Christopher Cross "The Best of Christopher Cross" (1991): Track by Track!

This week, Jason and Dee set a course for smooth waters as they dive into the world of Yacht Rock pioneer Christopher Cross, exploring his 1991 Greatest Hits collection. Track by track, they unravel the stories behind the songs—from the serene escape of “Sailing” to the driving groove of “Ride Like the Wind.” They dig into Cross’s unexpected rise, the pressure of sudden fame, and the quiet drama behind an artist who became the face of a genre he never asked to invent. Along the way, they cruise through his massive pop culture impact, including “Arthur’s Theme (Best That You Can Do)”—the Oscar-winning ballad that defined an era of soft-focus romance and late-night radio. Was Christopher Cross simply soft rock… or something far more influential? And this is just the beginning. Episode One of a two-part Yacht Rock showdown!

Next week, Jason and Dee climb aboard with fellow 80s soft rock legends Air Supply and their 1983 Greatest Hits. When the final notes fade, only one will earn Final Judgment… Who truly rules the smooth seas of the 80s?

All aboard. It’s time to set sail. ⛵️

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:15):
What's in your life?

Speaker 2 (00:17):
You find pocus the turn, You're harder round than next thing.

Speaker 1 (00:24):
You know your less.

Speaker 2 (00:28):
Every week.

Speaker 3 (00:31):
Shooting the serious.

Speaker 1 (00:35):
Sad he Stampa, Jason.

Speaker 3 (00:43):
Stamford, that's serious, man, it's not gold shoes.

Speaker 1 (00:53):
Make as soon as your old fountcy.

Speaker 4 (01:01):
From me here for retreat, all right, d You and

(01:27):
I have talked about who has had the greatest twenty
four hours in the eighties, and we talked about Billy
Joel having it where he came home and in his
apartment waiting for him was both Christy Brinkley and El McPherson.

Speaker 2 (01:40):
Yes.

Speaker 4 (01:41):
We also talked about how Lionel Richie hosted the AMAS
and then afterwards he wrote we are the World and
everybody came together and made this incredible song. I now
have a new nominee for greatest twenty four hours in
the nineteen eighties.

Speaker 2 (01:53):
Okay, okay, yeah.

Speaker 4 (01:54):
February twenty fifth, nineteen eighty one the Grammys, Christopher Cross,
in a clean sweep, wins Record of the Year, Song
of the Year, Album of the Year, New Artist, and
also just throw in best arrangement on a song right
for kicks He cleans up Yes. In the eighty one Grammys.

Speaker 5 (02:18):
Had never been done before and wasn't done again for
almost forty years. Billie Eilish did it in twenty twenty.

Speaker 2 (02:25):
There you Go, Yeah, heck V and night Man. Yeah.

Speaker 4 (02:28):
So today, everybody, welcome to the Shirley Can't Be Serious
podcast where we're talking about Christopher Cross.

Speaker 1 (02:38):
Takes me all.

Speaker 2 (02:45):
The Christopher Cross.

Speaker 4 (02:46):
Christopherross, our patreons clamored for this matchup. I mean, am
I true or no?

Speaker 2 (02:54):
It was a dead heat between this one in Chicago
and Survivor.

Speaker 1 (02:57):
It really was.

Speaker 4 (02:58):
So this week we are starting our compare of Christopher
Cross's Greatest tits yep to Air Supplies Greatest Tits too.

Speaker 5 (03:05):
We know we are normally a hard if we're going
to do rock and not do pop, we're normally a
hard rock.

Speaker 2 (03:10):
Approaching heavy metal kind of duo. Us.

Speaker 5 (03:13):
We haven't done a whole lot of soft rock. As
a matter of fact, I couldn't think of any soft
rock that we've done. But I would say these are,
if you want to call them guilty pleasures, these are
my guilty pleasure soft rock guys Air Supply and Christopher
Cross turn it up.

Speaker 2 (03:28):
Baby, I don't care, we don't care. We don't care.

Speaker 5 (03:31):
Okay, But for those of you who are not into
the soft rock, like Jeff Johnson, yes, who called us
out over Shirley Fest and was like, what what are
you guys doing? You're going to do Christopher Cross? Now
it's October two? Yes, do you have anything to say
to me?

Speaker 4 (03:46):
Almost?

Speaker 2 (03:47):
Yeah, kissing your forties, goodbye? Have your birthday?

Speaker 5 (03:50):
Yeah, my birthday tomorrow And I've mentioned this before. I
share a birthday with Tommy Lee, Frank Hannon, and Stee
Ray Vaughan.

Speaker 2 (03:57):
We're going to talk about here.

Speaker 5 (03:58):
Well, I'm going to talk about him right now, ok
right now, because this is this is relevant to today's podcast.

Speaker 2 (04:04):
All right.

Speaker 5 (04:04):
Yeah, So Steve Ravon back in nineteen seventy four was nobody.
He was still playing with club bands, had not gotten
Double Trouble together. I mean, he was well known as
a blues guy, but nobody cared about the blues at
this point in history. He was literally borrowing a guitar
from the guitar shop just to play in his gigs.
He was playing Get this. He was playing with Steven Tobolowski.

Speaker 2 (04:27):
Is that name ring a bell for you? You don't
remember him? Well, he is sure heck fire remembers you.
Oh my gosh, ned Head, Ned get Ahead, Ned Needleman,
Ned Myerson.

Speaker 5 (04:41):
Was in fact in a band with Stevie Rayvaughn at
some point, not even kidding this, all right, I'm not kidding,
but that's.

Speaker 4 (04:48):
About five seconds and you've blown my mind.

Speaker 2 (04:50):
OK, So that's where Stevie Rayvaughn was.

Speaker 5 (04:52):
Right Now, if you know Stevie Rayvon, or if you
happen to be a guitar player and just are familiar
with some of the more iconic guitars in history, his
is one of the most iconic. Very clearly, everybody will
recognize it because it has his initials sr V stickered
onto the pickguard of the guitar. Now, little side note,
the guy he had go get his stickers actually couldn't

(05:14):
find a V.

Speaker 2 (05:14):
It's actually a you, which is why it's very rounded.
And who knew at the time.

Speaker 5 (05:22):
Right, So, back in nineteen seventy four, Stevie ray Vaughan
bought this guitar second hand. It's a secondhand guitar. Now,
this is the guitar he called the wife. This is
his number one guitar, and you look at it today.
It's in the Texas Music museum down there, and the
finish is completely worn off where he's just hit it

(05:42):
so many times with pick it's got cigarette burns in
the head. The head of it actually broke and had
to be replaced with something else. Right, But this is
the guitar that he played as his main guitar for
his entire career. And we all know how good that sounds, right, Yeah,
for sure. Now here's the rest of the story. It
had been traded the day before Stevie ray Vaughn bought it.

(06:06):
It had been traded to the guitar store by Christopher Cross.

Speaker 1 (06:10):
What there you go?

Speaker 6 (06:12):
What?

Speaker 5 (06:13):
Christopher Cross wanted a beefier guitar. He had been playing
this Fender and he wanted a beefier guitar, and so
he went in and traded his Fender Strat for a
gibson less Paul. What And it's this fifty nine gibson
less Paul that he got that he plays on the
first song that we're going to talk about today. And

(06:33):
let me just tell you in this in researching this episode,
I think I can say with confidence Christopher Cross is
the most underrated guitar legend that has ever been big
in the music industry. I mean, we talked about it
with Prince, but Prince you still I mean, you've got
let's go crazy. You've got the solo that he did
when they covered my Guitar went gently weeps. I mean,

(06:56):
he's obviously a musical genius, but Christopher Cross, nobody thinks
about him playing guitar other than they happen to have
seen him on stage with a guitar in his hand.
But when we get to the first song that we're
about to cover, we're gonna talk about the guitar solo
at the end of it, and it's and I think
minds are going to be blown. Let's get into it, man,
all right, let's go all right. We are covering Christopher
Cross's greatest hits. Yes, so this is an album that

(07:17):
came out in nineteen ninety one, so we're going right
down the track listing.

Speaker 2 (07:20):
Yep.

Speaker 4 (07:20):
However, there are a few songs where I'm like, eh.

Speaker 2 (07:23):
I had the same thought.

Speaker 5 (07:24):
I've got a challenge for you, all right, Yeah, I
think there are probably three songs on this album that
could have been replaced with better hits by Christopher Cross.
Would you to tell me which three songs? And there
are three songs you would replace.

Speaker 4 (07:36):
You're on Okay, let's go to song number one. That
song is called Ride Like the Wind. I bought this

(08:00):
week I'm on the rout, no tame snep Okay.

