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| There was some amount of not the best idea... |
Another one I didn’t know till it popped up in the queue. Maybe if I’d been born in Syracuse…
The Hit
“She’s just 16-years-old/
leave her alone/
they say…”
Those are, 1) the opening lyrics to Benny Mardones, “Into the Night” and, 2) not great, obviously, and it didn’t help that Mardones was 33 years old when the single dropped. And, as you keep digging…yeah. From Wikipedia’sentry on the single:
“The video opens with Mardones walking down a street and approaching a house. The song plays over the video, and the lyrics serve as Mardones's monologue. He is met at the door by a bearded man who tells him, "She's just 16 years old. Leave her alone." Mardones leaves and walks around to the back of the house, peering through a window at a girl sitting sullenly in her room. The video then cuts to Mardones at a pay phone, speaking to the girl on the other end of the line and professing his love. The video then cuts again to Mardones returning to the girl's house, carrying a rolled-up carpet. He crawls through her bedroom window, unrolls the magic carpet, and taking the girl's hand, they take flight into the night sky. The video closes with Mardones serenading the girl as they embrace; the scene finally fades to black as they kiss.”
All…that notwithstanding, the song has a touching backstory. Mardones fleshes out the full story in an audio clip posted to Songfacts in 2011, but, long story short, the father of a family that lived in his building Spanish Harlem left his wife and three kids for a member of a chorus line. Equal parts touched and angry by the desertion, Mardones gave each of the three kids odd jobs (and overpaid them), and he tasked the youngest girl (age 16) with walking his basset hound, Zanky(sp?) every morning. When a long night of working on some songs turned to morning, the young girl knocked on the door for Zanky’s daily constitutional. After she closed the door behind her, Mardones’ then-writing partner, Bobby Tepper, started with something like “my God (as Billboard’s obit put it, he “got leery”) and Mardones cut him off with, “she’s 16, leave her alone.” He comes off like a decent guy, and I believe it, but that video…
Getting back to the song, it’s a soft-rock ballad with some nice piano twinkles, but it’s mostly washed-out synths and a simple, sparing arrangement of traditional rock-band instruments that lay out like a stage for Mardones’ vocals - who, when he really gets going, doesn’t sound so different from Journey’s Steve Perry (eh...on further listening, I was in a mood). He picked up “The Voice” as a nickname for a reason…
The Hit
“She’s just 16-years-old/
leave her alone/
they say…”
Those are, 1) the opening lyrics to Benny Mardones, “Into the Night” and, 2) not great, obviously, and it didn’t help that Mardones was 33 years old when the single dropped. And, as you keep digging…yeah. From Wikipedia’sentry on the single:
“The video opens with Mardones walking down a street and approaching a house. The song plays over the video, and the lyrics serve as Mardones's monologue. He is met at the door by a bearded man who tells him, "She's just 16 years old. Leave her alone." Mardones leaves and walks around to the back of the house, peering through a window at a girl sitting sullenly in her room. The video then cuts to Mardones at a pay phone, speaking to the girl on the other end of the line and professing his love. The video then cuts again to Mardones returning to the girl's house, carrying a rolled-up carpet. He crawls through her bedroom window, unrolls the magic carpet, and taking the girl's hand, they take flight into the night sky. The video closes with Mardones serenading the girl as they embrace; the scene finally fades to black as they kiss.”
All…that notwithstanding, the song has a touching backstory. Mardones fleshes out the full story in an audio clip posted to Songfacts in 2011, but, long story short, the father of a family that lived in his building Spanish Harlem left his wife and three kids for a member of a chorus line. Equal parts touched and angry by the desertion, Mardones gave each of the three kids odd jobs (and overpaid them), and he tasked the youngest girl (age 16) with walking his basset hound, Zanky(sp?) every morning. When a long night of working on some songs turned to morning, the young girl knocked on the door for Zanky’s daily constitutional. After she closed the door behind her, Mardones’ then-writing partner, Bobby Tepper, started with something like “my God (as Billboard’s obit put it, he “got leery”) and Mardones cut him off with, “she’s 16, leave her alone.” He comes off like a decent guy, and I believe it, but that video…
Getting back to the song, it’s a soft-rock ballad with some nice piano twinkles, but it’s mostly washed-out synths and a simple, sparing arrangement of traditional rock-band instruments that lay out like a stage for Mardones’ vocals - who, when he really gets going, doesn’t sound so different from Journey’s Steve Perry (eh...on further listening, I was in a mood). He picked up “The Voice” as a nickname for a reason…
