D-Day & Dancing Shoes: A Most Unexpected Double Feature

Not only is today the anniversary of D-Day in 1944, but it's also the same date in 1980 that the movie Urban Cowboy was released. John Travolta had just come off two huge movies. Grease and Saturday Night Fever had both done incredibly well at the box office, as did the soundtracks for both films.

So now they're looking to make a cowboy movie with a focus on dancing and another big soundtrack. Although it didn't do as well with ticket sales as Travolta's last two films, it was incredibly influential on society.

It seemed like everybody was wearing cowboy boots and hats, and brand-new country bars were opening in places like Las Vegas and New York City.

Get our free mobile app

Country radio wholeheartedly embraced everything that they threw at us. The soundtrack was a double album that had five number-one songs on it: "Love The World Away" by Kenny Rogers, "Love, Look What You've Done to Me" by Boz Scaggs, "Lookin' for Love" by Johnny Lee, "Could I Have This Dance" by Anne Murray, and Mickey Gilley's version of "Stand By Me." In fact, Gilley would tell people that the movie relaunched his career. It didn't hurt that everything was filmed in his bar, Gilley's.

Johnny Lee got a terrific start to his career and would be a staple of '80s country radio with his songs.

Folks got into line dancing and riding mechanical bulls.

I know that this is an old story because I remember having the soundtrack on cassette. And I'm retired from riding mechanical bulls.