Speaker 5 (08:06):
So one of the highlights of Shirley Fest, which was
just happened this past weekend, was when Jeff Johnson was
calling us out on covering Christopher Cross and we're like,
what about Ride Like the Wind? And he said what
and we said Ride Like the Wind and played it
and he was like, oh my gosh, I had no
idea that this was Christopher Cross.

Speaker 2 (08:24):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (08:24):
I talked to him today and he was like, he goes.
When I said I didn't like Christopher Cross, He's like,
I remember the like slow motion turning. He goes, And
then he dropped the needle on Ride Like the Wind,
and he goes. I had no idea that was Christopher Cross.
What a great song.

Speaker 1 (08:44):
And win.

Speaker 5 (08:59):
This is the debut single off of his debut album
went to number two, was kept out of the number
one spot by Blondie four I Believe four weeks four weeks,
which he said was not fair because Blondie only released
that song as a single. You didn't have to go
buy the whole album. You can only buy a single.
It had more album sales than his did, right hey, okay, yes,

(09:22):
that's all true.

Speaker 4 (09:23):
I gotta give you this top ten though, oh heck, yes, yes,
so there's some surely stuff going on right here. Okay,
of course, yes, so, as you said. This song was
released in January of nineteen eighty. It reaches number two
April twenty sixth, nineteen eighty. Here's your top nine. I'm
gonna give you nine, okay, yeah, so number nine You
May be Right by Billy Joel Love It. Number eight
I Can't Tell You Why by the Eagles.

Speaker 2 (09:45):
Okay, great, yepkay.

Speaker 4 (09:47):
Number seven fire Lake by Bob Seger. We just talked
about how we both kind of love that song exactly.

Speaker 2 (09:53):
Yes.

Speaker 4 (09:54):
Number six Lost in Love by Their Supply, Their Supply.
Number five Special by Ray Goodman and Brown.

Speaker 2 (10:03):
Don't recall that one.

Speaker 4 (10:04):
Just listen to that song? Yeah, horrible, ri, I'm like,
what are we doing here?

Speaker 1 (10:09):
All right?

Speaker 2 (10:10):
Okay? Yeah?

Speaker 4 (10:11):
Number four with You I'm Born Again by Billy Preston
and Serrita. Okay, I listened to that one. What are
we doing people?

Speaker 2 (10:18):
Okay? All right?

Speaker 5 (10:19):
Well we I mean we talked about when we did
our top five of nineteen eighty it was it was
a tough little rough and this is the beginning of
nineteen eighty.

Speaker 4 (10:26):
One, right, this is like the remnants of the seventies. Okay, Okay,
number three another brick in the wall, of course. Yes,
then you've got right like the wind and call me some.

Speaker 5 (10:34):
Stinkers, but some absolutely Mount Rushmore kind of exactly right.

Speaker 2 (10:38):
Sure, yeah, Okay.

Speaker 4 (10:39):
So I would listened to an interview with Christopher Cross
and he did say my clock may be off just
a bit on the chronology. He did say that they
held his first album until after Christmas nineteen seventy nine. Okay, Okay,
I show that it was released in nineteen seventy nine.

Speaker 2 (10:54):
Okay, I'm going to make the.

Speaker 4 (10:55):
Case that this is the last great album of the seventies. Okay,
So the competition is an album by Utopia.

Speaker 5 (11:05):
Okay, we're saying this is what the last week of
nineteen seventy.

Speaker 4 (11:07):
Nineteen seventeen, and last week in nineteen seventy nine. Okay,
you have another album by Neil Diamond called September one.

Speaker 2 (11:14):
Okay.

Speaker 4 (11:14):
I didn't recognize anything on that hot all right, I'm
not saying it's not great. I don't recognize it. And
then you have the clash London calling but that was
like a week earlier. Okay, so great album, not the
last great album.

Speaker 2 (11:26):
Though, Okay, okay, go yeah, okay, okay, So here's a
story on this. Tell me.

Speaker 5 (11:30):
So we've established that Christopher Cross is a great guitarist,
and we're going to learn more about that when we
look at the end of this song. But he was
so good that when Deep Purple came down to Houston
and Richie Blackmore got sick and couldn't play, they were
going to cancel the show. And somebody said, hey, there's

(11:51):
this kid not only can shred the guitar, he knows
all of your Deep Purple songs. And that kid was Christopher.

Speaker 4 (11:59):
Christ Cross Christopher Gebert at that time. Yes, right, yes,
you're right. They denied this for years and years and years. Yeah,
and then at the end of Deep Purple's career they
finally acknowledged it. Richie Blackmore said, you know, I've had
people kind of step in and kind of help me
on stage a little bit here and there, he goes,
but I've never had anybody sub for me. And he goes,

(12:19):
you're the only one, and.

Speaker 2 (12:20):
Did you tell me that? Like they put him in
a wig and and like it did it tried to
disguise him.

Speaker 5 (12:27):
Okay, yeah, I mean I think he actually had long
hair at that point in time in history.

Speaker 4 (12:30):
But they did not call attention to the fact that
it was not Richie blackmore.

Speaker 5 (12:34):
Right, They did not say, introducing Christopher Gebbert on guitar, right, Okay,
so he was that good. He's playing for a lot
of guys, you know, just a great guitarist. He actually
started as a drummer ball getting ino that later. But
he's he's playing guitar and doing very well. But there's
only so much money that can be made playing guitar
and bands in the late seventies, right, right, And so

(12:55):
he started he's an entrepreneur. He started a little side
business selling weed, of course, and he sold so much
weed that by the mid to late seventies he had
accumulated fifty thousand dollars that he had in the Broadway bank.

Speaker 2 (13:15):
Right.

Speaker 5 (13:16):
With that fifty thousand dollars, he decided, Okay, I need
to get a good demo. He bought himself at eight Track.
He knew a guy down in Austin who was opening
a brand new studio. So he has a buddy, Steve Shields,
who is building a full professional recording studio down in Austin,
and he just says, hey, can I bring my own
equipment in at a time that you're not recording, like

(13:37):
five am? Let me come in at five am and
I'll record my demo with my own equipment. I just
need to be in your space to have that, you know,
because they build it to have the best sound, right.

Speaker 2 (13:45):
Sure.

Speaker 5 (13:46):
And so he's playing in clubs seven nights a week.
One of the songs that he's covering is a song
called nineteen hundred and eighty five by Wings.

Speaker 4 (13:54):
You sent this to me today, Yes, I was blown away.

Speaker 5 (13:58):
Okay, So when you're in band and you have to
play seven nights a week, you have to do things
to extend your set. I mean you just you find
there's only so many songs that you can learn, and
so you're like, okay, what can we do to extend
the song? Now, nineteen hundred and eighty five is already
like a five minute and forty second long song, but
there's this.

Speaker 4 (14:17):
Break at about three forty in before you play that
clip dyes. Is it weird to think that there was
a time when they were writing about the future being
nineteen hundred and eighty five?

Speaker 5 (14:29):
Yeah, okay, So about three thirty five that piano drop happens,
and then the guitar solo starts happenings in C minor,

(14:49):
and so to extend the song, Christopher Cross is playing
extra stuff and he's developing his own riffs. Okay, so
they've played for seven nights. He's got this kind of riff.
They're driving from Houston to Austin so that they can
get to the studio by five am to do their
recording like they plan to, and on the way, he
decides to drop some acid.

Speaker 2 (15:10):
Because why not.

Speaker 5 (15:12):
It was the seventies, man, I mean, what else are
you gonna do? So he drops some acid, and on
the way he is thinking about this riff that he's
been playing over this nineteen hundred and eighty five song,
and he comes up with a plan for a new
song called ride like the Wind Wind. He writes it

(15:34):
in red marker on a yellow notepad as they drive
from Houston to Austin, and he's tripping balls.

Speaker 2 (15:42):
Right.

Speaker 5 (15:43):
It's about a guy who is sentenced to death, who
is riding like the wind to get down to Mexico
to escape the justice.

Speaker 4 (15:50):
I love it man, It's kind of that cowboy feel well. Yes, Okay,
Michael McDonald sings the answer back in the chorus in
this song Okay. The Doobie Brothers were recording taking it
to the streets, like in the studio next door, and
he said, Michael McDonald poked in one day and it's
just like, Hey, what's going on over here, guys? And
he said he said it was kind of heartbreaking for
Michael McDonald because he's like, I like what you guys

(16:13):
are doing over here better than I like what's going
on over there?

Speaker 2 (16:15):
Oh wow.

Speaker 4 (16:16):
And so he's like, listen, if you need me to
sing a little bit, help you out.

Speaker 2 (16:20):
Yep.

Speaker 5 (16:21):
He actually started by singing on a different song.

Speaker 2 (16:23):
Yep.

