Sunday, October 19, 2014

The Allnighter: Glenn Frey, Yuppie Sex God

(Note: For some reason, Mr. Frey and/or his legal team have put a copyright claim on all YouTube clips featuring songs from The Allnighter, which is odd, considering every song from No Fun Aloud is readily available on the site, and considering this album is 30 years old and wasn't even that popular when it came out. Why The Allnighter, Glenn? Why? Think of all the top-notch publicity Cosmic American Blog was about to give your sleazy 1984 opus! Nonetheless, I have decided to go ahead with my post, and if at some point these tracks pop up on YouTube, I'll just add them in later. In the meantime, if you're simply too curious, you can acquire the discussed recordings using your medium of choice.) [Edit: they're more or less up on YouTube now, and Glenn is dead.]

Although he'd already smothered himself in plenty of vaseline on No Fun Aloud, for his second solo album, The Allnighter, Glenn Frey slid even further into his unique soft-core L.A. universe. This album is like ten different Viagra commercials. What I really want to know is: what, exactly, inspired Frey pick up his guitar and think, "You know what the music scene really needs right now? It needs this." I picture him listening to a Prince record and feeling the thrill of competition. "He thinks he can make sexy music? I can make sexy music."

At first glance, the title track seems to be about L.A.'s most inexhaustible gigolo, but I'm starting to think it's actually about a vibrator. Tell me what you think:
Lonely girl, rainy night
Lookin' for that number
She needs someone to treat her right
There's plenty of men she could call
But she wants him most of all
Oh God, I hope he's home tonight
She needs a love from a real exciter
She needs the allnighter

The allnighter
He's the one, the one she calls
When she gets that feeling
Some nights she just can't stop herself
He's tough and tender, a soul bender
Ain't no service he can't render
He touches her like nobody else
He brings out the love, love, love deep inside her
He's the allnighter

Now when all the stimulation lets you down, down, down
And there ain't no medication layin' around, 'round, 'round
Ya feel your little heart begin to pound and pound
He's a satisfier of that one desire

Other guys come and go
They may try, but they don't know
Every girl needs special care
Oh, he's so bad, he's so good
He makes it feel just the way it should
Nobody else can take her there
He's the real thing, the pure delighter
He's the allnighter
"There's plenty of men she could call/But she wants him most of all"? "He's tough and tender, a soul bender"? I'm sure there are some supremely bendable sex toys around. "Every girl needs special care"? "Nobody else can take her there"? I think I'm on to something.



Then there's "Sexy Girl," which climbed all the way up to #20 on the strength of it's Huey Lewis-esque bouncy beat and biting guitar fills, but here's a general rule for aspiring songwriters: if you have to put the word "sexy" in your song title, your song probably isn't very sexy (see: Rod Stewart's "Do Ya Think I'm Sexy?"; Air's "Sexy Boy"). Here, Glenn composes a slightly toned down Penthouse Forum letter in which he shares with us his good fortune in real estate matters:
She moved in next door to me
And she showed me her world
What a neighbor
Thanks for the favor
She's a very sexy girl

She's a sexy girl (sexy girl, sexy girl)
She's a very sexy girl
She's a sexy girl (sexy girl, sexy girl)
She's a very sexy girl

I got a feeling I can't go wrong
'Cause every time I see her
It's like hearing my favorite song
She's already down the steps
She's way down the block
But my heart keeps beating faster
And it just won't stop

I love to take her walkin'
And when we started talkin'
I'd tell her she's the finest I've ever seen
She'd look into my eyes,
But then I'd realize
I'm holding on to a dream

Stop any man walking down the street
Ask him what kind of girl he'd like to meet
There's not one thing in the whole wide world
He'd rather see than a sexy girl
At least the video (currently muted, but screw it, I'm embedding it anyway) [Edit: it's gone now, but at least the audio is up] is a little more realistic: when Frey shows up to the girl's door with a bottle of champagne, she says hello ... and so does her football jersey-wearing boyfriend. Still, Glenn makes less of a spectacle of himself than the fat, balding, Hawaiian shirt-wearing neighbor whose garden hose mimics his erectile behavior.



