A "Kihn-Versation" with Greg Kihn
I remember it like it was yesterday, as I’m sure any other musician whose ever started a garage band will tell you. The moment where everyone in the band gets together and starts figuring out which songs to learn.
In between the usual shouts for Led Zeppelin and The Rolling Stones everyone puts in their own two-cents and decisions are made.
Some songs rise to the top because they’re fairly easy to learn. Others fall by the wayside due to their technical ability, or perhaps because no one in their right mind would ever want to hear them played in a club.
Eventually though, songs get whittled down until only a handful remain. These are the classic ones that everyone in the band, regardless of instrument, already knows how to play and is eager to put on the set list.
In my experience there was only one song that was the common denominator in every cover band that I was ever in: “The Break Up Song” by Greg Kihn. I liked to call it “Old Reliable” because it was a staple in my band’s arsenal. A song that we were quickly able to pull out on a whim whenever the ladies came within striking distance of the dance floor. A weapon of mass destruction that was both easy for us to play and yet would only reinforce our rock star status to those of the female persuasion.
“The Breakup Song (They Don’t Write ‘Em)” was the song that first introduced me to Greg Kihn. A song that broke the band into the mainstream and as you’ll discover, as all good songs do, has a true “rock and roll” story behind its origin.
But Greg Kihn’s musical legacy goes much deeper than just a single song. Case in point: after losing control of his master recordings from his days on the Beserkley label in the late 1980′s Greg began the monumental task of getting them all back.
A successful journey that now gives us:
Greg Kihn Band: Best of Beserkley, 1975-1984: a 21-track magnum opus that features 19 remastered original hits drawn from Greg’s eight-of-nine Beserkley Records studio albums. Most of which have been out of print for over twenty-five years.
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