Speaker 5 (16:24):
Christopher Cross had sang both the question and the answer
on this deal and they were like, I wonder if
we can get Michael McDonald to come back so good?

Speaker 2 (16:32):
Right? Yeah?

Speaker 4 (16:32):
You know who Elso sings on this track right here?
Tell me Don Henley, shut up, Don Henley?

Speaker 6 (16:38):
What?

Speaker 2 (16:39):
Yeah?

Speaker 4 (16:39):
So he sings back up on this track.

Speaker 2 (16:41):
I did not know that, yes, wow.

Speaker 4 (16:44):
So The interviewer was saying, how did you get Don Hiley? Dude,
like you were a first time artist, you get Don
Hilly the Eagles? He said, well, he's a Texan and
I'm a Texan and Texan support each other.

Speaker 2 (16:54):
Wow. Yeah, that is wow. That's great.

Speaker 5 (16:56):
All right, so real quick before we leave, Yes, I
have to talk about this the solo at the end.
Let's talk about this solo is fantastic. If you want
to get the full treatment, check out Rick Biatto's web page.
This one's got like three point three million views. As
he he says, this is an incredible solo that.

Speaker 2 (17:16):
You can't hear.

Speaker 4 (17:17):
Can't hear it.

Speaker 5 (17:18):
You can't hear it because they turned Michael McDonald all
the way up and they turned his guitar at five.

Speaker 2 (17:23):
Right, and it is freaking brilliant.

Speaker 5 (17:25):
And I mean, as Rick Biotto is is is trying
to play and listen and he was able to pull
the track like he got the stem tracks and he
was able to pull it and hear it. He's he's
throwing out names like this is Angus Young, this is
Terry caff.

Speaker 2 (17:39):
This is Jimmy Page. You know, he is just throwing
out and.

Speaker 5 (17:42):
He's right, These guitar licks that Christopher Cross is doing
are just amazing, and it's completely covered up by a
loud piano and allowed Michael McDonald and I'm really glad
apparently like Christopher Cross. Like when Rick Biotto put this
video out, like everybody started blasting Christopher Cross with that.
So Christopher Cross showed up at Rick Biatto's place.

Speaker 2 (18:03):
And was like, let's talk about it.

Speaker 5 (18:05):
And so they talk and he was like, honestly, it
didn't even occur to me that it was a problem
because he's so he was intimidated when they got there, which,
by the way, the intimidation that they all felt because
they're new musicians in this space is why we have
this unmistakable.

Speaker 1 (18:21):
Four on the floor boom boom, boom.

Speaker 5 (18:24):
Boom, because the producer was like, listen, guys, let's just
give something on every beat so that you've got it
and you're not getting you know, you're not losing your
place and all this other stuff. But he's very like
I wouldn't say insecure, but he's humble about his own
guitar playing. And I can't blame him because Eric Johnson
plays on some of these songs. Steve Lucather plays on
some of these songs. I mean, he's a smart guy.
He is surrounding himself with the best in the industry.

(18:45):
So Lily, this guy has amazing chops that nobody knows about.
Because he just said, you know, here's my first one.
I'll play this solo on this one, and now we're
just gonna get people better than me.

Speaker 4 (18:55):
That sounds like the end of Running with the Night
with Leona Ritchie, where Steve Lugather is just going crazy.

Speaker 5 (19:01):
Yes, and he's he's blisteringly good that you can only
hear every once in a while. And he said, didn't
think about it. What we were trying to do was
create a wall of sound. They were trying to do
the Phil Spector, you know, just and they it was
a wall of sound. It was just he was the
mortar instead of the brick.

Speaker 4 (19:16):
He is a huge Beach Boys fan.

Speaker 2 (19:19):
Yeah, there you go. Okay, next song, next song.

Speaker 4 (19:22):
Next song on this album is a song called all Right.

Speaker 1 (19:39):
I Know noa song you.

Speaker 2 (19:44):
Okay. It's nineteen eighty three.

Speaker 5 (19:45):
Yes, you're watching the nc Double A Division one Men's playoffs, Yes, okay,
and you might be watching because there's this incredible player
from North Carolina named Michael Jordan. That's true, but you
probably weren't because not that many I mean, unless you're
from North Carolina or we're just a big basketball fan.
He was just like this kid who is up and coming. Yeah,

(20:07):
it was probably even less likely that you were there
for North Carolina State.

Speaker 2 (20:11):
Now without a doubt.

Speaker 5 (20:12):
Okay, yes, And it's the finals and they're against Houston
and they're eight point underdogs, and I watched the end
of this game and it's one of the most memorable
moments in NCAA playoff history. Right, they are cornering them
up by the half court like they're doing everything they
can not to get fouled.

Speaker 2 (20:32):
The game is tied.

Speaker 5 (20:33):
Finally, like last two seconds, chunks one up from deep
rare a deep deep shot, and it arcs and falls short,
but Lorenzo Charles is right under the goal, jumps up,
grabs it, and slams it in at the last second,
and they win the game, beating Houston. Now, I say
all that to say a few minutes later you have

(20:54):
britt Musburger introducing the highlight video and what songs should
be playing with highlight video.

Speaker 2 (21:01):
But alright, by Christopher Crawling.

Speaker 1 (21:05):
All right.

Speaker 5 (21:07):
Again, just.

Speaker 4 (21:14):
First of all, I love that song and that game.
I mean Jim Balvano, the coach for North Carolina State.
I could still see him running around the court, look like.

Speaker 2 (21:25):
What just happened?

Speaker 7 (21:26):
What you know?

Speaker 4 (21:28):
And on that Houston team you have Clyde Drexler and
Keim Alaj Want me like these guys, I slam a
jam and that is an all timer team.

Speaker 2 (21:35):
Yes.

Speaker 4 (21:36):
I heard a guy say that Orson Wells would skip breakfast, lunch,
and dinner before North Carolina State would beat Houston, and
of course they did. Yeah, Okay, I've got a trivia
question for you regarding this song. I think I gave
it to you the other night. You did, and I
called my buddy Jim Butler, and I called David Wright.

Speaker 2 (21:54):
This is the question.

Speaker 4 (21:55):
Name the five songs in the eighties that have debuted
on the Hot one hundred at number twenty nine or higher.

Speaker 2 (22:02):
I'll give you one. This is one, right, Okay? Was
this one twenty nine? Twenty nine? Okay?

Speaker 4 (22:07):
This debuted at number twenty nine when it like, literally
you release it, it's number twenty nine on the charts.

Speaker 2 (22:12):
Yeah.

Speaker 5 (22:12):
So when you asked me this question, it took me
about five seconds to go Thriller, and you were like, yes,
because that one.

Speaker 2 (22:19):
We know the history on that, Like they didn't.

Speaker 5 (22:21):
Even want to release Thriller as a single, but the
album was doing incredible. They were making this incredible video.
You know that was planned, and so I can see
release that as a single. It's gonna be it's gonna
be debuting very high, very high.

Speaker 6 (22:33):
And what was it.

Speaker 4 (22:34):
We're twenty twenty. That's the highest release Thriller and it
like a bullet, okay, but Thriller only moved up sixteen places.
It never yeah, number one, number.

Speaker 2 (22:44):
One, that's crazy. And then you said there was there
was a duo. There was a duet.

Speaker 5 (22:50):
A duet, that's right, Yes, a duet, like two guys
who didn't normally sing together. That's true, right, not the
Righteous Brothers, that's right, that's right.

Speaker 4 (22:57):
Okay, So a duet, yes, And then we're gonna say
a special circumstance, a special circumstance.

Speaker 2 (23:05):
Okay.

Speaker 5 (23:05):
So it took some clues and you did, you did
go well, one of them's one we're studying now. I'm like, okay,
Christopher Cross, but it did not. I could not have
told you it was this song. For sure, right, but
he was on so much fire from that debut album, Huge,
like sweeps the Grammys, like, I mean, it's crazy and
Arthur's theme don't forget that. Yeah, Arthur's thing comes in,
it wins, the Oscar almost wins a bunch of Grammys itself. Sure,

(23:28):
And so I'm like, okay, Dot Duet, I got nothing
and You're like, we've covered one of their songs. I'm like, man,
And then I think of Paul McCartney and Michael Jackson
and I'm like is it the girl is mine? And
You're like no, And I'm like is it and you.

Speaker 4 (23:46):
Said yes, say Say s debut at number twenty.

Speaker 5 (23:49):
Six, okay, and then you then there was a band
that was involved, and I think on this one, I
don't remember how far along on this one, but we
had talked about it over the weekend and we talked
about covering this band and I was like, is it
min at work?

Speaker 2 (24:06):
And that is what it was? Overkill number twenty eight.
That was a shocker to me.

