February 27 – Seger Rode Against The Wind And Up The Charts

His best? His worst? You’ll find people who’ll argue either, but probably Bob Seger‘s Against the Wind was neither. It arrived this day in 1980. It was his 11^th studio album overall, and third credited to Seger and the Silver Bullet Band, his regular backing unit for years.

The ’80s arrived finding Seger in his mid-30s and an established superstar. And, after years of hard work and constant touring, perhaps a bit of a weary one, as suggested by his earlier hit “Turn the Page.” Seger said this album was about “trying to move ahead, keeping your sanity and integrity at the same time.” The result was a 10 song effort that mixed tuneful ballads and his more typical up-tempo rockers. He’d recorded it in two parts the year before, half in Miami and half in Muscle Shoals with their great session players including Roger Hawkins on drums, David Hood on bass and Pete Carr adding guitar to Seger’s own (not to mention his Silver Bullet Band guitarist Drew Abbott). And for good measure he used Dr. John on keyboards on “Horizontal Bop” and his old friend Glenn Frey, as well as other Eagles Don Henley and Timothy B. Schmit for backing vocals on the lead single, “Fire Lake.” Another Eagles name on Against the Wind was Bill Szymczyk, their usual producer from 1974 on, who co-produced the record with Seger and the Muscle Shoals crew.

The album didn’t sound terribly different than his previous pair, Night Moves and Stranger in Town, albeit perhaps a little more smoothly produced. Billboard saw it as a hit in the works, and both the New York and L.A. Times approved. The West Coast one suggested it was “close to his earlier work” but by now he was “mastering the form” and that the ballads, like “Fire Lake” and the title track stood out. Rolling Stone on the other hand panned it in a big way. They did think it “carefully constructed” but overall found it full of songs that were “utterly listenable and quite meaningless” which resulted in “not only the worst record Bob Seger has ever made but an absolutely cowardly one as well.” The Grammys obviously disagreed; he won his only such award for it in the Best Performance, Rock category. The art director also won one for its running horses cover, for Best Packaging. Years later on, allmusic graded it 4-stars,

a good record where he was “performing better on the ballads than the rockers” (they lamented him opening it with “Horizontal Bop”, a “careless…tossed-off “ song that was his worst in over a decade) and while not his best record, “compared with its peers, a strong, varied heartland record.”

Compared to its peers, and other records of that year, it performed strongly too. It hit #1 in the States for six weeks, his only chart-topper, and for three weeks in Canada, going 5X platinum in both countries (which actually has it a tad below his previous two in sales in the U.S.). Overseas, reaction was middling with it missing the top 10 in places like the UK and Australia. While album cut “Betty Lou’s Getting Out Tonight” and the final single, “Her Strut” both did OK on rock radio, it missed the top 40 but “Fire Lake” and “Against the Wind” were both top 10s in North America and “You’ll Accomp’ny Me” made it to #14.

Seger never had quite that level of success again, though he continued to sell well in the ’80s and be a major live draw until he retired in 2018.

September 4 – ‘Nine Tonight’ Did Better Than That On Charts

Many bands have reputations as great live acts. However, few of them carry that over and are able to sell many live albums; Cheap Trick and Peter Frampton were definitely outliers in the ’70s in that respect. But one more exception is Bob Seger and his Silver Bullet Band. They had a hit with Live Bullet in 1976, when they were just rising to national fame, and took another shot at it five years later with Nine Tonight which came out this day in 1981. Once again, he seemed to hit the winning formula.

It came out a year after Against the Wind, which elevated him to superstar status and the record was pulled from concerts on the tour for that album, one from Boston and one from his hometown of Detroit. And, while two live albums in five years might seem excessive, most of the 16 tracks came from records made after the previous live one. Seger had written all but three tracks and one of the trio done by others was known as “his” song – “Old Time Rock’n’Roll”, written by George Jackson and Thomas Jones. A cover of Chuck Berry’s “Let it Rock” was the finale, and he added in an older soul song, ”Trying to Live My Life Without You.” That one had been done originally a label mate of Al Green’s, Otis Clay in 1973, but despite being performed on Soul Train hadn’t taken off… until Seger got to it! Other tracks included a number of his familiar hits, mostly from the end of the ’70s and Against the Wind, like “Night Moves,” “Her Strut” and “Against the Wind” itself, with a few lesser-known ones like “You’ll Accompany Me.”

