Marshall Crenshaw? A songwriter’s songwriter. Ask anyone - except Crenshaw himself. "I’m a
musician first, and a songwriter eighth," he modestly insists. "I think of myself as a practitioner of
pop music. I just write songs to perpetuate that."
Bette Midler. the Dirt Band and Robert Gordon would disagree. They’re among the growing
crowd who have recorded one or more Crenshaw compositions. Since his own recording debut
four years ago, the thirty-two-year-old pop fiend from a Detroit suburb has attracted plenty of
critical attention. His songs typically look back to the 50s and 60s for a rustproof chassis
underpinning airflow melodies, V8 propulsion and power (guitar) breaks. His lyrics don’t shy away
from the more complex problems of the love tossed. He’s even had a top forty single - once.
Which might explain why Crenshaw is now in Austin, Texas, opening a show for Howard Jones.
"We’ve been really excited about coming to Austin," Crenshaw deadpans after opening with
"Someday Someway," his lone hit. "We’re dying to entertain you." The audience, mostly of high
school age, may or may not catch the humor. But they give Crenshaw and band a more than
tolerant response. Some are even familiar with his songs.
The singer/guitarist is on the road with Jones to promote a new album, Downtown. "From a
pragmatic point of view it made a lot of sense," Crenshaw says of his opening-act status. Crenshaw
is a pragmatist. Yet he can’t help but be ambivalent about the turns his career has taken since he
signed with Warner Bros. records in 1981.
Crenshaw’s first, self-titled album included "Someday, Someway" and sold over 200,000 copies,
according to manager Richard Sarbin. It’s a stunning debut, full of memorable phrases (verbal and
musical) and rhythmic by-play. Crenshaw’s band consisted of bassist Chris Donato and brother
Robert Crenshaw on drums. "I listen to it now," Marshall says in his Austin hotel room, "and it just
sounds like guys who are scared to death trying to make a record. I remember how impossible it
was for me to get a guitar sound, how upset it made me, and how under pressure Chris Donato
felt. The only thing about it that didn’t make me happy was that it didn’t go platinum."
He got a ruder shock the following year when his second album, Field Day, didn’t do as well as
the first. Producer Steve Lillywhite was roundly criticized for the record’s overblown sound; a
single, "Whenever You’re On My Mind," never charted at all.
"Let’s be honest - I was shook up about it," Crenshaw admits. "I never really figured it out. The
only disappointment that still lingers is that the single never went anywhere. All I ever really cared
about was that we had hit singles. I don’t really care about reviews." He blames a "political thing" at
Warners for hurting the singles chances.
Field Day was issued in spring, 1983. Downtown didn’t appear until well over two years later. "I
wasn’t doing much of anything" in 1984, Crenshaw says. "I was taking a rest. When our first album
came out we were already on the road, and we stayed out there for about a year. Then we
stopped and made another album. Then we went back out again, and stayed out for another year.
When it got to be time to start thinking about another record, I found I had just no idea what was
going on. I felt really disoriented and exhausted, spiritually and physically. So I decided to hang it
up for a while - give up show business. You gotta pace yourself, otherwise you’re dead."
A self-confessed homebody, Crenshaw "hung around the house." (He married his high-school
sweetheart eight years ago.) The year wasn’t totally lost; he did a session with producer Mitch
Easter that yielded "Blues Is King" on Downtown. But when he got serious about the album last
winter, there were changes made - starting with the band.
Crenshaw first thought about expanding his trio two years ago. "It’s really a matter of practicality.
The stuff on this album, I don’t think there’s any way the three of us could play it and pull it off. We
had a bit of a time doing stuff on Field Day too; it was really difficult for us to execute the songs in
concert. I didn’t think I was cuttin’ it anymore as a guitar player in a three-piece band. It was too
much of a load on my shoulders."
To relieve that load, Crenshaw and Downtown co-producer T-Bone Burnett recruited some
acquaintances: Crenshaw knew guitarist G.E. Smith and drummer Mickey Curry, of Hall & Oates’
band, from touring with them. NRBQ’s rhythm section is on "Yvonne," Crenshaw’s first recorded
twelve-bar. Burnett asked keyboard player Mitchell Froom, bassist David Miner and drummer
Jerry Marotta. Robert Crenshaw drums on two tracks. Donato isn’t on the album at all, and he
doesn’t mind telling you how he feels about it.
"Well," Crenshaw drawls, "they felt probably how you would imagine they felt. It’s kind of a
crummy subject. But it just became absolutely necessary in order to have the record come to exist.