Speaker 5 (24:11):
Yes, okay, And I think I guessed the other one
and I just brought the album in here and we
were just talking about it moments ago with Lionel Richie's Okay,
just brought the album in here and you get it
in front of the camera. There is thank you, Christopher Weber,
you got that for me last year. We're putting it
on the wall now. But Lionel Richie's best twenty four

(24:34):
hours this song, what did this debut?

Speaker 4 (24:37):
We Are the World debuted at number twenty one.

Speaker 2 (24:41):
Nice.

Speaker 4 (24:42):
Nice, but let's not let all right get buried in.
This debuted at number twenty nine. That's incredible.

Speaker 2 (24:47):
This is incredible.

Speaker 4 (24:48):
So and it's the first single off the second album
of Christopher Cross. Jeff Piccaro, Mike Piccaro, and Steve Lucather
play on this song.

Speaker 5 (24:56):
Three of the key members of Toto also played on
Eler by the way. They sure did, all of them,
They sure did.

Speaker 4 (25:03):
This was the last song written for that second album, okay,
because they were trying to They looked at her and
they're like, we need something a little radio friendly, uh huh,
And here.

Speaker 5 (25:12):
You got for nineteen eighty what was it three four
eighty three in nineteen eighty three. This is very radio friendly.
So this nineteen eighty seven not radio friendly.

Speaker 4 (25:21):
At all, exactly right. Yeah, So, as we've talked, I
mean eighty three, eighty four pretty stacked with hits. Yeah, okay,
I just want to roll through this real quick, all right.
Peaks out at number twelve, okay, okay. Number eleven as
you Are by Lionel Richie Powerhouse in the eighties. Sure,
Number ten maybe one of the worst songs of the
nineteen eighties, passed the Duchy by Musical Youth.

Speaker 2 (25:43):
I don't remember that one.

Speaker 4 (25:45):
Number nine back on the Chain Gang by the Pretenders.

Speaker 2 (25:48):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (25:48):
Number eight we've got tonight Kenny Rogers and Sheena Easton right.
Number seven You and I by Eddie Rabbit and Crystal Gail. Okay, yeah,
I remember, Hey, okay, Number six Bay come to me?

Speaker 2 (26:02):
No, all right?

Speaker 4 (26:03):
Number five hungry like the Wolf.

Speaker 1 (26:04):
Sure?

Speaker 4 (26:05):
Number four, do you really want to hurt me? Culture
Club or Ectric Club? Number three Straight Cat Strut by
the Straight Cats had that LP by the way, Yeah.
Number two Shame on the Moon okay, Bob Seeger Yeah.
And number one Billy Gene. Oh of course you were
not knocking Michael Jackson off that perch.

Speaker 2 (26:24):
No, I didn't realize that the Shame on the Moon
got so high. Number two. Yeah, that's that's impressive.

Speaker 4 (26:29):
So by the way, just a little tidbit, yeah, all
right by Christopher Cross was used for the NCAA Highlight
Reel for a few years until one Shining Moment came
and took over.

Speaker 2 (26:42):
Okay, all right.

Speaker 4 (26:44):
Next song on the album is a song called Someday.

Speaker 2 (27:00):
So we think.

Speaker 5 (27:10):
I feel like this could have been used as the
introduction for some eighties sitcom.

Speaker 2 (27:15):
I agree with you, like Empty Nest or something like that.

Speaker 5 (27:17):
Like I can see people doing the freeze frame and
the little name going underneath them, you know, oh, you
know what? You know how they do that with Predator?
Like they changed that, Yeah, the end of Predator. Yes,
it's got that. That would be a perfect song to
throw on the end of Predator to see if it works.

Speaker 2 (27:33):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (27:34):
I can see that, you know, used at the end
and the Facts of Life or something like that.

Speaker 2 (27:38):
I am totally gonna do that. I want to find
a way to do that.

Speaker 4 (27:40):
This song came out in nineteen eighty eighth. It doesn't
really feel like nineteen eighty eight to me.

Speaker 5 (27:47):
No, that's and that's why I was saying where this
would have been radio friendly in eighty three, not an
eighty seven, not an eighty eight.

Speaker 4 (27:53):
Okay, I'm going to say this is where we drop
in our first.

Speaker 5 (27:57):
Replacement replacement song. I think you're right, Okay, you're taking
out some day? Yes, what are you putting in its place?

Speaker 4 (28:03):
Let's go with swept Away?

Speaker 6 (28:05):
Okay, never anything at the Smoothfast?

Speaker 1 (28:17):
Did we look in a shed?

Speaker 7 (28:19):
And Mike Malass, I guess I'll let it shoo because
you're smile toomy.

Speaker 5 (28:28):
So ironically, since I just said that, the other song
that we threw out could have been used for a
sitcom if you happen to remember Season three of Growing Pains,
episodes one and two, where the Seaver family go to
Hawaii for for Sure. Kirk Cameron aka Mike Seaver, immediately
upon arrival falls in love with a beautiful Hawaiian tour guide,

(28:52):
and the montage that follows plays this song from beginning
till end. I just have to think like they were,
just like, hey, guys, we're rocking the networks right now.
How about you give us a free vacation, and you
guys fell away find a way to fill up a
bunch of space so that we don't have to talk much. Okay,
we're going to do a love montage with Christopher Cross

(29:15):
swept away, playing through the entire thing.

Speaker 4 (29:18):
I know, right, So I told you this is like
the ballad of Mike' sever Right. So he's looking at
this little Hawaiian girl who's like giving the tour, and.

Speaker 2 (29:27):
She's beautiful and all gorgeous.

Speaker 4 (29:29):
Yeah, and I could see where a you know, seventeen
or eighteen year old boy be like, eh, I slept way.

Speaker 2 (29:34):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (29:35):
I went to Kawai a few years ago and I
went to a hamburger stand there in Kawai.

Speaker 5 (29:42):
And you've talked about this on our what third episode
I think is because we talked about Raiders of the
Lost Ark.

Speaker 2 (29:47):
That's right.

Speaker 4 (29:48):
It was right by the mountain that the beginning of
Raiders of the Lost Ark is filmed out. Yes, And
there's a little hamburger stand there and their number one
seller is an Island Girl and it's a burger with
with pineapple and cheese on is great. So when you
buy the burger, you walk up to the front and
you say, I'd like to take an Island Girl home
with me tonight, and we all.

Speaker 2 (30:12):
How about a burger instead? Okay? All right.

Speaker 4 (30:16):
Next song on the album is a song called Love
Is Love.

Speaker 1 (30:36):
Shook Him Up.

Speaker 5 (30:39):
Town I can see Jason finally dancing with Catherine Colvin,
who's been begging him to dance for years now. It's
a little Hawaiian shirt on and a little hip shaken
with This song is love, man, they give it so
we didn't mention that in a ride like the Wind.
It starts off with the breeze blowing. You got that,

(31:00):
but it's very subtle. They're like, we're worried it was
gonna be a little too cheesy, but we just kept
it low and it's music comes in quick. This one
has the sounds of birds and waves and seagulls. Yeah, yeah,
you're out on You're out on the beach pretty quickly
into the song.

Speaker 4 (31:14):
I mean, put a lay around my neck, give me
a drink with an umbrella in it, let's go to
the beach.

Speaker 1 (31:19):
I'm good with it.

Speaker 2 (31:20):
Yeah, I'm good with it.

Speaker 5 (31:21):
No, Yeah, I'm surprised. I'm surprised it wasn't used in Cocktail.

Speaker 2 (31:26):
Love is love in any language, right.

Speaker 4 (31:28):
Yeah, not his best work, but still an okay song.

Speaker 2 (31:44):
Yeah, this is a decent song. I like it.

Speaker 5 (31:47):
I wouldn't kick it off of the album, right, We'll
leave it on the beach. But I mean, definitely. If
I'm on the beach this thing comes on, I'm letting
it play out and I'm drinking my Pina colada.

Speaker 2 (31:56):
Yeah, okay, next song on the album. Next song on
the album is Words of Wisdom.

Speaker 3 (32:06):
Hockeysten just because of Pain to the side.

Speaker 1 (32:18):
Another huh.

Speaker 5 (32:20):
Okay, So this stuff is second album, last song on
the album, and for my money, it is fantastic.

Speaker 2 (32:28):
I love this is This is pure Christopher Cross for me.
Just love it.

Speaker 5 (32:33):
Song about how people try to keep giving you words
of wisdom whenever somebody's broken up with you, and they
all sound the same and it doesn't ease the pain.

Speaker 4 (32:43):
He has the voice of an angel.

Speaker 2 (32:45):
He really does. I mean, it's a beautiful, beautiful voice.

Speaker 6 (32:47):
It is.

Speaker 4 (32:48):
It's in that upper register.