The tour it was culled from was their first that crossed Europe, and according to backing vocalist Shaun Murphy, “this was when the frenzy started to kick in…we had crossed the precipice.” She added “you’d look out in the audience and people were all singing all the words. That hadn’t happened to Bob (before)”.

Latter reviews were mixed for it. Ultimate Classic Rock called it his “victory lap” while allmusic gave it 3-stars, significantly less than the first live album’s 5. They didn’t seem to think it was a bad album, but did note “”the live versions here stick pretty close to the studio versions,” although “the cut of ‘Old Time Rock’n’Roll’ included here proves to be better than the original.”

His fans may have thought so too. Either way, the album made it to #3 at home and #6 in Canada, and hit the top 30 in Britain and Australia. Much of that was from “Trying to Live My Life Without You”, which hit #5 – his fifth top 10 hit song – in the U.S. and #11 in Canada. “Feel Like A Number” made it into the top 30 in Canada while the live take on “Hollywood Nights” did reasonably well in the UK. When all was said and done, the release (a double album, but put out later as a single CD with the Chuck Berry song shortened from its 10-minute plus length to make it fit) went 4X platinum at home, the biggest selling live record since the Eagles live one a year earlier.

August 6 – Seger Shakedown Shook Up The Charts

Charts can create funny anomalies. Some weeks of course, many records may sell a ton, others may be slow sales weeks. That in mind, on this day in 1987 Bob Seger had his only U.S. #1 single ever this day…and it probably isn’t one which you’d guess. “Shakedown” was on top 35 years back. In Canada, where it also went to #1, it was his second chart-topper.

Few would argue that this was Seger’s most memorable record, but somehow it did get to #1 when hits like “Night Moves” and “Old Time Rock & Roll” didn’t. The single came from the Beverly Hills Cop II soundtrack which also featured “I Want Your Sex” by George Michael and tracks from the Pointer Sisters and Corey Hart. Apparently Seger was the film producer’s second choice for the song which was co-written by Harold Faltemeyer (who did the “Axel F theme” from the first movie); Glenn Frey was the first choice. Frey had a big hit from the first BH Cop with “The Heat is On” but turned down “Shakedown” opening the door for his friend and fellow Detroiter Seger to score with it. Appropriately enough, Frey and Seger were close friends and grew up more or less together.

Such anomalies aren’t altogether rare in music chart history. Earlier in the ’80s, Jackson Browne had scored his only #1 American album – Hold Out. By no means his most critically-acclaimed or remembered album, and far from his biggest-seller overall but the only one to ever be the biggest-seller in a given week.

June 25 – When Prince Became King…Of The Charts

Prince hit the bigtime, and surprised meteorologists, this day in 1984. Minnesota’s chameleonic star released his most-successful and famous album, the Purple Rain soundtrack (about a month before the movie itself hit the big screen.)

While Prince was already famous and had good sales on his preceding album, 1999, this one put him over the top, eventually selling over 25 million copies worldwide, thereby making it the decade’s biggest soundtrack and sixth biggest one ever. The music won him an Academy Award for movie score and two Grammys including the best soundtrack. It stayed on the American album charts for over two years – 122 weeks initially (and more in 2016 when it re-charted as high as #2 after his untimely death.) In the U.S. it sold diamond status – actually 13X platinum, and it was multi-platinum in Canada and Australia as well, where it was also his first #1 album in both. It gave us some of his biggest-and most enduring hits including the title track (remarkably enough said to have been written by him in a self-imposed test to see if he could write a song that sounded like Bob Seger, as he couldn’t understand the secret of Seger’s popularity),  “Let’s Go Crazy” and “When Doves Cry.” Add in “I Would Die 4U”, and you have four U.S. top 10 hits, bested only by Born in the U.S.A. Springsteen among ’84 releases. The record likely gained some by being the first which credited his backing band The Revolution. While Prince still played a mean guitar, plus piano and “other instruments”, for the first time he got a backing band to add to and expand his sound and ideas.

