Happy Birthday Todd Rundgren!

To honour Todd Rundgren on his birthday, I've picked my top 3 Todd related tracks.
Here they are...

Nazz - Open My Eyes (1968)

This was the debut single to be released by Rundgren's first band, Nazz. A full on, sonic blast of phasing and fuzz.  Like a lot of American bands of this time, an Anglophile influence is present, with the intro paying homage to The Who's "I Can't Explain".  The song was given a new lease of life when it was included on Lenny Kaye's Nuggets compilation and has remained a dancefloor classic at any decent sixties/psychedelic club night.  The Nazz rarely put a foot wrong in the time they were together and their three albums are essential to anyone interested in psychedelic pop.

The video, like all good sixties promos, sees the band freaking out in the outdoors.

Todd Rundgren - Couldn't I Just Tell You (1972)

After breaking up the Nazz, the ever ambitious Rundgren went solo and mostly wrote, played and produced his albums by his self.  "Couldn't I Just Tell You", taken from his third solo album, a double LP called Something/Anything, is considered by many to be one of the biggest influences on Power Pop genre.  For the rest of the seventies he would experiment with sounds both as a solo artist and concurrently with his band Utopia to mixed results.  It gets a little too proggy for my liking, but in a good way I suppose.  It's always melodic!


This would possibly make it into my all time, Top 10 fave records.

Utopia - I Just Want To Touch You (1980)


The opening track to a Utopia album "Deface The Music" where the concept is to sound as much like the Beatles as possible.  Like the Rutles, the album pays homage to all stages of the Fab's songbook.  This song was going to be used in the soundtrack of a movie called "Roadie",starring Meatloaf but it was rejected in fear of legal action as it sound too much like the Beatles. 


I'll review the "Deface The Music" album in full on this blog sometime soon. But for now, "Happy Birthday Todd!" and enjoy...