Speaker 2 (32:49):
Uh huh. And he can go even higher.

Speaker 5 (32:51):
There are a few of these songs where he like
he takes it up another notch and I'm just like, dang, Yeah,
it's not even a struggle. You know, he's not straining.
It's just like he's just gonna go there and it's
gonna be casual for him. He has got incredible range.

Speaker 4 (33:02):
Yeah, I heard him talk about this album. He did
go to Ballatown a little bit in this album, but
he said, listen, this is the process that I went through.
These are the songs that I wrote. They tried to
make me, turn me into kind of a rock artist
my third album, but this is where I.

Speaker 2 (33:17):
Was at the time, and that's that's cool.

Speaker 5 (33:18):
So he can shred like Richie Blackmore, but that's not
what he wants to do. He loved Joni Mitchell, like, yeah,
he grew up. He loves Steely Dan, by the way.
On the note that he is an incredible guitarist. Steely
Dan tried to get him to come play on their stuff.

Speaker 4 (33:34):
I know.

Speaker 2 (33:35):
Steely Dan is known.

Speaker 5 (33:36):
For being hyper hyper critical about getting the best musicians
to they come play guitar, and he's like, I'm not
good enough to do that. Yeah, it's incredible, but this
song is I mean, it's beautiful. It pulls at your
heart strings. You can identify with the emotion that he's
going through.

Speaker 2 (33:52):
The melody is a hook. It's just all wonderful from
beginning to the.

Speaker 4 (33:57):
Meteoric rise that he went through for he literally playing
fraternity parties and super small clubs to opening for the Eagles,
and Bonnie Ray was so quick and so fast I mean,
you kind of need words of wisdom. But you know,
the interesting thing is how he got discovered. Do you
know this story? So he's like, all I want is

(34:19):
a record deal. How do I get a record deal?
So he looks in Billboard magazine and he was a
big fan of Warner Brothers because he liked Jenny Mitchell
and he liked he liked Jimmy Hendricks. He's like, okay, well,
I'd like to be a part of Warner Brothers. So
he sees the name mo Osting and he's like, well,
that guy gets tapes all day long. I can't send
it to him. So right under that was his assistant.

(34:41):
So he's like, well, I'll send my tape to his assistant.
His assistant's name is David Berson, good old Dave. So
Dave's his assistant. He's like, well, I'll send him the
tape instead. Well, Dave never gets tapes. He's in administration.
He has nothing to do with an R. So Dave
gets a tape. He's like, holy cow, somebody said munt tape.

Speaker 2 (35:02):
So he listens to it. He likes it.

Speaker 4 (35:05):
So Dave goes to lunch with the head of A
and R. His name is Lenny Warner Cruz and Lenny's like, dude,
I get tapes all day long, every day. Plus we're
not accepting anything new right now. Dave's like, no, dude,
you've got to hear this guy's got a great voice,
and basically insists, and they're in the car and turns
it like push it in. You're listening to this, And

(35:26):
so Lenny listens to it and he's like, yeah, this
guy's got a voice for radio, you know. And he's like,
I'm not really sure about the songs, but his voice
is terrific. He compared him to James Taylor, and so
Lenny goes on later and says, if he would have
sent it to the A and R Department, it would
have been instantly rejected, but instead found a way around.

Speaker 2 (35:47):
Brilliant.

Speaker 5 (35:48):
That's freaking brilliant, incredible, right, Yeah, that's awesome.

Speaker 2 (35:51):
All right.

Speaker 4 (35:51):
The next song on the album is a song called
say You'll be Mine?

Speaker 2 (36:14):
What do you think?

Speaker 1 (36:14):
I dig it?

Speaker 5 (36:15):
I dig it too, man. This is Christopher Gross giving
a little gravel to his voice. You know, we talked
about how beautiful it is, but this is like him
getting rushy.

Speaker 1 (36:23):
Yeah, I like it.

Speaker 4 (36:24):
This is the number one track off of his first album.

Speaker 2 (36:27):
Debut album, Christopher Gross.

Speaker 4 (36:28):
Yeah, I think it kind of resembles Jimmy Buffett a
little bit.

Speaker 2 (36:31):
It's just kind of a feel good little I hear that.

Speaker 5 (36:34):
Yeah, now that you say it, I can hear that
for sure. So, speaking of Jimmy Buffett, another thing that
we haven't touched on. Have you noticed that every single
album cover of his has a flamingo on it?

Speaker 2 (36:43):
I love it. Yeah, I think it's this cool little style. Yeah.

Speaker 5 (36:46):
I think it's just just plain accident, just like you know,
the first one had a flamingo, and he was like,
why not, let's just keep doing that, you know, why
tell me?

Speaker 4 (36:54):
So he had a friend who's like, hey, I painted
this picture. I think it looks like your music's sounds.
And so he's like, well, okay, And so they took
it to the record company. They're like, well, what do
you think about this as the album cover? And they
cleaned it up and kind of colored it and made
it look good.

Speaker 2 (37:08):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (37:09):
But you know, part of the reason why he wasn't
on the cover, he said he didn't He wasn't intentionally
not putting himself out there. But he was a big
guy you.

Speaker 2 (37:17):
Know, it's interesting that you say that.

Speaker 5 (37:18):
I just want to say this because I always thought
he was a big guy too. But I've looked at him,
looked at him performing back in the eighties. Looking he's tall, right,
and he's I mean, I would describe him as maybe husky, right,
But it's not like he's gargant. I mean, he's not
Frank Black from the Pixie. He's got that big old
belly on him, right. The thing is, though, he's got

(37:38):
that face. He's got the face of a guy who's
pushing three hundred, although he's probably like two fifty or something.
And I mean all respect to the man. Beautiful voice,
incredible talent. He looks kind of like slimer in his face,
you know, I mean, I'm just I'm just saying that.

Speaker 2 (37:56):
It's just the truth.

Speaker 5 (37:57):
Right now, I have no doubt that this guy gets
any girl he wants to get just by singing to them. So, hey,
you balance things out. I can't sing like him. I
wish I could write.

Speaker 4 (38:07):
I've got a great story on his first wife.

Speaker 2 (38:09):
Did you hear this story? Come on?

Speaker 4 (38:11):
So his first wife, she was eighteen, he was twenty two.
He had known her for two weeks, two weeks, but
he said I was a horny guitar player. That was it, right,
So he got they go to the courthouse to get married. Yeah,
and one of his buddies who's standing in as like
his best man. And it was one of those deals
where the judges said, all right, now I pronounce you

(38:33):
you man and wife or whatever. And his best man said,
this is not.

Speaker 1 (38:38):
Going to end. Well, take you.

Speaker 2 (38:55):
And guess what it did. It didn't, okay.

Speaker 4 (38:58):
In fact, his marriage was falling apart while he's on
this meteoric ascent.

Speaker 2 (39:05):
Right, he said, say you'll be mine and she said no, no,
not happened.

Speaker 4 (39:10):
By the way, this song reached number twenty on the charts.

Speaker 2 (39:12):
Nice, okay, it's kind of a hit.

Speaker 5 (39:14):
Yeah, all right, okay, we're to a point that we
got to say, it's the song one of the three
that you've been waiting for, right, it's the one.

Speaker 2 (39:24):
It's the one. Okay, here we go. Next song on
the album sailing, But.

Speaker 7 (39:42):
It's not foun down. He's not holling winds right, sail
the way find the ability.

Speaker 4 (39:56):
It's difficult to describe the beauty of this song.

Speaker 2 (40:00):
I've heard it hundreds hundreds of times.

Speaker 5 (40:05):
I've been singing it in my head for the last
week because we've been covering this album, like it won't
get out of my head. And still when you turn
it on and play it, it makes my heart hurt.
It just I mean, it's just an amazing You've You've
got a twenty eight piece string section coming in at
the beginning, you get this magical wind chime, and just.

Speaker 2 (40:26):
It takes you away to where you want to be.
Like he said it, like, how how did you figure
this out?

Speaker 4 (40:33):
It's not that far to paradise.

Speaker 1 (40:35):
It's gold.

Speaker 5 (40:36):
This is just pure gold. Now he says this is
his favorite song off the debut album. Okay, can't blame me, right,
but here's the story on this, right. Yeah, At this
debut album, Warner Brothers, as you mentioned, didn't really like
his songs as much, and so he recorded a song
specifically to be the single that they release. Now, what
they end up doing is releasing ride like the Wind,

(40:58):
because it's got the it's got the four on the floor,
it's got a drive to it, and obviously it does
very well. You mentioned mo ostin they're talking about what's
the next song that is going to get released and
he's he's on tour, you know, so he's talking to
Mostin on the phone and Mostein Mostine says, the next
one we're going to release is Sailing, and Christopher Cross

(41:19):
is like, I don't think that's a good idea. That's
not a that's not a single, that's a that's an
album track, that's not a single. I love the song,
but it's not you shouldn't do it. And Mosting's like, okay,
but that's the next song we're going to release, and
Christopher Cross says, okay, well, I think you're an idiot,
and then there's this long pause and he goes sir.