At the time it got good reviews for the most part. Rolling Stone gave it 4-stars, saying “the spirit of Jimi Hendrix must surely smile down on Prince Rogers Nelson…”. Entertainment Weekly a couple of years later rated it a “B”, but said it was “Soggy rock arrangements and the overblown title track bog it down” but years later altered their opinion to list it as the second best album of all-time by 2013! Likewise, Rolling Stone would three decades later rank it as the 72nd greatest album of all-time, saying it “showcases Prince’s abilities as a guitarist” while singling out “When Doves Cry” for lacking a bass and yet being “unforgettable.” Britain’s The Guardian retroactively gave it a perfect 5-star rating after his death, albeit still considering it only his third best work (they opted for Sign O’The Times as his pinnacle) noting it was a “concise showcase for Prince’s wares, from instant to experimental to epic.” Coupled with a decent, if not thoroughly challenging, job of starring in the movie of the same name, about a singer not unlike himself, it put Prince front and center as one of the major new talents of the decade.

January 18 – Eagles’ Memory Still Flies 5 Years On

We remember Glenn Frey, who became heaven’s “New Kid In Town” five years ago today.

Although an integral part of the SoCal music scene of the ’70s, Frey was actually born and raised in Detroit where he met and worked with Bob Seger. Only a girlfriend moving west spurred him to go to L.A., and while that romance fizzled apparently he did do OK there, quickly meeting Jackson Browne and JD Souther, then Don Henley with whom he joined Linda Rondstadt’s backing band in 1971 just before forming the Eagles.

He helped them go on to be the most successful American band of the decade, co-writing most of their hits, playing guitar, keyboards on some of their latter works and singing hits like “Take It Easy” and “Tequila Sunrise”. Although he didn’t match Henley’s success with solo works in the post-Eagles ’80s, his first two albums, No Fun Aloud and The Allnighter both went gold in the U.S. He came this close to #1 on Billboard with a pair of songs from soundtracks : “The Heat is On” (from Beverly Hills Cop) and “You Belong to the City” (from Miami Vice, a show he guest-starred on), both hitting #2.

He battled arthritis, and according to most reports, the meds he took were worse than the disease, causing him colitis and other problems which led to his death while recuperating from intestinal surgery in late-2015. Henley said Frey “was like a brother to me, we were family and like most families, there was some dysfunction. But the bond we forged 45 years ago was never broken.” Talent seems to run in the Frey family. Immediately after his death, his son Deacon took over his dad’s role in a number of Eagles concerts.

August 6 – Seger Shakes Down Competition From Top

Charts can create funny anomalies. Some weeks of course, many records may sell a ton, others may be slow sales weeks. That in mind, on this day in 1987 Bob Seger had his only U.S. #1 single ever this day…and it probably isn’t one which you’d guess.

“Shakedown”(in Canada, it was his second chart-topper) was on top 33 years back. Few would argue that this was Seger’s most memorable record, but somehow it did get to #1 when hits like “Night Moves” and “Old Time Rock & Roll” didn’t. The single came from the Beverly Hills Cop II soundtrack which also featured “I Want Your Sex” by George Michael and tracks from the Pointer Sisters and Corey Hart. Although it was his only #1 single, he’d hit the U.S. top 20 some 13 times before in the past decade, but surprisingly hasn’t been there again since.

Apparently Seger was the film producer’s second choice for the song which was co-written by Harold Faltermeyer (who did the “Axel F theme” from the first movie); Glenn Frey was the first choice. Frey had a big hit from the first BH Cop with “The Heat is On”  but turned down “Shakedown” opening the door for his friend and fellow Detroiter Seger to score with it. Appropriately enough, Frey and Seger were close friends and grew up more or less together.

May 6 – Seger Still The Same, But Older

He’s “still the same” – but older! Happy 75th birthday to one of Detroit’s greats, Bob Seger! The gravelly-voiced rocker has drawn comparisons to a Midwestern Springsteen and put out 18 studio albums along the way, plus two live ones. Both of the latter have gone multi-platinum in the U.S., a testiment to just how good a performer he is in concert!

