The Arrows: the original I Love Rock N Roll
Written: Dec 24 '06 (Updated Jun 16 '07)
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Product Rating:
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Pros: British Top 10 hit Touch Too Much and the original I Love Rock N Roll.
Cons: None.
The Bottom Line: Includes the Top 30 British hits Touch Too Much and My Last Night With You,plus the original version of I Love Rock N Roll (later a hit for Joan Jett).
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| Don_Krider's Full Review: Singles Collection Plus by Arrows |
It must be rough when you've written a true Top 40 classic only to see someone else take your song to #1.
That's what happened to The Arrows. Bassist Alan Merrill and guitarist Jake Hooker wrote a song called I Love Rock N Roll in 1975 that was released as a 1975 British single by the band that didn't click on the charts on either side of the ocean.
Seven years later in 1982, that ferocious first lady of punk, Joan Jett, covered the song as a single and sent it to #1 in the U. S. for seven straight weeks (earning a Platinum Record Award for a single that sold over two million copies).
In The Arrows' native England, Joan's single version also reached #4 on the British charts.
By 1982, when Miss Jett made the song a worldwide rock anthem, The Arrows no longer existed as a band, despite a pair of Top 30 British glam rock/power pop hits in the mid-1970's and a British TV series.
The lead singer of The Arrows, Alan Merrill, has since appeared on albums by Rick Derringer, Meat Loaf, Jon Tiven and others. He has also written songs recorded by Jett, Britney Spears, Derringer, Lou Rawls (When The Night Comes) and Felix Cavaliere, among others.
Merrill has released a number of solo albums (his first solo album featured Steve Winwood and The Rolling Stones' Mick Taylor as guest musicians) and according to the band's official website he is writing his autobiography.
The Arrows
I first became aware of The Arrows when I was 17 while watching the syndicated U. S. rock music TV series "Don Kirshner's Rock Concert" in 1974.
Amid the live performances on that series, they sometimes included videos from British bands (which is how I also discovered 10CC's music before they ever had a U. S. hit).
On my 19-inch color TV screen with its tiny speakers appeared this cool-looking power trio (guitar, bass and drums) named The Arrows in a video singing their British hit Touch Too Much (which hit #8 on the British charts and spent three months in the British Top 40 in 1974).
"...it's gettin' so hot that you're burnin' me / I wanna touch too much of your tender love / touch too much of your good, good love..."
The tune, written by Nicky Chinn and Mike Chapman (who had already written British hits recorded by The Sweet, Suzi Quatro, Mud, Smokie and others), had an Indian backbeat intro like The Sweet's Wig-Wam Bam mixed with hand claps and a progressively faster melody that climaxed into an unforgettable, harmony-filled chorus ("...I wanna touch too much...").
I was hooked. Bad thing about British recordings in the 1970s --- try to find them in your average U. S. record store. So that song has stuck in my head for 32 years but I've never owned a copy until now.
Though they never had a U. S. hit, The Arrows were quite popular in England in the 1970's, with hit singles, a British TV series in 1976-77 (amazingly, no records by the band were released while the TV show was on the air), a cartoon strip about them in a British music magazine, and book biography of the group by Merseybeat editor Bill Harry. The band broke up in 1978.
This CD
Thanks to the folks at Cherry Red Records and their 7T's/Glam label, all 21 tracks recorded by The Arrows have been reissued in one anthology, Singles Collection Plus....
This 21-song compilation includes all of The Arrows British chart hits (none of which charted in the U. S.) on a single CD. The songs have a total running time of 70 minutes and 18 seconds.
The 8-page CD booklet, with liner notes on the singles by Mark Brennan and color photos of the picture sleeve singles, is rather limited on biographical notes and has no lyrics, but is interesting to look through.
The tracks: Touch Too Much, We Can Make It Together, Toughen Up, Diesel Locomotive Dancer, My Last Night With You, Movin' Next Door To You, I Love Rock N Roll, Broken Down Heart, Hard Hearted, My World's Turning On Love and Once Upon A Time.
Also, Boogiest Band In Town, First Hit, Thanks, What's Come Between Us, Don't Worry Bout Love, Let Me Love You, Feelin' This Way, Love Child, Love Is Easy and Gotta Be Near You.
The music
The Arrows were a unique mix of music, ranging from uptempo bubblegum to anthemic glam rock to glorious power pop sounds.
The songwriting on this CD includes originals written by the band themselves, along with tunes written by Nicky Chinn and Mike Chapman (famed as writers of The Sweet's Ballroom Blitz), and by Phil Coulter and Bill Martin (who wrote The Bay City Rollers' #1 U. S. hit from 1975, Saturday Night).
The Arrows cut six singles and one album (First Hit) as a power trio featuring lead singer/bassist Alan Merrill, lead guitarist Jake Hooker and drummer Paul Varley. Though this was a British band, Merrill was born in The Bronx, New York, and Hooker was born in Israel.
In 1976, The Arrows became a foursome with the addition of guitarist Terry Taylor (from the Bill Wyman-produced band Tuckey Buzzard, Taylor was once considered as a replacement for guitarist Mick Taylor in The Rolling Stones) and the band made the move to TV.
