God's Late-70s Attempt to Save Rock and Roll

God sent Ellen Foley to save rock and roll, but the Devil sent the Clash to stop her.

My friend Gina was a rocker chick. And also a Bible-thumper. She didn't think the two were at odds and fervently believed God loved catchy hit singles, preferably with swooping sax solos, rhythmic keyboards, angelic harmonies, and blistering guitars. Given the right singer and the right guitar, she'd say, you can practically touch heaven (or at least get an idea of what it sounds like).

To hear Gina describe it, God got cranky in the mid-1970s. Rock was in bad shape and the radio was dominated by Disco, self-indulgent singer-songwriters repackaging an angst they lost four Jaguars ago, and songs by coked-up bands still coasting on a reputation they'd earned more than a decade earlier. Punk fluttered up, but acted more like a time-release drug (one that would take 15 years to fully activate).

So God sent down something bombastic and wondrous in the form of Meat Loaf and Ellen Foley, the only chick singer who could match him note for note. When Bat Out of Hell sold a bazillion copies, Epic signed Ellen Foley to her own record deal (and, as Gina told me, God was very pleased).

Ellen Foley's first album Night Out -- produced by Ian Hunter and Mick Ronson -- was a revelation. The songs swoop and jump and Ronson's guitars take you from the seventh circle of hell all the way up to heaven and back in under 4 minutes. Foley's vocals were passionate and rough (but polished up with harmonies from Rory Dodd, who also sang on Bat Out of Hell).

And God was very pleased. (Link for Gmail subscribers.)


More than that, Foley was cool as only rocker chicks can be cool. She covered the Rolling Stones at their bitchiest on "Stupid Girl" (and was tough enough that she didn't have to change the gender and water down the song).


Then (since rock and roll had not yet been sufficiently saved), Foley spread God's word, singing on an Iron City Houserockers album (produced by Ronson, Hunter, and Steve Van Zandt from Bruce Springsteen's E Street Band), and doing a duet with Hunter (as seen... um... here). For the first time since Saturday Night Fever, music seemed to be getting back on track.

But, said Gina, the Devil had other plans for Foley.

She started dating Mick Jones from the Clash, sang on their Sandinista album, and decided that her second solo album (The Spirit of Saint Louis) would basically be a Clash album (with production by Jones, credited on the sleeve only as "my boyfriend" and songs co-written by Jones and Joe Strummer). Songs like "The Death of the Psychoanalyst of Salvador Dali" left most fans scratching their heads and few wanted to hear Clash songs (which weren't quite good enough for Clash records) sung by Ellen Foley. The album never caught on and was in cutout bins within months.

And, Gina explained, because the Devil can multitask, the Clash soon started to fall apart (although Jones would channel his troubled relationship with Foley into the song "Should I Stay or Should I Go").

Foley's third solo album Another Breath tried to recapture the sound of her first album, but slick producer Vini Poncia was no Ian Hunter (and certainly no Mick Ronson) and the record -- despite featuring songs by Ellie Greenwich and Desmond Child -- never quite worked.

So Foley retired from rock and roll to raise kids (and take the occasional acting gig)... emerging last year with a new, bluesier band called Ellen Foley and the Dirty Old Men.

And that, Gina explained to me, is why God had no choice but to turn to Bruce Springsteen to save rock and roll.

Strat Like a Harley

The first Meat Loaf album might just be the perfect music for teenagers.

It's loud. It's bombastic. It paints love and sex as life or death struggles from Paradise Lost or a Wagner opera.

And it erects the sonic equivalents of Iwo Jima monuments to young lust. In short, it's what every parent fears and what every teenager thinks he or she alone has discovered. (Link for Gmail subscribers.)


Jim Steinman provided the songs (think Wagner having fever dreams that mash up Phil Spector and Bruce Springsteen anthems), Todd Rundgren produced the tracks (and paid for the recording himself), and the musicians included Max Weinberg and Roy Bittan from the E Street Band, Willie Wilcox, Kasim Sulton, and Roger Powell from Utopia, Edgar Winter playing sax, Ellen Foley and Rory Dodd singing, and Todd Rundgren himself playing the "motorcycle guitar" on the title track (which, on the album, goes on for nearly 10 glorious minutes).

The other thing about this album that teenagers recognize with great embarrassment decades later is that it's hilarious -- why else would NY Yankees announcer Phil Rizzuto be providing the play-by-play in "Paradise by the Dashboard Light," one of 3 songs on the record that are more than 8 minutes long?

The other day, I hauled my vinyl copy of this album out of storage and listened to it. (The record sure beats Tums for relief when you see this commercial.)Yeah, I cringed more than once. But I also laughed more than once and marveled at some of the music all over again. And while I know it's possible to defend this record, it's a bit of a guilty pleasure -- one that I share with almost 40 million people around the world (including about 200,000 new ones every year).

By the way, if you're in Germany, stop in and visit Charles Altmann and bring your vinyl copy of Bat Out of Hell. What better way to listen to an album with a "motorcycle guitar" than on a turntable built out of parts from an actual motorcycle?

Just Like Moses Malone

Squint your eyes, tilt your head, and she's a superstar.

In an alternate universe, Karla DeVito is a superstar.

You may remember her from the video of Meat Loaf's "Paradise By the Dashboard Light" (although it was Ellen Foley who actually sang on the song). Or from her song "We Are Not Alone" from The Breakfast Club.

But whenever I think of Karla DeVito, I think of her goofy and amazing debut album Is This a Cool World... Or What?, which came with a poster that had doodles, photos from her childhood, and handwritten lyrics. And the music was pretty great, Cyndi Lauder-esque goofiness, great pop musicianship from players like Anton Fig, Paul Shafer, and G.E. Smith, and powerful vocals that sounded like the love child of Kate Bush and Linda Ronstadt delivering a message from God. The album had a goofy song about a female pirate (perhaps explaining Broadway appearances to come) and some great covers (CCR's "Almost Saturday Night," the Grass Roots' "Midnight Confessions").

And then there's the title song. Which celebrates the coolness of modernity (circa 1981): French sunglasses, call-waiting, and a "house for my mother, just like Moses Malone." And she even dresses like a hippy chick, a Bobby Soxer, Alice in Wonderland, and a sad clown in the video. I dare you not to like it. (Link for Gmail subscribers.)


Karla DeVito might easily have become the Queen of MTV, but instead she followed Linda Ronstadt onto Broadway for a revival of The Pirates of Penzance. To capitalize, Budweiser made a commercial with DeVito singing a version of "Cool World" mashed up with the then-current Bud jingle (link for Gmail subscribers):


A year later, DeVito married Robbie Benson (her Pirates co-star) and had two kids. She recorded a second album in 1986, but the songs weren't quite as sharp and Bob Ezrin's slick, synth-heavy production bludgeoned all the humor out of the record (which never made it to CD).

The other day, I dragged my vinyl copy of Cool World out of storage. The poster is frayed, the cover is worn, the price tag is partially shredded (but hanging in there). But the music is still amazing -- a goofy, fun artifact from the alternate universe and coolest of all possible worlds, just before Karla DeVito became the Queen of MTV.

Just like Moses Malone.