Shaped at a young age by listening to the likes of Little Richard and Elvis, his first band, the Decibels had a strong following (and a minor hit) in Detroit when he was just 16. During the ’60s, he became friends with Glenn Frey (who played guitar on Seger’s first national hit, “Ramblin’ Gamblin’ Man”) and signed to Capitol, turning down an offer from Motown! He certainly would have stood out as the “one of these things is not like the other” had he signed on there. His reputation and following quickly grew in Detroit & adjacent Ontario but took awhile to spread. He recalls playing to about 70 000 at the Silverdome in ’70 and then playing in front of less than 1000 in Chicago the next night. But by ’76 and “Night Moves” he was a favorite coast-to-coast, on his way to 16 top 20 hits,like “Against the Wind” and “Fire Lake”, 13 platinum albums and induction into the Rock &Roll Hall of Fame in 2004.

In 2017, he put out his 18th studio album, I Knew You When which included the tribute to his friend Frey,“Glenn Song.”  Seger toured extensively last year on the “Roll Me Away” tour, which he said will be his last. At least his fans can take solace in knowing he did say he might have a few more songs left in him and he might put out more albums still.

One of his most-surprising feats: according to music writer Gerry Kiernan, he inspired Prince’s “Purple Rain.” Prince was said to be “baffled” as to the reason for enduring popularity of Seger and thus set out to write a “Seger-style ballad.”

May 3 – Wind Lifted Bob To The Top

It took so long that some of his early songs probably already qualified as “old time rock & roll” by then, but after a dozen or so years of constant touring and recording, Bob Seger finally had a #1 album. That was 40 years back, this day in 1980, when Against The Wind topped the U.S. charts. For all the success he’s enjoyed through the years, his 11th album was his only #1.

By that time, Seger had become pretty well-established as a rock star with singles like “Hollywood Nights” and “Old Time Rock’n’Roll” that did well on both AM hit radio and FM rock channels. For Against the Wind, he decided to change it up, at least a little. while much was familiar about it, rock songs about girls (“Her Strut,” “Betty Lou Is Getting Out Tonight” ), he did get a little more introspective and added a couple of slower ballads, like the two big hits off it, “Fire Lake” and the title track. He says he’s particularly proud of the former, the lead-off single Capitol released from it. Years later, he said “it’s one of my favorite lyrics…the track is very unusual, it’s sort of R&B meets country.” He says “Against the Wind” itself is about “trying to move ahead, keeping your sanity and integrity” and about “knowing the difference between people who are using you and when people truly care about you” and if you succeed at that,you’re winning.

Seger was winning with the album that utilized his usual Silver Bullet Band for backing musicians, supplemented with Alabama’s great Muscle shoals Rhythm Section on some tracks and an old friend of his from Detroit on one. Glenn Frey and Seger were buddies when they were young and lived in the Motor City, and Frey did the backing vocals on “Fire Lake”… along with his friends from the Eagles, Don Henley and Timothy B. Schmit.

The album was a major success, being able to knock Pink Floyd’s The Wall off the top of the U.S. charts and spend six weeks at #1. It also made it to #1 in Canada and a respectable #6 in Australia. Both “Fire Lake” and the title song were top 10s in North America and the next two singles, “You’ll Accomp’ny Me” and “Her Strut” did well on rock radio. When all was said and done, the album had sold around 8 million or so copies and was 5X platinum in the U.S. and Canada.

Critics were of mixed opinions of this. While some, like the New York Times liked it, calling it “an honest, attractive album”, others – especially Rolling Stone – panned it. they flat out called it “the worst record Bob Seger has ever made” and figured it full of “songs what are utterly unlistenable”, although they did compliment has actual singing. But Seger seemed to have the last laugh. Not only did it sell millions,it also won two Grammys. It took home Best Rock Performance by a Group or Duo , Seger’s only one to date. As well, the actual LP cover (which broke ranks for him, being the first since ’74 not to feature Bob’s face on it) with the striking Tom Bert photo of running horses took one for best packaging.

November 6 – Remembering The Northern Eagle

Remembering Glenn Frey, who was born 71 years ago.

