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The Hit
When he described the bones of his bigger hit, Walter Egan recalls having something very specific in mind: “a '50s throwback that was consciously in my mind. I was trying to write a song that had the Stroll beat, which is the snare hits every other one, that kind of 6/8 feel” - and you’ll definitely hear that (assuming you already haven’t). He hated his first pass at the lyrics, though, so he parked that part of the creative process and waited for inspiration. He found the first part while working with one of the producers on his first album, and the second while driving up the 101. As he recalled to a site called The College Crowd Digs Me in 2016:
“We had been doing recording sessions for Fundamental Roll...a song on there called ‘Tunnel O' Love.’ And Stevie was singing her wailing, banshee, background vocals. This was at Sound City. The now famous Sound City. And that was the night I just went...'oh my God, how am I so lucky?' Ya know, all the superlatives you could think of about someone falling for Stevie. In my young youth, at the time, it was just another girl who was very talented.”
His second muse was “one of those completely customized Continentals with the lights under it and the diamond window. We used to call it a Pimpmobile in those days.” He titled the song “Magnet and Steel” and, yes, the “Stevie” in that recollection was Stevie Nicks, who co-produced Egan’s debut album, Fundamental Roll, and who shows up all over it. He borrowed his second album’s title, Not Shy, from the vanity plate on that Continental and the phrase “with you I’m not shy” repeats throughout the song. Stevie Nicks wasn’t alone of the backing vocals for that track - Lindsey Buckingham, the other co-producer on his debut album (it’s a funny story), and a woman he’d worked with for years named Annie McLoone (or McLoon, depending on the interview) - but Buckingham put a lot of late-70s polish on the 50s chassis.
“Magnet and Steel” dropped around the same time as Fleetwood Mac’s notorious masterpiece, Rumours, and, as Egan told Classic Bands, “all of a sudden there was my record with Stevie's voice all over it and Lindsey's very precise production and playing on some of it, and so it was noticed because of that.” All that happened in late winter/early spring 1977 - Rumours was released in February 1977 - which pumped “Magnet and Steel” to No. 8 on the Billboard (No. 18 on the Easy Listening charts). Egan felt like he had a strong follow-up with a nostalgia-tinged “medium-rock” number called “Hot Summer Nights” - a song with a story of its own - and he recalls having a conversation with CBS Records’ Walter Yetknikoff, who assured him they’d push him just like they pushed Billy Joel, Springsteen, Les Dudek, and Boz Scaggs, all of whom Yetniknoff told him took four albums to break through. Egan would wait until the hot summer nights gave way to the long, cold nights of October…
When he described the bones of his bigger hit, Walter Egan recalls having something very specific in mind: “a '50s throwback that was consciously in my mind. I was trying to write a song that had the Stroll beat, which is the snare hits every other one, that kind of 6/8 feel” - and you’ll definitely hear that (assuming you already haven’t). He hated his first pass at the lyrics, though, so he parked that part of the creative process and waited for inspiration. He found the first part while working with one of the producers on his first album, and the second while driving up the 101. As he recalled to a site called The College Crowd Digs Me in 2016:
“We had been doing recording sessions for Fundamental Roll...a song on there called ‘Tunnel O' Love.’ And Stevie was singing her wailing, banshee, background vocals. This was at Sound City. The now famous Sound City. And that was the night I just went...'oh my God, how am I so lucky?' Ya know, all the superlatives you could think of about someone falling for Stevie. In my young youth, at the time, it was just another girl who was very talented.”
His second muse was “one of those completely customized Continentals with the lights under it and the diamond window. We used to call it a Pimpmobile in those days.” He titled the song “Magnet and Steel” and, yes, the “Stevie” in that recollection was Stevie Nicks, who co-produced Egan’s debut album, Fundamental Roll, and who shows up all over it. He borrowed his second album’s title, Not Shy, from the vanity plate on that Continental and the phrase “with you I’m not shy” repeats throughout the song. Stevie Nicks wasn’t alone of the backing vocals for that track - Lindsey Buckingham, the other co-producer on his debut album (it’s a funny story), and a woman he’d worked with for years named Annie McLoone (or McLoon, depending on the interview) - but Buckingham put a lot of late-70s polish on the 50s chassis.
“Magnet and Steel” dropped around the same time as Fleetwood Mac’s notorious masterpiece, Rumours, and, as Egan told Classic Bands, “all of a sudden there was my record with Stevie's voice all over it and Lindsey's very precise production and playing on some of it, and so it was noticed because of that.” All that happened in late winter/early spring 1977 - Rumours was released in February 1977 - which pumped “Magnet and Steel” to No. 8 on the Billboard (No. 18 on the Easy Listening charts). Egan felt like he had a strong follow-up with a nostalgia-tinged “medium-rock” number called “Hot Summer Nights” - a song with a story of its own - and he recalls having a conversation with CBS Records’ Walter Yetknikoff, who assured him they’d push him just like they pushed Billy Joel, Springsteen, Les Dudek, and Boz Scaggs, all of whom Yetniknoff told him took four albums to break through. Egan would wait until the hot summer nights gave way to the long, cold nights of October…
