Soundtrack Selection!!
Joey Scarbury – Believe It Or Not (Theme of “The Greatest American Hero”)
I was watching this great documentary series on PBS titled The Pioneers Of Television and one of their episodes featured superheros. Of the few true superheros they talked about, I thought it was awesome for them to devote a segment to The Greatest American Hero. Which obviously got me thinking about this song!
The Greatest American Hero was the story of a super curly headed teacher (played by William Katt) who is bestowed a magical superhero outfit but loses the instruction manual on how it works. So throughout the series he just can’t seem to get a handle of it’s special powers (particularly flying!).
The fantasy-comedy-drama-detective show aired from 1981-1983, and it’s now famous theme song “Believe It Or Not” performed by Joey Scarbury, was eventually recorded at a full length version and released as a single. Which by the way, made it it to a spectacular #2 on the charts! TV soundtrack man Mike Post also had a hand in this tunes development.
I remember this show being on as a kid, at a very early age, in one of the apartments we lived in. Maybe my Dad would leave it on (probably because Robert Culp was in it) and I’d get a kick out of the whole superhero thing which obviously had a comedic enough appeal to interest a child. In terms of longevity, to me this theme song can easily be regarded as one of “the greatest American TV theme songs” of all time!
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Great song! Definitely check out my interview with the song’s co-writer Stephen Geyer > http://oldschool.tblog.com/post/1970113240
He also co-wrote several other TV theme songs. Enjoy!
I TOTALLY remember this show, despite the fact that I was born in 1982, so I don’t know how that’s possible. Was it in syndication despite only airing for 3 years?
@ Jen – My memory was watching it when it was new, I was really little, so the memory is pretty fragmented. However, I don’t remember watching it thereafter. But if you do, it must have been on somewhere. It does have a TVLand quality to it (well.. back when that channel was cool) or better yet, the original F/X when they used to have tons of old shows from the 70′s and 80′s… but that’s as far as viewing in the mid-90′s was concerned, and I don’t remember it being on. During the 80′s, I’m not sure what channel it might have been syndicated on, if it even was.
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