Although Frey is of course best remembered for his work with The Eagles, he actually grew up in Detroit and the first famous musician he knew was Bob Seger. The two were friends in the ’60s and Glenn sang backup on Seger’s “Ramblin’ Gamblin’ Man” before he departed for L.A. to chase a girl. Although apparently things didn’t work out well with that lady, the rest of the California story was good to Frey. Soon after landing there, he met up with JD Souther and neighbor Jackson Browne, joined Linda Ronstadt’s backing band (with Don Henley) which eventually became The Eagles. Not only was Frey the main guitarist for the band and singer of hits like “New Kid in Town”, “Take It Easy” and “Tequila Sunrise”, according to their manager Irving Azoff, he was also the band’s “quarterback”, keeping the others in line and picking set lists.

Away from the band, Frey came close to having some #1 success- “The Heat is On” (from Beverly Hills Cop) and “You Belong To the City” (from Miami Vice) both got to #2 on Billboard. The Miami Vice connection was double; he also acted in the show briefly. 

Frey passed away at age 67 from various complications of pneumonia which ultimately stemmed from treatment for arthritis. Although friend Jackson Browne took his place in the Eagles at the 2016 Grammys, for a short time his son Deacon Frey (one of 3 kids Glenn has with his wife of 26 years, Cindy) has been taking his placein concerts. More recently, Vince Gill has taken on the role. Although the band had had its share of bad blood throughout the years, Don Henley said Frey was “like a brother to me” and also, when it came to the band “he was the sparkplug – the man with a plan.” Huey Lewis called him not only a “brilliant songwriter” but “talented, funny, cynical and sweet.”

June 25 – That Meteorological Oddity 35 Years Ago

Prince hit the bigtime, and surprised meteorologists, this day in 1984. Minnesota’s chameleonic star released his most-successful and famous album, the Purple Rain soundtrack (about a month before the movie itself hit the big screen.)

While Prince was already famous and had good sales on his preceding album, 1999, this one put him over the top, eventually selling over 25 million copies worldwide, thereby making it the sixth biggest soundtrack ever. The music won him an Academy Award for movie score and 2 Grammys including the best soundtrack. It stayed on the American album charts for over two years- 122 weeks initially (and more in 2016 when it re-charted as high as #2 after his untimely death.) In the U.S. it sold diamond status- actually 13X platinum, and it was multi-platinum in Canada and Australia as well, being his first #1 album in both. It gave us some of his biggest-and most enduring- hits including the title track, “Let’s Go Crazy” and “When Doves Cry.” Add in “I Would Die 4U”, and you have four U.S. top 10 hits, bested only by Born in the U.S.A. Springsteen among ’84 releases.

The record likely gained some by being the first which credited his backing band The Revolution.While Prince still played a mean guitar, plus piano and “other instruments”, for the first time he got a backing band to add to and expand his sound and ideas. More surprising, not credited but important to the sound was Bob Seger! It’s been well-noted that Prince and Seger were touring around the same time, and to put it politely, Prince was “perplexed” as to the reason Seger’s popularity was enduring. He thus decided to record a Seger-like song, to see if he could duplicate that kind of success. The result was the song, “Purple Rain.”

At the time the soundtrack got good reviews for the most part. Rolling Stone gave it 4-stars, saying “the spirit of Jimi Hendrix must surely smile down on Prince Rogers Nelson…”. Entertainment Weekly a couple of years later rated it a “B”, but said  “soggy rock arrangements and the overblown title track bog it down” but years later altered their opinion to list it as the second best album of all-time by 2013! Likewise, Rolling Stone would three decades later rank it as the 72nd greatest album of all-time, saying it “showcases Prince’s abilities as a guitarist” while singling out “When Doves Cry” for lacking a bass and yet being “unforgettable.” Britain’s The Guardian retroactively gave it a perfect 5-star rating after his death, albeit still considering it only his third best work (they opted for Sign O’The Times as his pinnacle) noting it was a “concise showcase for Prince’s wares, from instant to experimental to epic.” Coupled with a decent, if not thoroughly challenging, job of starring in the movie of the same name, it put Prince front and center as one of the major new talents of the decade.