Disney loves to promote every anniversary they can, for our fun, and their profit! But we don’t mind as we flock by the millions to Disney Theme Parks around the world to celebrate each and every one.
We also love to collect the tie-in merchandise, like this Mickey’s 50th Anniversary LP record:
This is an odd release by any definable standard. It lacks both quantity and focus.
On Side 1 we get an original song entitled ‘I Grew Up on Mickey Mouse’ which is the only reason I bought this for my collection. You can listen to it below. Side 1 concludes quickly with a medley of music from the original Mickey Mouse Club and the second try, The New Mickey Mouse Club, which ran from 1977 to 1979.
This is interesting only in that it shows how different the music was with 20 years between the two Clubs.
Ovation Records produced this orphan of a record in 1978 (Mickey’s ‘birthday’ in 1928 + 50 years). Ovation Records was an American independent record label based in Glenview, Illinois. The label was founded in 1969 by Dick Schory.
Now for the musical highlight of our post:
I didn’t grow up on Mickey Mouse as the mania had subsided by the time I was on the scene and aware of such things. But I did come to love the Mouse later in life and so I collect things like this. Why, even I don’t know!
Side 2 just doesn’t make any sense for this release. It consists of what they bill as a ‘medley’ of music from the 1971 hybrid movie Bedknobs and Broomsticks, starring the late Angela Lonsbury. It was hoped that it would be the next Mary Poppins, but it failed at the Box Office and is largely forgotten today. Why did Disney include an entire side of music from an unpopular movie that came out in theatres seven years before the anniversary being celebrated with the LP?
The complete package called The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh, the original Rescuers movie, and Pete’s Dragon all came out in 1977. Surely one of or all of these could have been used for a bit of cross promotion!
In any case, and for whatever unfathomable reason, we have what we have.