We hadn’t played together in a long time. We were out of touch with one another. We tried some
stuff and it just was impossible to get anything done. I had to kind of break that habit."
On tour though, Crenshaw is reunited with his brother and Donato - plus guitarists Tom Teeley and
Graham Maby. Teeley is a friend of Crenshaw’s since they toured together in a Beatlemania road
show in the late 70s. Maby, Joe Jackson’s longtime bassist, met Crenshaw on a Jackson tour.
Crenshaw picked them up as much for their singing as instrumental abilities; the expanded group’s
vocal harmonies are in evidence as they run through "Cathy’s Clown" at a sound check. "We took
our thing as far as we could as a three-piece group," Crenshaw says. "I think we have one of the
best rock ‘n’ roll bands out there right now. I’d like to get this band into a studio as soon as
possible."
When Crenshaw says "rock ‘n’ roll," he doesn’t mean Led Zeppelin. "More or less, I hated all
contemporary rock music from about 1970 to about ‘78," he states. His favorite guitarists are Bo
Diddley and Duane Eddy. He’s recorded songs originally done by Gene Vincent, the Jive Five and
Buddy Holly. Holly used to be a favorite critical comparison, although the resemblance stops at the
fact that both wear glasses. Indeed, despite his love of 50s sounds, Crenshaw is no copycat
revivalist. He accomplishes the much harder task of writing contemporary music rooted in the
values of past craftsmanship.
"I find a really good technique is just to pick up a guitar and start beating on it and give it absolutely
no thought beforehand. You start with the germ of an idea and just sorta build it up from there. The
best ideas are the ones that materialize out of nowhere. Those are the ones I try to capture and
develop. All over my house I have work tapes of me humming in front of a cassette machine. The
idea behind songwriting and making records seems to be that you have to really labor at something
in order to make it sound spontaneous."
He doesn’t have a fixed m.o. "I’ll start something and not finish it for two or three years. Or I might
throw something together in half an hour." He claims "Someday, Someway" took five minutes. On
the other hand, "sometimes I’ll find I’m editing and fooling around with something even after it’s on
a record. I’m still changing the lyrics to ‘Our Town’ [on Field Day]."
Surprisingly, Crenshaw began songwriting in earnest only two years before his first album. At first "I
was really concerned about making every song as short as possible. I thought if I could get ‘em
down to four seconds that would probably be a good thing. I don’t even remember why anymore.
I guess it was just in emulation of 60s rock. Finally one day I realized my brain was turning inside
out. Now I can be more objective about what I’m doing. I don’t use a formula anymore...I just sit
down and try to come up with something that moves me."
That almost always means a love song. "True love is a great topic for songs. I don’t think there ever
will be enough songs written about it. True love is probably the only thing in the world that isn’t
corrupt. It’s not all there is, but what else is there?" he laughs.
Still, the music comes first. Instead of "songwriter," Crenshaw prefers the term "manipulator of
musical sounds." "As far as words go, I feel I’m just groping along, trying to finish the songs. Music
is a much more powerful form of communication than language. There are hundreds of songs I love,
and I don’t know what the lyrics are.
"I was listening to a song today: "Who’ll Stop The Rain," by Creedence Clearwater Revival. It’s a
beautiful song, I love it. but I don’t get what the hell he’s saying. You just get your own impression,
and that’s cool with me." He regrets the printed lyrics on Field Day’s inner sleeve. "It’s a rotten
way to listen to a record."
For Crenshaw, music is a language - one he’s been familiar with almost as long as he’s known
English. From a musically inclined family, young Marshall played with his father’s guitar until he got
his own, at age six. His childhood taste in pop veered toward rockabilly. It wasn’t until 1963 that,
inspired by "Wild Weekend" and "Louie Louie," Crenshaw got serious about making his own
music. Even now, he says it’s a tie between listening to music and playing guitar for his favorite
activity.
After high school Crenshaw played in a bar band, an oldies band, a country band, a Hawaiian
band, and even accompanied authentic, transplanted rockabillies like Jack Earls. "Mostly in the 70s
I was listening to Chuck Berry and Phil Spector, Les Paul - anything but Uriah Heep."
A trip to Los Angeles in 1976 didn’t pan out. Two years later Crenshaw had better luck
auditioning for a John Lennon role in Beatlemania. After eighteen months of the Beatles, however,
he was ready to make some music of his own. Reunited in New York with his brother Robert -
they had played together in the Detroit oldies group - Crenshaw found a bassist (eventually
Donato) and began gigging in clubs.
