OPO: Raspberries

Yeah, that's news to me, too!

what'd he say what'd he say

Carmen has no falsetto and Wilson said this is true for all true tenors.

That’s what is said in the interview. Think that the more correct version of the statement is something like “baritones are more likely to be good falsetto singers than tenors,” apologies for the Internet pedantry.

So here's my little Raspberries-adjacent story from a couple of months ago:

I had been looking to buy a Strat, and saw one for sale on a local Northeast Ohio gear sell/swap/trade group on Facebook. The seller, Randy, was about 40 minutes away from me in Painesville, OH. (Just west of where I went to high school in Perry, OH.) I drove out to look at it, we agreed on a price, and I bought it. We were chatting throughout the transaction, and he mentioned that he was going to use this money for a new Gretsch to use in his band, The Choir.

"Wait," I said. "The Choir? Like, 'It's Cold Outside' The Choir?" He said it was, and it turns out he was Randy Klawon, brother of The Choir founder Danny Klawon, and that the two of them went to high school in Mentor, the next city over, with Wally Bryson, Jim Bonfanti, etc. Randy joined The Choir a little later originally but played with them on and off over their various reunions and incarnations.

I then asked if he knew a guy named Artie Peeler, another local musician who is good friends with Wally Bryson. He said yeah, he'd known Artie since high school as well. Artie used to date my aunt Debra, and when I was first learning guitar in the 80s he taught me some tricks like different chord voicings and Keith Richards's open G tuning. And to complete the small world circle, he knew Wally's son Jesse, who used to front a Cleveland band called Rosavelt back in the 90s. My band at the time played a couple of shows with them.

Here's a video of Bryson and Peeler at a local bar last Christmas: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4WZaddldaaU

Cool! Thanks for the story and the video.

no votes for "i don't know what i want"? amazing song

That's such a great story, Eliza!

"I Don't Know What I Want" is indeed amazing; it even quotes "I'm A Boy"!

Apparently, Eric Carmen was a stone Who fanatic -- he called that song his "love letter to the Who" -- and his pre-Raspberries band Cyrus Erie once opened for the Who in Cleveland in 1968.

Yeah, he talks about how term Power Pop was originally used by Pete Townshend to describe what The Who was doing but the term ending up really sticking to The Raspberries, which was fine with him.

Also, this is interesting:
http://www.ericcarmen.com/eric-interview-03.html

Forgot that Wally Bryson was in Fotomaker, which band I can’t recall ever having listened to.

Probably did hear a radio promo for them and definitely saw the album in ye olde brick and mortar record stores.

Surely Pete Frame did a Family Tree for this stuff.

* checks book * dang, no

https://www.facebook.com/raspberriesrock/posts/wally-bryson-may-26-2018-if-any-guitar-players-ever-wanted-to-know-how-to-play-t/1744151732329195/

Also, from that interview I posted yesterday:

I was a little bit in the dark initially about how this was all going to work and at one point Ringo I think could see that I was stressed. Simon and I were going to accompany him to a show while we were in Atlantic City that he was supposed to go to, and I arrived at his room first and he said something like, "I sense a bit of the perfectionist in you." *Laughs* "Not unlike Mark Hudson."

*Bump*... two, three, four!

/Maybe they were too formulaic! "I Wanna Be with You" does that same thing, too, with a 6-bar verse and 16-bar chorus! To me, they are formulaic in an awesome way.

Hold me tight
Our love could live forever after tonight
If you believe in what we're doin' is right
Close your eyes and be still

Was just listening to a Stories song on a Left Banke playlist and kept thinking it was the Raspberries.

Similar vibe. Not as good though.

Ian Lloyd is a great (rock) singer though.

“Love Is In Motion.”

That's their best song but it's nothing like anything else they did.

Not being a Raspberries trivia geek, I didn't know until today they changed drummers between albums 3 and 4. Such great drumming on their stuff.

Rhythm section changed between 3 & 4. It kind of weakens the band because the new guys didn't write as well.

Timely revive, as I went through my Raspberries vinyl in order this week. Think Side 3 is the best LP this go round (followed by Fresh).

for pure powerpop rush it's always "Tonight", for me

'Come Around And See Me' keeps popping into my head, particularly the delightfully vari-speed 'Don't ever think I'll be cruel to you / I'm a fool for you / Come a-round, and, seee mmeeeeee' part

Posting here as well as Rolling Music Theory:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=epqYft12nV4

Reposting here so I don’t forget:
https://observer.com/2017/08/eric-carmen-raspberries-pop-art-live-interview/

“Whose songs are the hardest?” and the entire band swirled around and pointed at me and said, “Eric’s!”

People thought the Raspberry stuff was real simple. I remember I was trying to teach the band Go All The Way and Dave Edmunds looked at me at some point and he said, “For God’s sake there is a fucking chord for every word! I’ve never seen anything like this

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C0lHlczRwz0

^I've never seen this before, unless of course it's upthread and I forgot.

RIP Eric Carmen

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cqdiSN8aVIg

kind of insane how many great songs this dude wrote, absolute genius

just the other day I heard Hey Deanie and thought "dang this is really good who wrote this"

my opo is probably I Saw the Light

I wouldn't call him a genius, but he reminds me of Tom Petty in that he was a master of his genre and no more but unlike Petty was prone to distraction. As a teen I was shocked that the guy responsible for "Make Me Lose Control" and "Hungry Eyes" wrote "Go All the Way."

aw man RIP! amazing artist — my discovery of the raspberries is probably upthread. shame he didn’t live to see america great once again

"Overnight Sensation" has more hooks than many bands manage in one song.

xp blech didn't realize that. His Twitter account no longer exists, but someone blogged in 2019 that "most of his feed is right wing nut jobbery now."

You’re right, I didn’t realize that!

74-year-old white guy from Cleveland, checks out.

Ah. RIP Eric. V. talented dude.

recently picked up the first raspberries record at a thrift store, really great RIP

i mentioned it upthread and it's atypical for carmen/the raspberries but "i don't know what i want" rules so hard

^^ that one's a pretty successful Who rip

Had no idea Hungry Eyes was this dude.

the followup "Make Me Lose Control" is a shameless late '80s yuppie-smarm move that works imo

xp I can't stand the film enough to sit through it, but one of the most horrid conceits about Dirty Dancing is how they anachronistically shove mucusy '80s shlock into a story that plays out in the summer of 1963. Anachronisms can be brilliant, but not in the service of horrendous taste.

yeah, you are way wrong. The movie's rather good, especially since it foregrounds the young heroine's sexuality: she wants this dancer and she gets him. And there's an abortion in this movie! And no one apologizes for it.

If you don't think "I've Had the Time of My Life" works in context as beautifully as Solomon Burke's "Cry to Me" does in the seduction scene, then *throws hands up*