Though the new lineup cut demos, the band's love-hate relationship with their record label and litigation kept the group from releasing new product while the group had massive exposure via their TV show in 1976-77. This situation led to the band's break-up in 1978.
There are several fine tunes on this CD if you're into power pop and glam rock.
Touch Too Much is a true classic that actually hit the British Top 10 charts in 1974, as discussed earlier, produced by the legendary Mickie Most. Mickie Most won the Grammy Award in 1964 as Producer Of The Year for The Animals' hit House Of The Rising Sun (he also produced such 1960's greats as Herman's Hermits, The Yardbirds, Donovan and Lulu).
That same 1960's Mickie Most quality of sound production standard is maintained on all the tracks on The Arrows' Singles Collection Plus... with outstanding vocal and instrumental clarity on all the songs.
The band's many song styles are what makes them interesting to this listener.
On Diesel Locomotive Dancer you have a tune that could be Kiss circa 1974 (it sounds a lot like Nothin' To Lose), while We Can Make It Together seems to borrow heavily from Rick Derringer's old band, The McCoys and their hit Hang On Sloopy in its melody.
Those two tracks also represent the kind of songs, like I Love Rock N Roll, that band members Merrill and Hooker wrote: infectious, hook-laden melodies with a great chorus that sticks in your head forever.
My Last Night With You reminds me of The Platters (The Great Pretender) with its slow 1950's ballad feel and in its pleading lead vocal ("baby, baby, I'm begging you cause this is my last night with you"). The single reached #25 on the British charts.
The original 1975 version of I Love Rock N Roll sounds just like Joan Jett's hit version from 1982 --- note-for-note:
"...I love rock n roll, so put another dime in the jukebox baby / I love rock n roll, so come on, take your time and dance with me..."
Instrumentally and vocally, it's every bit as good as Jett's cover version (see the link to the band's YouTube video later in this review if you want see and hear for yourself).
On Don't Worry Bout Love, The Arrows are at once Free and The Small Faces, with heavy guitar rhythms showing a band moving in a hard rock direction sound-wise as the lead singer sounds most like Paul Rodgers here ("you got all the love you could ever need, don't worry bout love").
Then, if you need a change of pace on the CD, out-of-the-blue, somebody let's The Righteous Brothers (You've Lost That Lovin' Feeling) in and with a Phil Spector-ish wall-of-sound production out of your speakers comes Let Me Love You, a really lovely ballad composed by Coulter and Martin (who also wrote several Bay City Rollers hits).
Another pretty ballad, the piano-driven Love Child, features a sweetly sung lead vocal caressing the lyrics of "it's a long way from New England to the beach at Malibu".
And after listening to this CD, if you're like me, you're left wondering why The Arrows never had an American hit.
Jake Hooker
I talked about Merrill's work after leaving the band earlier in this review, but if you're wondering about what became of Merrill's I Love Rock N Roll songwriting partner, guitarist Jake Hooker, he went on to form Hookent and Edge Management
That company manages rock acts and Hooker's clients have included Edgar Winter, The Knack, Eddie Money, Missing Persons, Orleans, Player and Uriah Heep, among others. Hooker is also the ex-husband of Lorna Luft, Judy Garland's daughter.
The Final Recommendation
If you liked The Sweet, Slade, Kiss, The Babys, Raspberries and The Bay City Rollers, I think you would probably enjoy The Arrows and their CD Singles Collection Plus.... Music is the closest thing to time travel that we have, and I enjoyed this musical trip down memory lane.
The album is available at most online retailers. I bought mine from Amazon.Com .
Videos
You can hear clips of the band at various websites (listed in my "on The Web" section" below) and also in the following videos on YouTube.Com:
The Arrows Touch Too Much and Toughen Up videos that blew me away when they aired on "Don Kirshner's Rock Concert" in 1974: http://youtube.com/watch?v=fYD0vCK5zRQ
The Arrows doing their original version of I Love Rock N Roll on Grenada TV: http://youtube.com/watch?v=8AT_Pbtyid0
Brief live footage The Arrows performing Touch Too Much before a loving teen audience on TV's "Never Mind The Buzzcocks": http://youtube.com/watch?v=_nQl9ZqKAq4
The Arrows interviewing The Bay City Rollers on their 1976 TV series: http://youtube.com/watch?v=gLgesl73E4U
On The Web
The Arrows official website: http://www.geocities.com/Hollywood/Makeup/4010/page2.html
The Arrows on Myspace (includes music clips): http://profile.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=user.viewprofile&friendid=75954005
The official Alan Merrill website: http://www.alanmerrill.com
You might also enjoy:
Greatest Hits by Shaun Cassidy: http://www.epinions.com/content_120943709828
Recommended:
Yes
Great Music to Play While: Hanging With Friends
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Epinions.com ID:
Don_Krider
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 in Music, Musical Instruments |
 - Top 200 |
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Member: Don Krider
Location: USA
Reviews written: 301
Trusted by: 971 members
About Me:
Fan of power pop (Raspberries, Badfinger, Cheap Trick, The Knack, Romantics, Slade,Sweet...) --- "Play On"!!!
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