At the same time he was shopping demos of his tunes to anyone who’d listen. One who did was
producer Richard Gottehrer - who liked what he heard enough to have Robert Gordon, whom he
was producing, cut five Crenshaw compositions. Gordon liked Crenshaw enough to record another
three of his songs, after Gordon and Gottehrer split up, for the album that finally came out. (One
was "Someday, Someway," a single for Gordon a year before Crenshaw’s version.)
A 1981 single on the Shake label increased Crenshaw’s audibility. Warners came calling, and even
agreed to let him produce his major-label debut. Crenshaw was familiar with four-track equipment
from a Detroit he owned with his early 70s band. But the driver’s seat wasn’t for him, and
Gottehrer took over. Downtown lists Crenshaw as co-producer with Burnett and engineer Larry
Hirsch. "I wanted to produce this album," he recalls, "and it was almost a replay of what happened
with the first album. Let’s just say I’m completely cured of wanting to produce my own records."
The new record maintains Crenshaw’s melodic flair on both uptempo rockers ("Little Wild One" -
the current single that’s going nowhere - and "Yvonne") and pensive slower tunes ("Blues Is King,"
"The Distance Between," the countryish "Like A Vague Memory"). This album’s Everly Brothers
tribute, "Lesson Number One," was even submitted to the Everlys for possible use on their EB84
album. "I wanted more than anything for them to cover one of my songs," Crenshaw sighs: "Run
With Me," also tailored for the duo, was recorded by the Dirt Band instead. With the Bellamy
Brothers, no less, recording "You’re My Favorite Waste Of Time," Crenshaw’s future may lie
within the unlikely skyline of Nashville. Manager Sarbin is pleased about wrapping up a publishing
deal recently with Screen Gems: "When it comes to getting songs with Dolly Parton or George
Jones or Eddie Rabbit, you just need a larger company." Regardless of his career’s
unpredictability, Crenshaw is unperturbed. "The really odd thing to me about us," he reflects, "is,
when I started doing this I imagined that we would be a singles band. I still think of us as a singles
band, even though we’ve only had one single that got in the top forty. My impression was that we
would be like Abba or Creedence Clearwater. It just hasn’t fallen that way, and I’m at a loss to
understand why. But life goes on, and I’m still more than happy to be doing things the way I’m
doing them. This is a really weird business, a heartbreaking business. I wanted to make records all
my life, so I’m not complaining."
Hold the Keyboards!
Marshall Crenshaw, a self-confessed guitar lover, keeps a harem of thirty instruments. On the road
this fall, though, he narrowed it down to three Mosrites: a 60s-era twelve string, and two new
six-strings (one blue, one sunburst). He uses Dean Markley custom light-gauge strings (.009 to
.046), and plugs into a Vox AC30 amplifier. "The sound has a real character to it I can’t find in any
other amplifier." Crenshaw states. "Plus I like the way they look." An MXR DDL box provides
echo. Tom Teeley, plays a 1964 Fender Stratocaster with D’Arco Ten strings (.010 to .046). He
too has an MXR digital delay, and MXR Dynacomp, going into a volume pedal and Vox AC30.
His acoustic guitar is a Guild, his flat picks heavy-gauge.
Graham Maby also strums a Guild acoustic, with medium-gauge strings (high G tuning) and a
bridge pick-up. His own guitar is a blue Ovation special edition. On a couple of numbers Maby
switches to a Fender VI six-string bass, or plays the band’s Samson wireless.
Left-handed bassist Chris Donato plays a 1969 Fender Jazz, and a Precision with a redone neck
and Seymour Duncan pickups and pots. Strings are medium-gauge GHS boomers. Donato plugs
into an old SVT tube amp and two Music Man cabinets, front-loaded with four twelve-inch
Electro-Voice speakers in each.
Robert Crenshaw has a twenty-inch Gretsch drum kit, with twelve-and thirteen-inch rack toms,
and a fourteen-inch floor tom. Heads are white Ambassadors. Yamaha hardware includes the
tom-tom mount and bass-drum legs. Aside from a sixteen-inch Paiste pang (special effects)
cymbal, Crenshaw has Zildjians: a sixteen-, eighteen- and twenty-inch ride. He uses a LinnDrum
triggered by the kick drum and rack tom, and Promark 5B sticks.
This article originally appeared in Musician Magazine.