Song of the Day 11/29: Raspberries, “Overnight Sensation (Hit Record)”

Though they’re now acknowledged as founding fathers of power pop, Raspberries weren’t fully appreciated in their time. Their Mod-based sound was considered lightweight, their teen-angst lyrics banal, their matching-suits look either eight years too early or eight years too late. In 1972 their bubblegummy “Go All the Way” hit No. 5, and several lesser hits followed, but by 1974, after three LPs with disappointing sales, Eric Carmen and Wally Bryson were the only original Raspberries remaining.

They titled what became their last album “Starting Over,” and they kicked it off with Eric Carmen’s magnum opus about what it was all for — a hit record on the radio. Sprinkled with DJ lingo and punctuated by new drummer Michael McBride’s enthusiastic pummeling, it’s clear these Cleveland boys logged a lot of radio visits trying to become overnight sensations. The production gimmick of mimicking the song coming out of a transistor radio, the Beach Boys-worthy harmonies (I especially like the background “number ones” on the fadeout), the false ending…they threw everything at the studio wall in their effort to will a record into a hit.

Carmen wanted to call it “Hit Record” until the suits at Capitol nixed the idea. It didn’t get close to No. 1, but it did reach No. 18, making it the band’s last hit record.

One big fan of the song: Bruce Springsteen. He has praised the band at several concerts, at one telling the audience, “They had a great record called ‘Overnight Sensation,’ one of the greatest little pop operas anybody ever did.”