🌟GROW BIGGER EARS #17: Raspberries' Best-The Covers-EXCLUSIVE BONUS EDITION

A handful of covers have been made of Raspberries classics, but far fewer than I had guessed! Here's what we uncovered!

(l-r) Jim Bonfanti, Wally Bryson, Eric Carmen, Dave Smalley stopping traffic in 1972, celebrating the release of their second album.

Our recent peek into the several rockers, hair metal-ers, and otherwise, just plain “famous” rockn’n’rollers who have expressed their love of and inspiration from Eric Carmen’s ‘70s power pop progenitors, The Raspberries, has now whelped this Playlist of creative covers! That original article is here:

The Boss Knows ‘Berries

Discovered just after publication was this: Bruce Springsteen’s liner notes to the Raspberries Live on Sunset Strip album (Rykodisc) in 2007:

“In the late ’70s I’d drive on Sunday nights to Asbury Park to sit in with Southside Johnny with The Raspberries Greatest Hits firmly stuck in the cassette player of my C-10 pickup. Dismissed at the time of their chart dominance for having “hits” (Fools!), they are THE great underrated power pop masters.

Their best records are as fun and sound as fresh today as when they were released. Soaring choruses, Beach Boys harmonies over crunchy Who guitars, lyrics simultaneously innocent, lascivious, and all about sex, sex, sex continue to make an unbeatable combination.

“Go All The Way”, “I Wanna Be With You”, “Let’s Pretend”, “Tonight”, all still deliver on their three minutes of promised ecstasy, while “Overnight Sensation (Hit Record)” still raises the hair on your arms and should go down as one of the great mini-rock opera masterpieces of all time.…”

After our FR&B publication of “Raspberries, Surprise!” article,

Rick Ellis

(of Substack’s Too Much TV Newsletter) informed me of a wonderful cover of “Overnight Sensation” by Cherie & Marie Currie from 1980, and their Messin’ With the Boys LP on Capitol:

Not only was I miffed at having forgotten that cover and its parent album (which I used to own!), I was certainly happy to be reminded of it, and infinitely grateful to Rick for reaching out to me about it, which, of course, is what inspired this Bonus Cover Playlist!

Please tune in to Rick’s Too Much TV (rabbit ears optional), and consider subscribing, here:

Before we dig into the Cover Playlist, here’s some rare 1973 footage of six songs that were played live, recorded, and aired on Viacom’s syndicated Don Kirshner’s Rock Concert! Nine songs were actually recorded at New York City’s Palace Theatre on November 7, 1973, but just six aired. With the original Carmen, Smalley, Bryson, and Bonfanti lineup, rare live Raspberries:

The Raspberries Cover Playlist:

1. “Go All the Way”-Matthew Sweet and Susanna Hoffs, 2009

From their second (of three) covers album, Under the Covers, Vol. 2, Matthew Sweet and The Bangles’ Susanna Hoffs (above) kick off the Bonus Playlist with “Go All the Way”:

Just because they’re so much fun, here’s their cover of Todd Rundgren’s “Couldn’t I Just Tell You.” It fits here, not only because it’s so very power pop- and Raspberries-forward, but just like “Go All the Way,” “Couldn’t I Just Tell You” was released as a single in July 1972! While the ‘Berries topped out at #5 on the Billboard Hot 100, Todd’s Something/Anything? single entry only got to #93.

Music journalist Paul Lester (of The Guardian) called Todd’s song (above) a “masterclass in compression,” and said that Rundgren “staked his claim to power pop immortality [and] set the whole ball rolling”….I wouldn’t hesitate in adding “Go All the Way” to that double-barreled shotgun blast.

2. “Tonight” Raspberries, from Live on Sunset Strip, recorded 2005 (released 2007) on the Playlist + Off Broadway’s cover from the 1996 cover compilation, Raspberries Preserved:

   + The Rubinoos, 2003, from Crimes Against Music:

3. “Ecstasy” Live (on the Playlist) + Remastered:

4. “I Wanna Be With You”-The Sneetches, 1991

The Sneetches (Alec Palao, Daniel Swan, Matt Carges, Mike Levy) were an American indie pop/power pop band formed in San Francisco in 1985. They released several albums before splitting up in the mid-’90s. The band was once described by Trouser Press as “one of the most tasteful, consistently tuneful pop bands on the American scene.” In 2017, AllMusic.com described The Sneetches as “one of the best classic guitar pop bands in the late ‘80s/early ‘90s.”

5. “I Can Remember” Raspberries, Remastered (on the Playlist) + Live:

6. “Overnight Sensation (Hit Record)” Cherie & Marie Curie, 1980

More From Bruce Springsteen

By Marvin Matthews (originally published in Backstreets Magazine, 2007):

“In 2005, on his Devils & Dust tour, there were several nights when Springsteen took a moment to plug a favorite band and dedicate a song to them—though strangely, it was a band that had broken up three decades earlier.

“I had this white Ford pickup, and it had a cassette player—there weren’t any CDs at the time,” Bruce would tell the crowd. “I kept this cassette of the Raspberries’ Greatest Hits in there. They’ve still yet to get any respect, the Raspberries… but why? I don’t know, because all the power pop and the guitars… they wrote a bunch of great songs, and they had an especially great record called ‘Overnight Sensation,’ which was a classic, a beautiful pop record.

“If you haven’t heard it, go get ‘Overnight Sensation.’ I guarantee—if not, next time you can say ‘Bruce, your taste sucks,’ or whatever—it’s a great record.”

7. “Don’t Want to Say Goodbye”/”Let’s Pretend” Medley, The Lettermen, 1979 + Bay City Rollers, “Let’s Pretend,” 1976

8. “Drivin’ Around”/”Cruisin’ Music” Raspberries, Medley Live

9. “Starting Over” Raspberris Live

10. “Don’t Want to Say Goodbye” The Flashcubes, 2018