Eric Bazilian recently vaulted back into the music news when Joan Osborne's "One Of Us" made playlists across the country and revived interest in the band of which he is still a major force, the Hooters. Philadelphia's favorite sons have been playing together since the early 1980's and their current lineup - Bazilian, Rob Hyman, David Uosikkinen, John Lilley, and Fran Smith, Jr - has been intact since 1988.
The opportunity to have a song do well outside of the Hooters, especially on an international level, made it that much more rewarding for Bazilian: "There is something exciting about having a song thriving out there independent of one's further efforts. It's kind of like seeing your children succeed out on their own."
Although fellow Philadelphian Daryl Hall didn't get recognized as a "true" writer by members of the elitist press until Paul Young took his "Everytime You Go Away" to #1, this wasn't the first time Bazilian wrote for other artists outside of the Hooters.
"The collaboration with Joan felt totally familiar, as we've done similar projects with Cyndi Lauper, Patty Smyth, Sophie B. Hawkins, and others," recalls Bazilian. "And even though Rob and I spend the lion's share of our time writing together, we had certainly done our separate projects, such as Cyndi Lauper's "Time After Time", already."
"Time After Time" was Lauper's biggest hit, and represented the high point of her solo career. In fact, Bazilian and Hyman *were* her main backing band on the debut album She's So Unusual. They continued collaborating later on her Hat Full of Stars album (especially "That's What I Think") and Lauper's vocals appear on the Hooters "Boys Will Be Boys", from Out Of Body.
Before the Hooters became known nationally, Hyman, Bazilian and David Kagan released two unsuccessful albums on Arista as the group Baby Grand. The experience did bring future better-known results: one of the tracks, "Never Enough" was slightly re-written as the title track for her post-Scandal solo debut, and the producer for that release was none other than Rick Chertoff.
After that, the Hooters began to take form. Their first two singles were a live version of "All You Zombies" and "Fightin' On The Same Side", which led to the 1983 independent release of Amore. At the time, Amore established new heights for the success of an indie album; an even more amazing sidelight is that 4/5 of the band from that effort are still in the band today, with only Fran Smith being a "newbie". There are plans to reissue this on CD at some point in the future (with unreleased tracks), but nothing is concrete at this date.
After 15 years of playing a song such as "All You Zombies", it could get tiring to perform. But, as Bazilian states, this is not the case. Some unnamed songs do grate on him, but, "All You Zombies, is not one of them. That song came into being in a miraculous way and it continues to inspire."
Before Hooters albums come out, it seems like there are test runs live in concert to see which songs perform well and which don't. According to Eric, there are very few songs that haven't made it to record. "We have repeatedly tried to go out and perform batches of new songs live, but this is often not a very good barometer of what will translate to record. We did perform a few new songs on tour last summer in Europe which was fun but, ultimately, the audience has limited patience for unfamiliar material."
Compiling the band's years on Columbia, Hooterization: A Retrospective recently surfaced. For dedicated fans, the only two new tracks are "Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds", previously only a B-side to "Johnny B", and the Hyman/Cyndi Lauper-penned "Time After Time", both live from a concert in Philadelphia at the Tower Theatre during October of 1987. Others may find out that there really is a lot more to the band that had top 40 hits with "And We Danced" and "Day By Day", but ran into resistance from American radio progammers on other tracks which have stood the test of time such as "All You Zombies".
So, today, everything comes full circle. Nearly 20 years after Baby Grand released their first album, the Hooters are on yet another label - Rick Chertoff's Blue Gorilla - a division of Polygram, and best known for spawning Osborne's Relish album. The success of "One Of Us" has opened more industry doors, including a friendship with the legendary Carole King which has led to some writing. And, the inevitable question: When will there be a new Hooters album? Bazilian replies, "The writing is taking some time and it's been long enough that we really want it to be right. Which doesn't mean "hits" or "perfect"; it just has to feel like it's something new and exciting to us. We're trying to take Hooterization to the next level." If it's anything like it has been in the past, it will include a healthy mix of rock and pop with a slight touch of reggae for flavoring, a great live show, and most importantly, some great fun. Here's hoping that Americans finally realize what Europe and Japan have been saying for years - the Hooters are still a great band. TRACK LISTING for Hooterization : And We Danced, Nervous Night, All You Zombies, Satellite, Karla With A K, Where Do The Children Go, 500 Miles, Fightin' On The Same Side, Day By Day, Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds (Live), Heaven Laughs, Brother Don't You Walk Away, Johnny B, She Comes In Colors, Time After Time (Live), Beat Up Guitar