(41:45):
And it turns out that mo Ostein was the head
of Warner Brothers for a reason, because this is the
first number one song for him.

Speaker 2 (41:54):
It's it's just amazing.

Speaker 1 (41:58):
It's amazing.

Speaker 4 (42:03):
Takes me.

Speaker 5 (42:20):
And you and I have been talking like we talked today,
and we talked about the fact that this is you know,
his daughter is a key producer in the yacht Rock documentary,
and you know, it was kind of funny when he
talked about how he made his fifty thousand dollars surplus
selling weed in order to start his music career. He
was like, was that often She's like, no, this is great,
But anyway, yat rock, right, have we said the word yet?

(42:42):
Have we said those two words yet? Okay, So he's
a key part of the documentary. He's obviously a key
part of the scene, the yacht rock scene. And we're
talking to Mike. Is there any way that the term
yacht rock doesn't come from this song? No way, there's
no way, right, I mean, is the epicenter of yachra
it has to be. And I mean I looked at

(43:04):
I looked at yacht rock on the Wikipedia, and it
talks about, you know, beach boys and Sloop John b
and Captain Taneil and all this other stuff. But I
said to you, there's no way that without this song,
that that is that category of music is still called
yacht rock. It's called something else, absolutely right. Yeah, it's
called asia. I don't know what, you know, It's just

(43:25):
it's not going to be called yacht rock except for
this song.

Speaker 2 (43:28):
And this is the definitive. You're on the boat, man,
You're on the boat.

Speaker 4 (43:33):
I mean, I listen to this song and docksiders appear
in my feet. You know, you know, I've got a
knock salt off my arm.

Speaker 5 (43:41):
Okay, so do you know the story behind the song,
Well tell me. It's literally about sailing. Trouble childhood, which
I'll get into a little bit more detail later, but
trouble childhood, and he has a friend who has a
sailboat who's like a kind of a surrogate big brother
for him. He has regular brothers, but this guy was
just kind of there for him whenever he was down,
and he take him out and literally that's where the

(44:02):
words come from. It takes me away, It takes me
away from all of my problems. I can just feel
myself relaxing and being at ease when I'm sailing. Now,
he writes this song about that experience. Fast forward twenty
eight years, he's on the Howard Stern Show and he's
talking Howard Stern and Howard Stern's like, who's the guy?

(44:23):
And he's like, ah, you know, I don't. I don't
really feel comfortable, but Howard Stern is Howard Stern. He's like,
tell me, come on, man, come on, just tell me
tell me his name. Yeah, Push, Push Push, and he's
he's a little embarrassed, and he's because he knows what
Howard Stern's gonna do with this? And he's like, okay,
it's al ol what glass Cock. And of course Stern

(44:44):
is like, oh, I'm gonna go somewhere with this. But
apparently Howard Stern like puts it out there like does
anybody know this Al Glasscock guy? And within minutes somebody's
called like, yeah, I work with him. He gets a
hold of Al glass Cock and he tries to make
a bit out of his weird last name, but the
is just so nice and easy going that even Howard
Stern is just like, yeah, okay, we'll just get we'll.

Speaker 2 (45:05):
Make this friendly.

Speaker 5 (45:07):
Well now, I'm not going to be a dick, you know,
I just will make this friendly. And he calls up
Christopher Cross. He's like, hey, I found him. Do you
want to talk to him again? And they reunite through
Howard Stern, and ultimately Christopher Cross sends him a copy
of his gold record that he got for this song
that he wrote while on Al glass Cock's sailboat.

Speaker 4 (45:28):
That's fantastic, great story, what a great story, what a
great song. I will tell you this about this song. Yeah,
you mentioned the strings at the beginning. Now that totally
capture you right as soon as they start, I'm like, oh,
bracing myself for the beauty that's coming. Total accident.

Speaker 1 (45:48):
What Yeah.

Speaker 4 (45:49):
So they're mixing it right, okay, and you've got the producer,
You've got Christopher Cross, and you've got Christopher Cross's wife's brother. Okay,
his brother, gotcha, yeah yeah, and they this is back
in the day when you had it like on reels, right. Well,
you know, you've got what you've played, and then you've
got the strings and when you press play, the strings

(46:11):
started before the studio stuff started, so you have this
swell of strings that was supposed to sync up with
the very beginning of the song. But it happened like
twenty seconds in front.

Speaker 3 (46:23):
Oh.

Speaker 4 (46:24):
And they're sitting there like, oh, whoops, what happened there?

Speaker 2 (46:27):
And the brother in law was like, man, that is
so cool.

Speaker 4 (46:29):
You guys did that because that is a really neat
way to kind of capture the beauty of that song.
And they're like, I guess it is kind of cool.
And that's why you have the strings in the beginning
of that song.

Speaker 2 (46:40):
That's great. It is a great story.

Speaker 4 (46:42):
Okay, Just a couple of little tidbits for you on
this song VH one called Sailing the most soft stational
soft rock song of all time. Soft soft stational. It
hits number one August thirtieth, nineteen eighty, number seven on
the Hot one hundred that same week. All out of
Love by Air Supply.

Speaker 2 (47:03):
Very good boo.

Speaker 5 (47:04):
In case you weren't paying attention, we are comparing Christopher
Cross to check out our next episode on air Supply's
Greatest Hits.

Speaker 2 (47:11):
It's coming, Yep, it's coming, all right.

Speaker 4 (47:13):
Next song on the album is the Oscar winning song
Arthur Steam.

Speaker 2 (47:19):
Best that you can do.

Speaker 3 (47:26):
Once in your life. Fire someone to churned your harder around.
Next thing you know your cz down town, wake up minute, Okay.

Speaker 5 (47:42):
I genuinely I cannot remember how I had access to
this song. I maybe we had the Arthur soundtrack my house.
I don't remember what it was, but I can tell
you that at six years old, I could not stop
playing the song like I mean, it was my favorite
song of that moment, without a doubt. Loved it, loved it,

(48:05):
and I still think it's great.

Speaker 4 (48:29):
It is freaking eighties gold. It is, I mean, it's
Oscar winning gold.

Speaker 2 (48:33):
Beautiful piano at the beginning.

Speaker 5 (48:35):
I mean, you got a fun movie that goes along
with it, which I mean, if you can't laugh at
being an alcoholic and a dark driver, what else can
you laugh about?

Speaker 2 (48:44):
And you and I will say this.

Speaker 5 (48:46):
You mentioned as a cinematic sin in one of our
group texts that you have not seen Arthur yet.

Speaker 2 (48:51):
I haven't seen it either. Really, I feel like we
got to. Maybe we should do.

Speaker 5 (48:54):
That reaction video for that'd be fun. Yeah, but yeah,
Dudley Moore and e Liza Minnelli, who also is a
factor in the writing of this song.

Speaker 4 (49:02):
Right, the creation of this song is so unbelievable. If
it weren't true, you would not believe it, right, Okay.
This song is written by Burt Bachracht, Yes, I mean huge, famous,
great musician, great songwriter. Yes, along with Christopher Cross. Yes,
of course, I mean Burt Bachracht. He did the score

(49:24):
for Arthur, so he got together with Christopher Cross. They
wrote this song along with a woman named Carol Bayer Sager.

Speaker 2 (49:31):
Who ultimately would marry Burke Backrack.

Speaker 4 (49:33):
Yes, yep, okay. And then a guy named Peter Allen.

Speaker 5 (49:36):
Peter Allen and Carol Baker Sager beer Seger wrote songs together. Yes,
they did the line Caught Between the Moon and New
York City actually comes from another song that they did together.
It comes from Peter Allen being stuck up in the
air over John F. Kennedy Airport and it's nighttime. He's
literally stuck between the moon and New York City. Yeah,

(50:00):
but what a great poetic line, right, So listen to this, Okay?

Speaker 4 (50:04):
So, yes, that line does come from a previously unreleased song. Yeah,
and it's it's really cool. It's it's got that something there.
There's something that she something, right, So listen to this
sticky sticky, it's sticky. According to flight attendant Susan Lena,
she said, Peter Allen was on my flight and when
he was deplaning, he said to me, you have inspired

(50:26):
me to write a song and you will know it
when you hear it.

Speaker 2 (50:31):
I love that. How about?

Speaker 4 (50:32):
How cool is that?

Speaker 3 (50:33):
So?

Speaker 2 (50:33):
Peter Allen, Liza Minelli's husband, former husband, was it? Yeah?

