From 1983, it's Bleecker Street's finest, the fabulous Floor Models, and the broodingly melodic "A Shot in the Dark."
This was essentially recorded in somebody's living room on a home four-track machine, but despite that it, it's pretty slick, I think. (For which I must credit the production assistance of ex-Beatlemania guy David Grahame, who went on in the 90s to co-write that million-selling Mr. Big annoyance "To Be With You").
The sound of it actually reminds me of some of the Marshall Crenshaw demos that have floated around over the years, in particular "My Favorite Waste of Time." Not the song, just the sound.
In any case, "A Shot in the Dark" is by my chum Andy "Folk-Rock" Pasternack [left, with Rickenbacker] and it's sung by the irrepressible Gerry Devine [second from right]. The bass player is on the far right, some guy whose name rhymes with Sleeve Nimels.
We had a couple of tunes I've always suspected could have been hits back in the day, and this is the one I kinda thought had the most commercial potential. Of course, I'm a fairly unreliable judge of these sorts of things. Or as Chuck Barris famously said -- what do I know? I like cold toilet seats.
10 comments:
Very nice Steve! Sounds of course Byrdsish (thank you Rickenbacker) with a little Tom Petty thrown in, and that's good enough for me.
I have a nice little collection of songs by The Floor Models so far. With some more I could make a best of CD, neat heh?
Funny you should mention...
:-)
Holy octaves, Steve, you must really have been cleaning out your closet this weekend to find this. Great to hear it all digitized. A lotta lotta compressor on that twelve-string, huh? Also, a great example of David Grahame's fadeout axiom, "always end the fadeout with the title line in the chorus." If "Let Her Go" ever turns up, he made us do it there also. - AP
That opening riff really wants to turn into "If I Needed Someone," but seriously, nice cut.
Good song. Thanks. But I bet, deep down inside, you really like "To Be With You". It's not that bad a song. Now, "Su Su Sudio" by Phil Collins, THATS A BAD SONG!!!!!!!
To Gummo: It's really flattering to think the intro riff might have led to If I Needed Someone, since I'm afraid it's perilously close to the intro to Here Comes My Girl. - AP
You guys look a lot like a group that played in SF in the late 70s called "No Sisters" (the gimmick was, they were all supposedly brothers; of course, they weren't, but they all looked the same).
Really nice Steve. But, the Ricky sells the song! :)
That is the most egregious headline in the history of journalism, except for one I (almost) wrote for the Trenton Times 20 years ago.
Well?
Spill it, for heaven's sake.
:-)
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