Great Albums: Todd Rundgren's Something/Anything

When I was a teenager, my father used to regale his family with fascinating stories about his co-workers. I guess he thought that they were fascinating. My brother and I used to laugh at the the stories behind his back. I don't remember most of the guys' names, but there was one named "Carmichael". Carmichael was a black dude who worked alongside my dad. One day Dad brought home a record and said that Carmichael had bought his for his own teenage sons, and they didn't like it. So he passed it along and it wound up in our hands. The record was Todd Rundgren's Something/Anything.

You gotta understand: We were listening to things like Zappa, Return to Forever, Crimson, sure, The Beatles, but mostly more obscure stuff. Musically dense, ruthlessly intelligent artists. So when we got this double record of unabashed pop songs, we were not exactly enamoured of it. At first.

At the time Something/Anything was released, Todd was well on the way to becoming one of the most important and in-demand record producers in the industry. He had previously been in the 60's psych group, Nazz, and he had two solo records under his belt. The solo records earned some nice reviews, and a minor hit with We Got to Get You a Woman. No one was prepared for Something/Anything though. I am loath to call any record perfect, but if there are any I've listened to, Something/Anything is on the list.

My brother and I gradually warmed to the album. Only the hardest heart would not be moved by the sweet melodies and catchy songs on Something/Anything. The first song to really blow me away was The Night the Carousel Burned Down. Ostensibly a song about a fire at a merry-go-round, it always felt like it was about something more. About lost youth, and innocence gone, never to be regained.

The two-record set opens with the popular I Saw the Light, which sounds uncannily like Carol King. On his next record, A Wizard, A True Star, Todd screams out "My voice gets so high you would think I was gay/But I play my guitar in such a man-cock way".

Something/Anything, however, is a young man's album, and many of its songs are about wistful crushes. The first side is all ballads, with the exception of the funk-soul number, Wolfman Jack. One tune, Cold Morning Light, is almost unbearably sad. Not the song to listen to when you are aching after a romantic breakup.

Thing start to get weirder on Side 2. It opens with a tongue in cheek monologue about identifying the sounds of the studio. That is, recognizing poor production, mixing, and engineering. It immediately segues into an electronic ditty called Breathless. It sounds hopelessly outdated now, but at the time it was groundbreaking.

Side Two ends on a particularly strange note. The trippy, I Went to the Mirror, is a slow, reflective bluesy psychedelic dirge.

The tempo picks up considerably on the third side. Todd cranks right into Black Maria, a hard rocker that he still uses in concert today when he wants to shred on his guitar. A couple more ballads follow, and the side ends with another arena-worthy, almost metal song called Little Red Lights, which extols the virtues of high speed motoring and the ever-present danger of cops on your heels.

The amazing thing about Sides 1-3 of Something/Anything is not so much that Todd performed all the instruments himself. He wasn't the first to accomplish that. But it was how fast he was doing the songs. It wasn't intended to be a double record, but he was writing and recording songs at a remarkable rate. It's like he could not get them out fast enough, and he was even writing and getting songs completely recorded in one day.

Side 4 was something altogether different. It was recorded at the Power Plant studios, and Todd spontaneously recruited musicians for the songs. Rick Derringer, Moogy Klingman, The Brecker Brothers, Billy Mundi (a former Mother of Invention) were among the players, and amid the various background singers was one Edward Olmos, who later became famous as Edward James Olmos.

The songs on Side 4 took a downright bizarre turn. One, Piss Aaron, is about colorful delinquents at school, You Left Me Sore is a bitter yet compassionate ballad about sexually transmitted disease, and Some Folks is Even Whiter Than Me preaches about the evils of taking the role of leadership. Before Todd collapses in exhaustion, a tarted up, Glam-tinged number called Slut concludes the songs on Something/Anything.

Oh yeah, Todd exhumed an old Nazz song on Side 4, and inadvertently created a pop-rock standard with Hello It's Me.

It's a heady bouquet of songs that run the gamut from pop to operetta to freakish, but Todd makes it all work. With sincerity, great hooks, spot-on performances, and delicate mixing, Todd Rundgren gave the world a beautiful gift with Something/Anything. Forty years later it still feels fresh and relevant.

But no one expected what Todd came up with next. Adventurous listeners embraced A Wizard, A True Star, but pop fans were confounded by its complexity and almost schizophrenic blend of musical styles. That was merely the beginning of the musical journeys that Todd has taken his fans on, and he is still confounding them with 2103's State.

I Love Rock and Roll

I'm not normally one to insist on neat generic classifications of musical styles. Or the type who has to have a book or movie fall solidly into one specific genre. It's like those birdbrain critics who say dumb crap like, "The director doesn't know whether he is making a comedy or a serious picture". Not everything is easily pigeonholed. Thank God.

However, I do think that the term, Rock and Roll, signifies an approach to music. To me, rock and roll is raw. Primitive. Lusty. Dangerous.

Over the years just about anything was considered rock and roll. Aerosmith, Led Zeppelin, and yes, Joan Jett. They rock, sure, but where's the roll? It's like getting a meal of meat and potatoes, and it's all well and good, but where are the rolls?

Rock and Roll began at a time when wild hillbillies discovered the rhythm of black ethnic music. Put these elements together and it turned into a distinctly American phenomenon called Rock and Roll.

Like later phenomena like Punk or Grunge, the real, true life of rock and roll was only a few years old before it became diluted and toned down for sensitive dispositions. That Neil Sedaka crap came along and took the life out of rock and roll. Where it was once rebellious and infused with the exploding libido and anger of discontented youth, it became clean and wholesome.

The Beatles were a rock and roll band before they expanded their musical horizons, but that was later, and their sound had the heavy influence of the Skiffle movement in England.

Few groups really embraced the true essence of rock and roll. Certainly not things like The Stray Cats. Their sound was always too clean, too polished. Sure, Brian Seltzer is an excellent guitarist, but gifted guitar players are a dime a thousand in the music biz. And with rock and roll, it's not always about musical proficiency, but the raw approach of unbridled passion and insanity.

For me, the greatest rock and roll band of all time is The Cramps. They came into prominence in the burgeoning days of Punk in NYC, but their roots were pure rock and roll. And unlike just about very other long-running group, The Cramps never betrayed their deranged roots. Their music did tighten up as the years went on, but they maintained the essence of what rock and roll stood for when it was born. Which many feel is a song called Rocket 88, by Ike Turner's Rhythm Kings.

In short, what many call Rockabilly is what I consider to be genuine rock and roll.