December 22 – Runt A Giant Among His Peers

They called him “Runt” but he had a big day on this day in 1973 – Todd Rundgren‘s great “Hello It’s Me” peaked at #5 on Billboard, making it, not surprisingly, his biggest hit to date.

Rundgren grew up in Philadelphia and quickly grew to become a versatile musician capable of playing just about any instrument it seemed. He joined a couple of bands there while still a teen, most notably Nazz. It was with them that he recorded the original version of this song, the first one he ever wrote, in 1969. That version was a little slower and more psychedelic than the one we know that became a hit in the ’70s.

After striking out on his own, he quickly developed a following with the early-’70s hits “We Gotta Get You A Woman” and “I Saw the Light”. He became increasingly creative, talented in the studio and on any number of instruments and tired of working with other musicians who didn’t share his energy (large amounts of Ritalin and pot “caused me to crank out the songs at an incredible rate” he says of the period) or visions. He came to work for Bearsville Records at their studio in upstate New York and help produce albums from Ian and Sylvia, Paul Buttersfield and Jesse Winchester (whom he helped Robbie Robertson of The Band with) before getting to work on his third album, Something/Anything? .

He decided at first to do that album entirely on his own, and seeking a change of pace and inspiration, took off to L.A. to record it. He wrote and recorded a good chunk of the opus there all by himself, including the hit “I Saw the Light”. But an earthquake caused problems at the studio, causing him to retreat back to Bearsville where he finished off what ended up being a 90-minute double album. While he had no help on sides 1 through 3 of the LP, side 4 in New York, he tried to record as a live record in the studio, and utilized a number of session musicians including Rick Derringer on guitar, Randy Brecker, one of Blood, Sweat & Tears’ great horn-virtuosos and Vickie Sue Robinson (who later had a hit with “Turn the Beat Around”) among the backing singers. Side 4 he termed “Baby Needs A New Pair of Snakeskin Shoes – a Pop Operetta” and included “Hello It’s Me”.

The album earned him his only solo gold record in the U.S. and won rave reviews. Rolling Stone, for example, graded it 4.5-stars when it came out calling it “perfectly composed.” Later the publication would rank it as the 117th best album of all-time, naming it his “tour de force” which “demonstrates his command of the studio …over a kaleidoscope of rock genres.”

The command of the studio’s served him well. Since then he’s produced a large number of popular and well-received records including Meat Loaf’s Bat out of Hell and XTC’s Skylarking. Between his own work and his band Utopia he’s put out some 18 more studio albums since Something/anything? but few have rivaled it in sales or acclaim.

“Hello It’s Me” remains one of the more popular singles of the early-’70s and among the myriad of artists to cover it are Matthew Sweet & Susanna Hoffs, as well as John Legend on a Gap (jeans) promo CD.

By the way, in case you were wondering, “Runt’s” really not that tiny. Most sources put him as 5’10” or 5’11” tall.