But it's not all fun and Hustler on The Allnighter. With "Smuggler's Blues," perhaps the musical step-child of his buddy Bob Seger's "The Fire Down Below," Frey spins a bluesy drug dealing tale so gritty it would make Tony Montana blush:
There's trouble on the streets tonight
I can feel it in my bones
I had a premonition
That he should not go alone
I knew the gun was loaded
But I didn't think he'd kill
Everything exploded
And the blood began to spill

So baby, here's your ticket
Put the suitcase in your hand
Here's a little money now
Do it just the way we planned
You be cool for twenty hours
And I'll pay you twenty grand

I'm sorry it went down like this
And someone had to lose
It's the nature of the business
It's the smuggler's blues

The sailors and pilots
The soldiers and the law
The pay offs and the rip offs
And the things nobody saw
No matter if it's heroin, cocaine, or hash
You've got to carry weapons
'Cause you always carry cash

There's lots of shady characters
Lots of dirty deals
Every name's an alias
In case somebody squeals
It's the lure of easy money
It's gotta very strong appeal

Perhaps you'd understand it better
Standin' in my shoes
It's the ultimate enticement
It's the smuggler's blues

See it in the headlines
You hear it ev'ry day
They say they're gonna stop it
But it doesn't go away
They move it through Miami
Sell it in L.A.
They hide it up in Telluride
I mean it's here to stay

It's propping up the governments
In Columbia and Peru
You ask any D.E.A. man
He'll say "There's nothin' we can do"
From the office of the President
Right down to me and you

It's a losing proposition
But one you can't refuse
It's the politics of contraband
It's the smuggler's blues
If you're thinking this practically sounds like an episode of Miami Vice, well ... so did the producers of Miami Vice. According to Wikipedia, "The single 'Smuggler's Blues' helped to inspire the Miami Vice episode of the same name, and Frey was invited to star in that episode, which was Frey's acting début." I'm not sure if the video is a truncated version of the episode or something else entirely, but you know what? He's not half bad!



But if "Smuggler's Blues" gives the listener an impression of moral ambivalence, on "Better In The U.S.A.," Frey picks a side and he ain't afraid to admit it. Perhaps he heard Don Henley's "Them And Us" and thought, "You what Don? I can do a better Cold War song than you can." When the Beatles recorded "Back In The U.S.S.R." and turned it into a Chuck Berry/Beach Boys pastiche, they were joking. But Glenn decided to write the same exact kind of song about the U.S., and I think he was actually serious. "Better In The U.S.A." reads like a Fox News rant about how liberals should stop complaining about all of America's flaws because, hey, Russia's worse! Well, the Soviet Union probably was worse, but that's not saying much. This might have made a good television short narrated by Charlton Heston, but as an '80s pop song, it's kind of awkward:
Well, they look to the east, they look to the west
The Third World wonders, which way's the best
We got freedom, we got soul
We got blue jeans and rock 'n' roll

Man there ain't no choice
It's better in the U.S.A. (It's better in the U.S.A.)
You can be what you want
Say what you wanna say (It's better in the U.S.A.)
How can I make you understand
It's better in the U.S.A. (It's better in the U.S.A.)

I hear the same propaganda, day after day
It's gettin' so hip, to knock the U.S.A
If we're so awful, and we're so bad
You oughta check the nightlife in Leningrad

Man it ain't even close
It's better in the U.S.A. (It's better in the U.S.A.)
If you could see behind the curtain
Life is cold and gray (It's better in the U.S.A.)
How can I make you understand
It's better in the U.S.A. (It's better, it's better)

Nobody's perfect and change comes slow
It's really up to you which way you wanna go
You can move to the left or move to the right
You can stand in the dark, you can stand in the light

Drivin' on the beach on a night in June
Me and my baby and the lover's moon
We're playin' sweet soul music, got it turned up loud
Makes me feel so good, makes me feel so proud

Man there ain't no choice
It's better in the U.S.A. (It's better in the U.S.A.)
They'd be movin' here from Moscow
If they could only find a way (It's better in the U.S.A.)
How can I make you understand
It's better in the U.S.A. (It's better)

We got burgers and fries (In the U.S.A.)
We got the friendly skies (In the U.S.A.)
We got the beautiful girls (In the U.S.A.)
They got the beautiful curls (In the U.S.A.)
We're drivin' beautiful cars (In the U.S.A.)
We're diggin' movie stars (In the U.S.A.)
We get to make romance (In the U.S.A.)
We let the little girls dance (In the U.S.A.)
It's better baby!
Nice sweater, baby
What'd you say, you and me go for a little drive?
Come on


Leave it to Glenn Frey to turn a patriotic anthem into an excuse to pick up an unsuspecting female.

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