Speaker 5 (50:37):
I guess yes, very And then I'm quoting Wikipedia here.
Flamboyant performer on stage and he after I and Liza
split up, he became partners with the man. Tragically, they
both died of age related cancer with I think within

(50:58):
eight months of each other or something like that. But
he and Carol Bayer Sager had written songs together, but
she ends up doing more with Burt Backerack, right.

Speaker 2 (51:06):
That's right, And so what did they do together?

Speaker 4 (51:08):
So Burt backeract and Carol Beyer Sager have written a
couple of songs, okay, a couple of number one hits.

Speaker 2 (51:14):
Okay.

Speaker 4 (51:15):
One of them is a song called on my Own
Patti LaBelle, who we've talked about in the Beverly Hills
Cops soundtrack. Yes, and Michael McDonald of course, of course,
right right. And they also wrote That's what Friends Are For.

Speaker 2 (51:27):
Oh wow, that's great.

Speaker 4 (51:31):
Warwick, Yeah, Elton John, Stevie Wonder and Gladys Knight. Oh okay,
number one hit in eighty six.

Speaker 2 (51:39):
Yeah, that's a good one. Nice, I like it.

Speaker 4 (51:41):
I hate to leave this song so quickly, but it
is so good.

Speaker 5 (51:44):
Yeah, but we can't get stuck here. Yeah, you say,
maybe we can talk more when we do our reaction
video to Arthur.

Speaker 4 (51:52):
Okay, before we move on to the next song. I've
got a little tidbit. I just want to buy you
real quick, okay, Okay. One of the Grammys that Christopher
Cross one that night in nineteen eighty one was Best
New Artist. I don't know if you've heard, but there's
kind of a stigma around the Best New Artist Grammy. Okay, okay,
so there for a while they've talked about the Best

(52:13):
New Artist curse. Okay, right, Yeah, and Christopher Cross is
one of the victims of that curse.

Speaker 5 (52:20):
Well, I mean, when you have that big of a
showing on your debut album, there's nowhere else to go
but down.

Speaker 4 (52:26):
That's true.

Speaker 2 (52:26):
That's true. So here you go.

Speaker 4 (52:28):
Here's my case for the curse, and then I'll give
you a case against the curse. Okay, so the case
for the curse. In nineteen seventy seven, you have the
Starlight Vocal Band Best New.

Speaker 2 (52:39):
Artist, Never heard of them.

Speaker 4 (52:40):
Nineteen seventy nine, you have a Taste of Honey.

Speaker 2 (52:43):
That's the name of the band. Yeah, I don't know.

Speaker 4 (52:46):
The song you might know is boogie ugy ugy Okay.

Speaker 2 (52:49):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (52:50):
Nineteen eighty one you have Christopher Cross.

Speaker 2 (52:53):
Get this.

Speaker 4 (52:53):
I'm gonna blow your socks off with this.

Speaker 2 (52:55):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (52:55):
Nineteen ninety of course, you have the infamous Millie Vanilli.

Speaker 2 (52:59):
I knew that one was. Yeah.

Speaker 4 (53:00):
Nineteen sixty one Grammy for Best New Musical artist Bob Newhart.

Speaker 2 (53:09):
What Bob freaking new Heart? Wow, that's crazy, right, okay.

Speaker 4 (53:15):
So all right, here's my case against Mariah Carey, Alicia Keys, Adele,
Billie Eilish, and the Beatles.

Speaker 5 (53:23):
Well, those are all pretty good. They were not cursed, right,
all right?

Speaker 4 (53:27):
Last tidbit for Arthur. Okay, I've never seen Arthur. I've
never seen Arthur two.

Speaker 2 (53:33):
Right, okay.

Speaker 4 (53:34):
Arthur two was released the summer of nineteen eighty eight.

Speaker 2 (53:37):
Okay.

Speaker 4 (53:38):
It was released one week before maybe the best movie
of the nineteen eighties.

Speaker 2 (53:43):
It was released one week before Die Hard.

Speaker 4 (53:46):
Before die Hard, Oh Wow. Okay, And it was released
two weeks before maybe the worst movie of the nineteen eighties,
Caddy shak Too.

Speaker 2 (53:55):
There we go, Summer of eighty eight. Let's go al right,
next song on the album any Old Time.

Speaker 7 (54:18):
Everyone Twice's Friends.

Speaker 5 (54:26):
All due respect to people who love this song, this
does not belong on the greatest album This's Gotta go. Yeah,
this is a replacement song. Okay, so fair agree our degree? Okay,
you're giving me a very repetitious chorus to start.

Speaker 2 (54:40):
The song clock it was yeah, it was yeah, not good.

Speaker 4 (54:43):
That song was originally written for Barbara streisand by the way, okay, okay,
what are you replacing it with. We're bringing in the
right hander, We're bringing in think of Laura.

Speaker 1 (54:51):
Oh okay, everyone in.

Speaker 4 (55:14):
Turn Madday, think of Laura. Number nine hit not on
this Greatest Hits albul that's an odd choice. Okay, beautiful,
top ten hit from nineteen eighty three.

Speaker 1 (55:26):
Love it.

Speaker 2 (55:26):
Check your bingo card.

Speaker 4 (55:28):
This is the second episode in a row that we're
going to talk about Anthony Gary, Luke and Laura.

Speaker 5 (55:33):
Can you believe that it's weird? I would not have
expected that to come up, Yes, in a row, even
in a row.

Speaker 2 (55:40):
Yeah.

Speaker 5 (55:40):
So, if you missed our last couple of episodes, we
compared Pee Wee's Big Adventure two UHF Filo. The mad
scientist in UHF is played by Anthony Gary. Anthony Gary
is also known as Luke from General Hospital, whose name
that comes along with him in all circumstances is Laura.

(56:01):
Right now, this song is not about her, right, but
CBS decided to go ahead and use it anyway.

Speaker 4 (56:06):
That's right, they did. Yeah, tell me the story.

Speaker 5 (56:08):
So this song is about This is about a girl
that was a roommate of one of Christopher Cross's girlfriends
who is a lacrosse player. I mean she was sitting
in the back of the car with her had been
with her family for homecoming at the college that they
were going to. This is a girlfriend's roommate and there's
some gang gunfire and she gets killed.

Speaker 2 (56:29):
It's just tragic, like she's sitting.

Speaker 4 (56:31):
In the back of her father's car and gets hit
by a stray bullet.

Speaker 5 (56:34):
Yeah, and so it's just this horrible circumstance. Christopher Cross
writes this tribute song for her, and and and says,
you know, because he knew her, and he's like, when
you think of Laura, laughed, don't cry, because that's what
she would want. Is this really moving circumstance. And they
decide to use it to promote General Hospital's plot line

(56:56):
where Laura has disappeared and they're trying to find her.
Bad taste on top of bad taste, Man, that's really terrible.

Speaker 4 (57:04):
So the interesting thing to me is he goes to
her family and says, listen, I wrote this song.

Speaker 2 (57:09):
It's a tribute to her.

Speaker 4 (57:10):
Would you be offended if I put it on my album?

Speaker 2 (57:14):
And they said no.

Speaker 4 (57:15):
I mean if it gives solace to somebody else, then
that's great, you should do that. Yeah, so he puts
it out there on the album. Well Tony Gary, Anthony
Gary is a fan of the song, and he's trying
to think of a way to bring the actress who
played Laura, who broke away to do films, try to
bring her back.

Speaker 2 (57:33):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (57:33):
And back in these days, if you only played a
short amount of the song, you didn't have to pay royalties, right,
and so they're just like, oh, great, scoop that song up.

Speaker 2 (57:42):
And they did it over and over again too. Yeah
it's terrible. Yep. He was not happy. He has openly
said this is not.

Speaker 4 (57:50):
Okay, not what I intended.

Speaker 2 (57:51):
That's right. Now, I played you another song, right, yeah
he did. Okay.

Speaker 5 (57:55):
So here's this one so beautiful cover. This is boys
to Men. This song is called think of Aliyah. Remember Aliyah?

(58:16):
I do so Aliyah if you don't remember, she was
on Star Shirt when she was about twelve, sang with
Gladys Knight. Weird that she would come up twice in
one episode here and then.

Speaker 2 (58:32):
I have to mention this.

Speaker 5 (58:33):
I'm reading her history and I'm like, her first album
is produced by R. Kelly, and I'm like ooh, And
then I see that. The name of the album is
age is just a number, and I'm like ooh, And
then I'm like, holy crap. They were married what nineteen
ninety four, she would have been fourteen maybe fifteen years old.

(58:57):
What it ultimately was annulled because it probably was an
illegal marriage? Of course, How did people not get the
red flags back in the mid nineties when that happened. Wow, dude, Yeah,
very weird, very weird. But I mean justice comes slowly,
I guess.

