"The Bee Gees (founded by Robin Gibb), were a cultural phenomenon," 'The Paris Review' observed. In 1983, their song, 'Islands In The Stream', performed by Kenny Rogers and Dolly Parton topped the Billboard Hot 100 chart. Inspired by the 1970 book, 'Islands In The Stream' by Ernest Hemingway, published some nine years after his death, Maurice Gibb told the BBC in 2009, the song was initially written for Marvin Gaye.
In 2005, the song topped the Country Music Television's poll of the best country duets of all time.
At first Kenny Rogers recorded 'Islands In The Stream' solo with Barry Gibb producing. As told to 'People', "It all started when Barry Gibb wrote 'Islands In The Stream', and he gave it to me to record — he was producing an album." However after "singing it for four days", Kenny Rogers decided he did not click with the song.
"I finally said, 'Barry, I don’t even like this song anymore' and he said, 'You know what we need? We need Dolly Parton.'”
In an interview with 'Taste of Country', Kenny Rogers recounted, "And my manager said, 'I just saw her downstairs', so I said, 'Go get her and bring her back.' So he brought her back in and once she came in, that song was never the same. She lit it up and we became good friends from that point on."
Speaking to 'People' in 2017, Kenny Rogers described of the a-ha moment, "I had a recording studio at the time and she was downstairs and my manager Ken Kragen said, 'I just saw her!' and I said, 'Well, go get her!' He went downstairs and she came marching into the room, and once she came in and started singing the song was never the same. It took on a personality of its own." It was noted 'Islands In The Stream' was the only country song to reach No. 1 on the all-genre Billboard 100 until 2000 (some 17 years later), when Lonestar topped the chart with 'Amazed'.
The UK 'Telegraph', December 2015: It's three decades since 'Islands In The Stream', your duet with Dolly Parton. Is that still a favourite?
Kenny Rogers: 'Islands' was a huge song for me. It was originally written by the Bee Gees for Marvin Gaye but then they asked me to do it as part of a whole album. I sang it in rehearsals for four days and then said to Barry Gibb, 'I don't even like it any more'. He said he had just run into Dolly Parton and would ask her to sing with me. I love working with Dolly and I give her full credit because that song was one of my career-making ones. The Bee Gees were so good at writing on the upbeat. It's just a happy song and I still do it live, singing both parts and trying to sound like Dolly.
In October 2017, Kenny Rogers and Dolly Parton did a last-ever performance of 'Islands In The Stream' during the epic 'All In for the Gambler: Kenny Rogers' Farewell Concert Celebration' at Nashville’s Bridgestone Arena.
Speaking to the 'Christian Science Monitor' at the start of the 1981-82 television season, B. Donald (Bud) Grant, then president of CBS Entertaiment Division told Arthur Unger, "As long as I've been here (at CBS) we've had a consistent point of view, and that is series programming. That's the backbone of the CBS schedule. Series programming is the most popular and efficient form for television.
"Three or four years ago (around 1977) there was a definite division of opinion between the way we (CBS) approached things and the way NBC did - they (NBC) went for event programming, specials, mini-series, that sort of thing. Well, my theory is - find successful series programming, develop it, put it on the air, promote it well, advertise it well. TV series go in cycles. There used to be a slew of westerns on the air. And then there were private eye shows. It's the public. They like one thing until the point of saturation and then the pendulum swings the other way. So television is always going through cycles. I think it is evolution, but I don't think it is revolution."
Arthur Unger then wondered, "Can Mr. Grant predict the next trend in TV?" Bud Grant replied, "Nobody knows what that will be. Trends are set by one producer finding a hit - and the rest following along. But you usually find a hit by stumbling across it - you think a show will be good, but ... I can't honestly say to you that I thought 'Dallas' was going to turn out to be one of the highest-rated shows on TV. I thought it would be successful but ... it started a trend. Success dictates trends."
At the time, Arthur Unger observed NBC was trying to create a trend. However Bud Grant believed, "I know what happened there. NBC looked at shows they had developed and decided they wouldn't work. At the last minute they had to get new shows for the fall so they put together stars and producers … I don't think that stars make television. I think that television makes stars. Look at 'M*A*S*H.' Alan Alda wasn't exactly a household name before that show. Did you ever hear of Henry Winkler before 'Happy Days'?"
Writing for 'The Paris Review' in July 2014, Bob Stanley reminded readers, "The Bee Gees' dominance of the charts in the disco era was above and beyond Chic, Giorgio Moroder, even Donna Summer. Their sound track to 'Saturday Night Fever' sold thirty million copies. They were responsible for writing and producing eight of 1978's number ones, something only Lennon and McCartney in 1963/64 could rival — and John and Paul hadn't been the producers, only the writers.
"Even given the task of writing a song called 'Grease', they came up with a classic. At one point in March they were behind five singles in the American Top 10. In 1978 they accounted for 2% of the entire record industry's profits … This happened because they were blending white soul, R&B, and dance music in a way that suited pretty much every club, every radio station, every American citizen in 1978. They melded black and white influences into a more satisfying whole than anyone since Elvis. Simply, they were defining pop culture in 1978.
Like ABBA, there is a well of melancholic emotion, even paranoia, in the Bee Gees' music."
Speaking to the BBC in 2012, lyricist Sir Tim Rice remarked, "You can easily speak about them in the same breath as Lennon and McCartney and Elton John and Bernie Taupin. They were fantastic performers and singers but of course why they will last forever is the songs. They had jolly good melodies and very original lyrics and they were songs an awful lot of people could identify with. In a way, unusually for most pop singers, they actually got better as they went on.
"'Islands In The Stream' and 'I Am A Woman In Love' (Barbra Streisand, No. 1 in 1980) and all these other songs were quite late in their career. Their influences are such that a lot of people from The Fugees to Take That, from blatant pop acts like Steps to quite sophisticated acts today (in 2012), are covering their songs. And of course, people who have done their songs over the years include legendary artists like Al Green, Elvis, Nina Simone and Barbra Streisand. These are Division One artists."
Gary Osborne added, "The Beatles were in a different league, then there was the Gibbs, then there was everyone else. I don't even think (Mick) Jagger and (Keith) Richards could quibble with that, just in terms of the quality of the actual songs. In the dance era, the groove was very important, but the Bee Gees weren't about the groove. They were about the song, whereas the Rolling Stones are about the feel of the riffs.
"We love the vibe and the synth on 'Jive Talkin'' and all those things, but when you strip them down to a guitar they would have worked in any era. They were just classy writers. They won 29 Ivor Novello Awards between them in pretty much every category we've got, culminating in the Academy Fellowship in 2005. And in songwriting terms that pretty much says it all. They just wrote brilliant tunes. It's not a mystery but it's magic."
