Billy Squire: Classic of Dud?

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This guy should have been as big as Faith No More, if not bigger.

― Joseph Larkin (Joseph Larkin), Saturday, 27 March 2004 21:45 (twenty-two years ago)

He was.

― Broheems (diamond), Saturday, 27 March 2004 21:52 (twenty-two years ago)

Pissed off he doesn't get a cameo in the "Fix Up, Look Sharp" video.

― Anthony Miccio (Anthony Miccio), Saturday, 27 March 2004 22:24 (twenty-two years ago)

classic OF dud -- OTM, typo or not.

― lovebug star-ski, Saturday, 27 March 2004 22:32 (twenty-two years ago)

Friends who I've shown the "Rock Me Tonite" video to have often asked me whether or not they were hallucinating at the time.

― Anthony Miccio (Anthony Miccio), Saturday, 27 March 2004 22:34 (twenty-two years ago)

Whats the difference between Michael Jackson and Billy Squire ?

One beats it, one strokes it.

― darth nader, Saturday, 27 March 2004 22:42 (twenty-two years ago)

Whats the difference between Michael Jackson and Billy Squire ?
One beats it, one strokes it.

...and Kiss licks it up! (Stole that from an old issue of CREEM)

Billy S-Q-U-I-E-R (spell it correctly: he useta have a rider in his contract that he'd earn a bonus from promoters if they misspelled it on the marquee, no kiddin!) - classic for two-and-a-half LPs.

― Myonga Von Bontee (Myonga Von Bontee), Sunday, 28 March 2004 00:54 (twenty-two years ago)

I'd say he just qualifies. For classic.

― christoff (christoff), Monday, 29 March 2004 21:15 (twenty-two years ago)

classic...put a good itchy funk in his midwestern hard rock....good hooks....also, for the Big Beat and The Stroke alone he's classic!

(and that Rock Me Tonite video is super duper classic, even if it ruined his career)....

― M@tt He1geson (Matt Helgeson), Monday, 29 March 2004 21:19 (twenty-two years ago)

also Everybody Wants You is amazing...

― M@tt He1geson (Matt Helgeson), Monday, 29 March 2004 21:19 (twenty-two years ago)

Anyone else ever catch the "Everybody Wants You" riff at the end of Pavement's "Range Life?"

― mike a, Monday, 29 March 2004 21:38 (twenty-two years ago)

Is it true that "Everybody Wants You" was inspired by Maurice Gibb? Someone told me that once. Like, Billy Squier ended up next to Maurice on an airplane or something and Maurice just talked and talked about how famous he was and how, well, everybody wanted him.

― spittle (spittle), Monday, 29 March 2004 23:02 (twenty-two years ago)

wow, I've never heard that but I want it to be true, that would be a one of the strangest dis records ever!

― M@tt He1geson (Matt Helgeson), Monday, 29 March 2004 23:10 (twenty-two years ago)

I know. A friend of mine said he heard this in a radio interview with Billy Squier years ago. So I guess I'll just believe it until proven otherwise.

― spittle (spittle), Monday, 29 March 2004 23:23 (twenty-two years ago)

two years pass...

This guy should have been as big as Faith No More, if not bigger.

Oddly enough, Faith No More's Mike Patton sang a cover of Billy's "The Stroke" when he was touring with Mr. bungle in 1992. This thread (written by fake[r] Joseph Larkin) has truly come full circle with real Joseph Larkin adding that little factoid!

― Joseph Patrick Larkin (Joseph P. Larkin), Saturday, 10 June 2006 00:21 (nineteen years ago)

anyone ever hear billy talk about the video that killed his career - like what he was thinking, who he fired in the aftermath, if he has no regrets or whatever - any links or anecdotes??? it would be cool if he was all like "I'd do everything the same way" sort of defiant, but somehow i doubt it.

― timmy tannin (pompous), Saturday, 10 June 2006 01:25 (nineteen years ago)

I assume he was thinking ... "What a feeling!"

― Joseph McCombs (Joseph McCombs), Saturday, 10 June 2006 01:59 (nineteen years ago)

"My Kind Of Lover" is one of the greatest rock pop songs ever bequeathed on the top 40.

― Brooker Buckingham (Brooker B), Saturday, 10 June 2006 03:12 (nineteen years ago)

"Classic of dud" kinda sums him up.

― Rickey Wright (Rrrickey), Saturday, 10 June 2006 05:52 (nineteen years ago)

I love "Everybody Wants You" and "In the Dark."

― Rickey Wright (Rrrickey), Saturday, 10 June 2006 05:52 (nineteen years ago)

the funk spoken of herein is most often provided by his drummah, Bobby Chouinard.

― veronica moser (veronica moser), Saturday, 10 June 2006 12:59 (nineteen years ago)

eight months pass...

I just moved and my CDs are in the usual disarray that comes from such activities so I decided I would throw in the first thing that I found that met the following criteria:

1) I knew the material. I tend to work faster when listening to music I can bop or sing along to.

2) It rocked. Although the definition of "rocked" is kinda nebulous, even for me, in this case I meant something that sounded better louder (which meant about 80% of my collection anyways).

What did I find? Don't Say No.

I popped it in and yes, it did meet both of the above and more. No wonder early hip-hop types loved the guy. He was Van Halen without the pyrotechnics but with soul that the wooden VH rhythm section would have sprained something if they dared approximate it.

Classic.

<parenthetical>

I also made the following observation when "The Stroke" came on. It was one of the first songs that I heard onTop 40 radio that really sparked my interest in music. I obsessively catalogued Casey Kasem's weekly countdown, completely ignorant of the fact I could buy Billboard for even more charts to feed my too-early-for-diagnosis obsessive-compulsiveness, and I just knew when I heard this that it shit all over "Bette Davis Eyes" and "Just The Two Of Us."

The other song of the era that had the same effect was "Back In Black." So my eleven-or-twelve-year-old self was apparently predisposed to loud riffing guitars.

That or strippers.

</parenthetical>

― NYCNative, Sunday, 4 March 2007 17:00 (nineteen years ago)

eight months pass...

srsly, if someone wrote a 33 1/3 book just about this video, i would buy it. after all these years, this still mystifies

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=orW2NXQZg8U

― gershy, Thursday, 15 November 2007 09:06 (eighteen years ago)

Wow, hadn't seen that since it's heyday. Yet I still remembered the shirt-ripping open. Then the cut to it suddenly restored.

I think this video embedded itself into Will Farrel's id. Seems like the secret key to unlock his schtick.

― bendy, Thursday, 15 November 2007 12:55 (eighteen years ago)

ten years pass...

Dude could rip. Side one of Don't Say No is hit after hit after hit after hit. Perfectly calculated zep/new wave straddling sound for his era. Emotions in Motion is pretty much as good without as many hits.

Wikipedia says his middle name is Haislip.

Classic.

― john. a resident of evanston. (john. a resident of chicago.), Thursday, 27 September 2018 01:12 (seven years ago)

THE BIG BEAT.

https://zrockr.com/user-files/uploads/2014/07/BOBBYC.jpg

― earlnash, Thursday, 27 September 2018 01:14 (seven years ago)

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