Speaker 2 (59:14):
Anyway.

Speaker 5 (59:16):
She moves on from that and is doing very well.
I mean, she's got a lot of great songs, and
she's in this movie called Queen of the Damned. And
then tragically she's down in the Caribbean and is on
a is on a plane that they have improperly loaded,
and it crashes almost immediately after taking off. The pilot

(59:38):
is found to have had cocaine and alcohol in his
system and was not licensed to fly that kind of plane. Tragically,
she is killed. And so Boys to Men releases this
cover of Think of Laura as Think of Aliyah.

Speaker 4 (59:52):
Love it Yeah, beautiful song.

Speaker 2 (59:54):
Yeah, okay.

Speaker 4 (59:55):
Next song on the album, It's Trying the Snake. I
love this song, Dad. This is like in my undiscovered

(01:00:17):
Christopher Cross hit right here.

Speaker 2 (01:00:19):
That's a great one. Yeah, and this is a little
bit later on. Was this eighty five?

Speaker 4 (01:00:22):
Eighty five Surprises didn't make more of a noise?

Speaker 2 (01:00:26):
Yeah, I mean it did, okay, it did okay. But
did you see the video for this?

Speaker 4 (01:00:31):
I did.

Speaker 5 (01:00:32):
Did you think of Top Gun or Days of Thunder?
Because I saw it. I mean you got that that
golden sunset and for shrepping that, I mean they're what
they're doing is they're doing drag car racing instead of
you know, aircraft carrier landing the jets.

Speaker 2 (01:00:45):
But it's that same style.

Speaker 5 (01:00:47):
I had the pretty girl cheer in for him, and
it turns out it's not Tony Scott as its fatter.
Matter of fact, Tony Scott wouldn't have that footage until
the next year's eighty six, that's right. But it was
directed by David Fincher. Yeah, wow, Yeah, And it's not

(01:01:17):
his style that I'm familiar with, but shoot, he knew
what he was doing.

Speaker 2 (01:01:20):
Man, it's a pretty cool video.

Speaker 4 (01:01:22):
That's pre Alien three, yes, pre by Club pre seven.

Speaker 2 (01:01:28):
It's probably pre Rock the Cradle of Love. Actually, yeah,
it is pre Rock the Cradle of Love Ye pre vogue.

Speaker 4 (01:01:34):
Yeah, so, directed by David Fincher Christopher Cross racing race cars,
which he had a hobby of doing.

Speaker 5 (01:01:42):
Yeah, not these exact type of cars, but these cars
looked cooler. So, and he was kind of excited to
do it too.

Speaker 2 (01:01:48):
Yeah, it's fun. Yeah.

Speaker 4 (01:01:49):
Do you know who sings background vocals on this? Richard Marks?

Speaker 2 (01:01:53):
Of course, of course.

Speaker 4 (01:01:54):
I love the song. I think it's great. Next song
on the album, ye, all right. Every Turn of the

(01:02:17):
World is the title track and lead single off his
third album, which had a little more rock to it.

Speaker 2 (01:02:21):
Yeah, and I like this song. I think it's good.

Speaker 5 (01:02:24):
Yes, this is Okay again, it's kind of a rocker.
This is him, Yeah, getting after it a bit.

Speaker 4 (01:02:28):
Reach never forty four in the hot one Hunter didn't
quite crack the top forty.

Speaker 2 (01:02:32):
Still a good song, still a charting song. I like
it worth of those all right.

Speaker 4 (01:02:37):
Final song on the album, Yeah, it's a song called
that Girl.

Speaker 2 (01:02:51):
I think we found our last song to replace Yes, okay.

Speaker 4 (01:02:54):
All right, I'm coming in strong with the song never
Be the Same Okay, which was the third single off
of the first album Okay. So. This song peaked at

(01:03:20):
number fifteen in nineteen eighty. This is when Christopher Cross
is still rolling through all these hits off that first album.
I think it's a great song.

Speaker 2 (01:03:29):
I love it.

Speaker 5 (01:03:30):
Okay, So I didn't really go into the history. It
seems like a weird place to give the beginning at
the end here, But let me just say so. Christopher
Cross bounced from place to place, bounced from Texas to
Japan back to Texas again. His dad was in the army.
He was actually a pediatrician, took care of Dwight D.
Eisenhower's grandchildren. Yeah, that's right, David and Julia Eisenhower.

Speaker 2 (01:03:52):
I'm guessing.

Speaker 5 (01:03:53):
But his dad had also been a musician. Played this
double bass four you ready for this?

Speaker 2 (01:03:59):
Lauren's welk.

Speaker 5 (01:04:02):
And I mean, there's a lot of comedy associated with
Lawrence Walke, but Lawrence Walk was Lawrence Walk for.

Speaker 2 (01:04:07):
A reason, right, That's not nothing.

Speaker 5 (01:04:10):
And his dad was an incredibly bad alcoholic, ultimately passed
away from cirrhosis of the liver. But there were these
moments where he would put on a Glenn Miller album.
His dad would put on the Glenn Miller album, He'd
get out his double bass and he'd play along it
and he said, in those moments, that would be when
I saw joy in my dad's face. Right, yeah, just

(01:04:32):
not happy all of his life except for those little moments.
And he even referred to it as just the happiest
time in his life was when he was playing music.
So Christopher Cross is like kind of captivated by this
idea that music can make you happier. He's having obviously
a tough time too, and he goes to the music
store and he's like, listen, my dad loves Glenn Miller.

(01:04:52):
I love listening to it. Do you have something that's
like that but for somebody my age? And he brings
him Dave Brewbag Time Out, which if you listen to it,
it's freaking amazing, Okay, And Christopher Cross listens to it
and he is transfixed by the drums, and so he
asked his parents for drums and they get him a

(01:05:13):
drum set, and so for his first band, which I
believe was called the Psychos, he played the drums and
sang because everybody else was too chicken to sing, that's right.
And he said they used to play at makeout parties,
which is basically like the parents hosted a party, not
realizing that all the kids were in like closets and
back rooms making out with each other, right, and paid

(01:05:35):
them fifty bucks for playing music. And so then he
joins another band called Flash. This time he's playing playing guitar,
is getting into the rock and roll scene a little
bit more, and he ends up going to hate Ashbury
in like the late sixties when all the counterculture is
happening over there comes back to the high school with

(01:05:55):
long hair, and on the Wikipedia page, it will tell
you that he graduated from the high school in like
sixty nine. No, he did not, right, and we did not.
He came in and the principal was like, you're not
coming to school with hair that long, and he said,
then I guess I'm not coming to the school.

Speaker 1 (01:06:10):
He left.

Speaker 2 (01:06:11):
Now he still played at their prom.

Speaker 1 (01:06:13):
Then he really he did.

Speaker 4 (01:06:14):
That's crazy, and he was he was voted.

Speaker 5 (01:06:16):
Like most creative or something like that. So it's you know,
they still kind of Now here's the rest of the
story on that one. Many years later, he's got all
these attorney friends who used to sell weed two.

Speaker 2 (01:06:28):
Back in the seventies, right, and they're like, we're.

Speaker 5 (01:06:31):
Getting you this high school diploma, and they did it.
They got a hold of the school. They worked their
magic whatever they do, and he received an honorary high
school diploma.

Speaker 2 (01:06:43):
That's fantastic. Yeah, that's great.

Speaker 4 (01:06:45):
All right, Well that wraps up. Christopher Cross. Okay, I've
got one last thing I want to tell you about. Okay,
we break for air supply next Weekay. Have you heard
about the woodstock of yacht Rock. No, apparently this is
happening at the end of this year in Cabo San Lucas,
Cabo Wabo. Yeah right, yeah yeah, Christopher Cross, Kenny Loggins,

(01:07:08):
Alan Parsons, Ambrosia, Rick Springfield. There's all sorts of big name.

Speaker 2 (01:07:13):
Not Steely Dan because they would not be assistant.

Speaker 4 (01:07:17):
Like freaking screw you, guys. But they're having this big
festival in Mexico.

Speaker 1 (01:07:23):
Would be awesome.

Speaker 4 (01:07:24):
I mean, are you kidding me.

Speaker 2 (01:07:25):
Let's find a way to go. I would love to
go to that. That would be awesome.

Speaker 5 (01:07:29):
All right, guys, thank you so much for joining us
for this soft rock Master. Come back next week when
we talk about air supply. Making love out of nothing.

Speaker 4 (01:07:39):
We're all out of love.

Speaker 2 (01:07:40):
Oh man. Okay, thanks guys, see you guys next week.

Speaker 4 (01:07:43):
Thanks guys,