{"id":26117,"date":"2023-10-03T05:30:59","date_gmt":"2023-10-03T09:30:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/?p=26117"},"modified":"2023-09-26T14:05:30","modified_gmt":"2023-09-26T18:05:30","slug":"take-five-andrew-gold","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/2023\/10\/03\/take-five-andrew-gold\/","title":{"rendered":"Take Five: Andrew Gold"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>A multi-instrumentalist, producer, songwriter, arranger, engineer, live performer and recording artist, the late Andrew Gold is best known for his pair of 1970s hit singles \u201cLonely Boy\u201d and \u201cThank You for Being a Friend.\u201d Seven years after the latter\u2019s release, the song took on a second life when it was used as the opening theme of the popular TV sitcom <em>The Golden Girls<\/em>. In addition to a fruitful solo career, Andrew Gold worked with a long and wide-ranging assortment of artists, lending his suite of talents to their work. Gold passed away in 2011; August 2 of this year would have been his 72nd birthday. Here are five tracks that merely scratch the surface of Andrew Gold\u2019s deep well of creativity.<\/p>\n<p><strong>\u201cYou\u2019re No Good\u201d from Linda Ronstadt\u2019s <em>Heart Like a Wheel<\/em> (1974)<\/strong><br \/>\nBefore he began a successful recording career as a solo artist, Gold worked largely behind the scenes; he played most of the instruments on three of Linda Ronstadt\u2019s biggest smash singles, including this, her biggest hit, a cover of a song first recorded by Dee Dee Warwick in 1963.<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"YouTube video player\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/e0vJNp5asqc\" width=\"560\" height=\"315\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p><strong>\u201cNever Let Her Slip Away\u201d from <em>All This and Heaven Too<\/em> (1978)<\/strong><br \/>\nOn the heels of his successful singles \u201cLonely Boy\u201d (U.S. #7) and \u201cThank You for Being a Friend\u201d (U.S. #25), Gold released \u201cNever Let Her Slip Away,\u201d the third single from his third solo album. The song performed modestly on U.S. charts (#67 on <em>Billboard<\/em>\u2019s Hot 100, #16 on the Adult Contemporary chart), but it was a smash overseas, soaring to #5 in the UK (earning a Silver record) and #2 in Ireland. With its memorable ARP synthesizer arrangement, \u201cNever Let Her Slip Away\u201d would be Gold\u2019s last charting single for many years to come.<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"YouTube video player\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/YitRwdUj_Mw\" width=\"560\" height=\"315\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p><strong>\u201cBridge to Your Heart\u201d from Wax\u2019s <em>American English<\/em> (1987)<\/strong><br \/>\nAfter playing on several 10cc recordings (and being asked to join that group, an invitation he turned down), Gold formed Wax, a duo with 10cc\u2019s Graham Gouldman. Billed in the U.S. as Wax UK, the group failed to gain popularity in America, but internationally it was a different story. Wax scored hit singles around the world, including this song, a Top 20 hit in eight countries.<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"YouTube video player\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/1isRH9E9WAE\" width=\"560\" height=\"315\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p><strong>\u201cSpooky Scary Skeletons\u201d from Andrew Gold\u2019s <em>Halloween Howls<\/em> (1996)<\/strong><br \/>\nBy the mid 1990s, Gold had worked on dozens and dozens of album projects for other artists. But in 1996 he made time for a kid-centered project, a collection of Halloween-themed pop songs. The tunes found popularity among the younger set, and the music had staying power: in June 2023 \u2013 27 years after its release and 12 years after Gold\u2019s passing \u2013 the album\u2019s single \u201cSpooky Scary Skeletons\u201d earned a Gold Record award.<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"YouTube video player\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/v45YO1zepHg\" width=\"560\" height=\"315\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p><strong>\u201cLove Tonight\u201d from The Fraternal Order of the All\u2019s <em>Greetings from Planet Love<\/em> (1997)<\/strong><br \/>\nOne of Gold\u2019s least-known projects is also his very best. A loving pastiche of late-sixties styles \u2013 psychedelia, baroque pop, folk rock and more \u2013 <em>Greetings from Planet Love<\/em> is Gold\u2019s love letter to the best music of that era. Displaying an inimitable sense of exuberance and style, his original songs skillfully evoke the spirit of the \u201860s. Long unavailable in any form, the astounding <em>Greetings from Planet Love<\/em> has just been reissued, for the first time ever on vinyl.<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"YouTube video player\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/rj3RXVsDnaE\" width=\"560\" height=\"315\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A multi-instrumentalist, producer, songwriter, arranger, engineer, live performer and recording artist, the late Andrew Gold is best known for his pair of 1970s hit singles \u201cLonely Boy\u201d and \u201cThank You [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":26118,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[27,51],"tags":[192],"class_list":["post-26117","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-essay","category-pop","tag-andrew-gold","cat-27-id","cat-51-id","has_thumb"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26117","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=26117"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26117\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":26119,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26117\/revisions\/26119"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/26118"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=26117"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=26117"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=26117"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}