, figuring you’re gonna chop them up when the song’s over. Why? It’s in the Joe Wissert production and the melancholy way Helen sings these lyrics:
You live your life in the songs you hear On the rock and roll radio
And when a young girl doesn’t have any friends
That’s a really nice place to go
Alright, I get that—alienated youth, finding solace in music.
Folks hoping you’d turn out cool
But they had to take you outta school
You’re a little touched, you know, Angie Baby
Ok, does Angie ride the short bus? Or is she setting fire alarms off? Or is she playing tic-tac-toe on her arm with a piece of glass? And no, I don’t know who touched her…
Lovers appear in your room each night
And they whirl you across the floor
But they always seem to fade away
When your daddy taps on your door
I’ll assume this is her fantasy. But how old is Angie that these guys are already ‘lovers’? That seems a little creepy to me.
Angie girl, are you all right. Tell the radio good-night
All alone once more, Angie Baby
Angie Baby, you’re a special lady
Living in a world of make-believe
Well, maybe
Well, now I know where Janis Ian got the idea of At Seventeen. Except that Janis was depressed and whiny, not crazy… I think.
Stopping at her house is a neighbor boy with evil on his mind
‘Cause he’s been peeking in Angie’s room
At night through her window blind
Now, this is coming off as a creepy masturbatory fantasy written by some sleazy old dude.
I see your folks have gone away
Would you dance with me today
I’ll show you how to have a good time, Angie Baby
Don’t let him in, Angie! Where are the parents? They should be taking care of this mentally handicapped kid. I bet Hustler did a whole video series based on this concept.
When he walks in her room,
He feels confused like he’s walked into a play
He walks in? From the window? Now I’m confused, and there’s not a stage in sight.
And the music’s so loud it spins him around
‘Til his soul has lost its way
Some horny kid gets let into the house and then the bedroom of an unsupervised child, and the music starts getting him confused? I assume that this is the song that was playing.
And as she turns the volume down
He’s getting smaller with the sound
It seems to pull him off the ground
Toward the radio he’s bound never to be found
This just went from a low-grade soft porn movie to a Sid & Marty Krofft cartoon.
The headlines read that a boy disappeared
and everyone thinks he died
‘Cept a crazy girl with a secret lover
Who keeps her satisfied
Wait a minute…this is real? A real boy died? It was reported in the papers? This girl has a sex slave in her bedroom closet or locked up in a trunk by her bed? That’s when this song goes from being weird to sick. Imagine if it was a crazy boy with a peeping girl…And Helen sings this song the same way she sings You & Me Against The World. Did she realize what she was saying?
It’s so nice to be insane
No one asks you to explain
Radio by your side, Angie Baby
These are my favorite lines of the song, and I think of them each time I watch a presidential nominee debate.
Listen, if you dare, and make your conclusions:
7 Inches of 70s Pop 
renee a devoure
/ June 2, 2012all of your songs remind me of a very unhappy childhood but I know that I can turn that around just by making new ones,I’m so greatful for you being apart of my ear to hear such grace and compassion in music that you’ve knowingly been a legend in.
renee de voure
Joe
/ July 15, 2012Hmmm, I remember when this song came out. I was just a 9 year old kid, and it kinda creeped me out. Like everybody else I found the lyrics puzzling, but I concluded that she seduced him, turned the tables on him and killed him. That act of control made him hers forever, now of course, just another fantasy that she can relive. Perhaps she’ll make a habit of it and find another…and another…
macsnafu
/ December 3, 2014Locked in a closet or trunk? No, it’s *magic*! Like a comic book horror story. He’s trapped in the radio and can only come out when she turns the radio on again. What? Didn’t you read comics when you were a kid?
W.B.
/ March 15, 2021Stuff like this is the type that, had Taylor Swift been around back then, she would have done. Try telling me “Look What You Made Me Do” is not a content descendant (no, not a descendant that’s contented; rather, a descendant in terms of the content of its message) of “Angie Baby” and its ilk.
And is it just me, or is there something of an MOR-c*m swamp rock vibe to this (given that Wurlitzer or Hohner pianet playing in the background the way it is)?