GROW BIGGER EARS #1: The "Audio Autopsy" Playlist-Summer Power Pop

Charlie, Dodgy, Eric Carmen & more! A small, but tasty collection of tune-heavy power pop with harmonies aplenty! Summer Power Pop......some are not!

As the sun dares to set on Summer 2022, the crew at Front Row & Backstage thought it might help if we gathered a handful of catchy, summer-friendly tuneage to stretch the beachy, top-down good times out just a little longer!

A couple of these songs might be brand new to you, in which case, one may just show up in a future “Audio Autopsy”! There might be one here that has already gone under the aural microscope…in that case, we’ll drop the link for you to dig further!

1. Bruce & Terry, “Summer Means Fun,” 1964, Columbia Records

Bruce is Bruce Johnston, who shows up a couple times, Front Row & Backstage. Terry is Terry Melcher, Doris Day’s son, and the youngest producer in Columbia Records history. Bruce & Terry produced, while veteran popsters, P.F. Sloan and Steve Barri, wrote it.

Jan & Dean (under the nom-de-tune of The Legendary Masked Surfers) covered “Summer Means Fun” (b/w “Gonna Hustle You”) as a single for United Artists in 1973.

Bruce, of course, became a decades-long Beach Boys member, and wrote gorgeous songs like “Disney Girls” and “I Write the Songs.” Bruce comes up in my 1975 interview with David Cassidy, as it was Bruce who produced Dave’s first post-Partridge Family album for RCA Records.

It seems David was the first to ever release “I Write the Songs” as a single, beating Barry Manilow to the vinyl punch by several months. The Captain & Tennille recorded it first, though, in the early ‘70s, but only as an album track (Bruce was a session player thereon).

That 1975 interview with David (look for the Easter egg within! It can take you to the actual audio recording of my interview with Cassidy!) can be uncovered here:

2. Charlie “Turning to You,” 1977, Janus Records

Another of those bands no one heard back in the day, as every radio station on the planet, for some reason, was making sure Fleetwood Mac and the Eagles monopolized the airways.

“Turning to You” flows like a sweet, thinner molasses, mid-tempo, but hauntingly melodic, with the tower of vocals we poppers love! Oh, and a modulation toward the end!

Charlie was formed in the UK in 1971, led by singer/songwriter, Terry Thomas (who wrote and co-produced “Turning to You”). This song comes from their second album, ironically titled No Second Chance.

Oddly, Charlie never charted in their UK home, but had four minor hits in the US: “Turning To You” (1977), “She Loves to Be In Love,” (1978), “Killer Cut” (1979), and “It's Inevitable” (1983). Charlie’s No Second Chance would make a suitable entry into the “Audio Autopsy” archives…so, it just might!

3. Flo & Eddie “Let Me Make Love to You,” 1974, Columbia Records

From their Illegal, Immoral and Fattening album, former Frank Zappa sidemen, Mark Volman and Howard Kaylan, created a pop classic with this one, bringing it in under 2 1/2 minutes, yet!

Catchy melody, soaring strings, horn arrangement, and the wonderful chorus you’d expect from two former “Happy Together” Turtles, there’s even the multi-layered, helium-filled harmonies they brought to T. Rex’s “Get it On (Bang a Gong)”! Even if Flo & Eddie couldn’t/didn’t score a hit with this Joe Wissert production, where was anybody else on this song?

4. Eric Carmen “Last Night,” 1975, Arista Records (Remastered):

The former Raspberries singer/songwriter/guitarist/legend was courted by Arista chief, Clive Davis, to be just a bit of a Barry Manilow clone for this, Carmen’s debut solo LP. Except for rockers like this one (and the opening “Sunrise” and a couple others), Clive got what he wanted (“All By Myself”—’nuff said).

Eric opens with a piano riff on what seems to be a ballad: “I think I’ll stay at home, just play some records, and catch up on some sleep.” By the time he gets to “I’ve been so busy, maybe someone will drop by,” the song explodes into an unabashed Phil Spector chorus befitting 1964!

Name it: Stacked chorus (with “dit, dit, dit-dit”s!), horns aplenty, pounding piano, pounding drums. Listen closely…I think you can even hear a kitchen sink!

Carmen scored extra “cool” points when he “turned on the Carson show”! As he did for all four Raspberries albums on Capitol, Jimmy Ienner produced. Ienner pops up on FR&B’s “Inside Tracks” #2, having produced the Bay City Rollers’ turn on Tim Moore’s “Rock and Roll Love Letter.” Catch it here, if you missed it:

Inside Tracks #2: Tim Moore, "Rock and Roll Love Letter" + Covers by The Bay City Rollers (1976) & The Records (1979)

5. Dodgy “Staying Out for the Summer (Summer 95),” 1994, A&M Records (UK)

We started with a song with “Summer” in the title, so my OCD-Lite says we end with one! I heard this song, around the end of the last century, in a movie, and it knocked my socks off (wish I could remember the movie). Live, from a ‘95 Top of the Pops/UK:

As I was selling my record collection on eBay, anyway, a quick search led me to the Dodgy compilation CD, Ace A’s and Killer B’s, with this song as the second track. For my dinero, the first half-dozen tracks are, indeed killer, but the disc slows thereafter.

If you catch me on the right day, I’m even likely to include “Staying Out for the Summer” in my Top 5 or 10 all-time favorite songs. What a master class in concise, literate, catchy-as-a-pandemic songwriting (music by Nigel Clark/Andy Miller, lyrics by Clark/Mathew Priest), with all the bells’n’whistles that define classic pop songwriting, let alone power pop! The recent FR&B Dodgy tribute:

Audio Autopsy, 1994: Dodgy, "Staying Out for the Summer," "Good Enough"/A&M Records, UK