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It’s hard to write a rock and roll novel. First and foremost because most fans don’t read. Second, if they do, they want nonfiction, they want to dig deeper into the histories of the stars. Most of those books are awfully written. To the point where you wonder if they were even edited at all. Out of sequence, grammar and spelling mistakes…yes, even when a major publisher is involved!

As for the independently published books… It’s too cheap to do that. So it’s just like Spotify, there are the hits and then…every boomer who can no longer work in the music industry has written a book, and then you’ve got the youngsters writing a guidebook to try and get ahead, but they all share one thing in common…THEY SUCK! Because writing is a skill. You can have such an incredible story that the writing is secondary, like “Educated,” but Tara Westover is a better writer than everybody referenced above! As for rock writers… Like the critic in this book, they focus on taking notes, getting down the facts, leaving the feel absent, and the feel is what it’s all about. The book must be so well written, so inviting, that the subject is secondary. Having said all that, you should read Rob Sheffield’s “Love Is a Mix Tape”… The story is engrossing and the writing is intimate and more than adequate…unfortunately, sans such a great story, Sheffield has not been able to reach this peak again.

So…

Not a single person in the music industry has reached out to me about this book. NOT ONE! I reach six figures of people and there’s absolutely no buzz. Then again, is that the modern era, is there only buzz in your own, maybe tiny, niche, and then almost everything stops there, to grow is nearly impossible?

Yet, “Opal & Nev” has gotten stellar reviews, and Curtis Sittenfeld, whose work I admire, has said it’s one of the two best books of the year, but…you just can’t feel it. Then again, unless they’ve got famous names attached, books tend to take a while to percolate in the marketplace, so maybe “Opal & Nev” still might reach a wider audience.

So is this the best rock novel ever written? Well, that’s not a very high bar… Yes, you’ve got Nick Hornby’s “High Fidelity,” but that’s a story set in a record shop, the music is secondary, but it’s not in “Opal & Nev.”

Now if it were a couple more decades down the line, youngsters would read “Opal & Nev” and mistake it for truth. As a matter of fact, the only elements untrue in this book are those attached to Opal & Nev, everything else is rock and roll fact. So, if you lived through the era, you’ll live through it again. All those events, all those references that you think only you know, they’re in this book.

So Opal & Nev make music in the early seventies.

Let’s be clear, this is after the Beatles, the entire British Invasion, FM rock radio was already established. These are the big money years.

Nev comes from the U.K., and his history is well told.

Opal is African-American and she comes from Chicago, and her background is put forth too.

And then Nev rescues Opal from obscurity and…

Nothing happens.

But then it does.

What today’s wankers who think they’re entitled to get paid beaucoup bucks on Spotify don’t realize is back in the so-called “golden years,” most acts did not make it. They soon went back to civilian life. As for signing cash? It went into the production of the record, living expenses at the time and…you probably didn’t even net enough to buy a car. And if the record didn’t start to fly, they dropped you. Sure, Warner Brothers was famous for giving you multiple chances, but most acts did not get one and were not successful.

But then comes the Rivington Showcase… One event can change the course of history, both public and personal.

So the music business was built by individuals on a lark. Those with rough edges, nearly criminals, who were forces of nature who got things done. Now it’s mostly corporate, but back then…there were colorful characters.

As is Howie Kelly, the head of Rivington Records.

And Rosemary Salducci is his secretary/receptionist, back when you could still use the s-word, but she’s so much more than that. Entrepreneurs have gatekeepers, usually of long tenure, you may think they’re secretaries, but they’re powerful people.

Bob Hize is the guy who ankles his major label gig to work for Rivington, so he has a chance to produce. You’ve got to believe in yourself. But that’s not enough to make you successful. Even back then… Opal & Nev’s album is released, and they have trouble getting gigs. Now it’s the reverse, you prove you can get the gigs and then you might get a record deal.

So, the book is a fake oral history. But unlike too many oral histories, which are unreadable, it’s not one sentence at a time, the interview statements are lengthy, so it reads like a book.

So, Sunny is writing a book about Opal & Nev. She’s got history through her father…I’ll leave it at that.

Sunny is also the first African-American editor of “Aural,” which represents “Rolling Stone,” even though “Rolling Stone” is a competitor in this book.

So, Sunny does her interviews and then adds her editor’s notes and…

At first it’s like one of those rock bios, only much better written. You’re getting the backstory. But then, about halfway through, you realize “Opal & Nev” is a real book with a real story, themes bigger than rock stardom. And throughout there is wisdom, like:

“But my personal definition of success is that you don’t do a goddamn thing you don’t want to. If you ain’t feeling it, you ain’t doing it.”

This is uttered by a musician. OF COURSE! Musicians, not necessarily stars, are different from the rank and file, it’s a secret society, with different mores. You see it’s about playing and getting high and inside jokes and late nights and friends… You think you’ll be privy to this if you get backstage, but you won’t. You’ve got to be on the bus. First and foremost they’ve got to trust you, and they know better than to trust anyone, but… Forget running a corporation, imagine doing work that you love, and only doing work you love…doesn’t that sound great? As long as you’ve got enough money to get along?

So ultimately, there emerges a dichotomy… Do you do what’s expedient or do you do what you feel.

Now the truth is everybody in America has short-term thinking. Not only the reality TV stars, but the corporate executives and the elected officials. People will do whatever they’re told for fame and money. But later..? All those Republican congresspeople believing in the Big Lie… Funny, now Liz Cheney is a household name, her sins of the past have been wiped away, solely because she stood up for what’s right. She’s the new Colin Kaepernick! (No, don’t take that too far, but you get the point, suddenly everybody knows their names because they stood up for their beliefs.)

So the book is littered with real companies, real situations, like Opal signing a deal with Sire.

But really “Opal & Nev” is about the people. The record business is secondary to the story, even though the story is told through the record business, it never wavers.

So, should you read “Opal & Nev”?

Well, I didn’t absolutely love it. But I enjoyed reading it.

But I loved how the author, Dawnie Walton, wove truth into fiction, getting the past right. And also wasn’t worried about angering anybody. That’s another point about artists. They do what they feel inside, employ their inner tuning fork. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn’t, and sometimes your best work is ignored and then is exalted decades later. So, you’ve got references to Trump, and you’ve got the issues of Black people but you definitely don’t feel you’re lectured to, these points are integral, hell, talk to Black people, they’re Black 24/7!

As you can tell from the above, this ain’t your regular music book.

But I try to only recommend slam dunk stuff.

This isn’t quite a Steph Curry three-pointer from half-court, then again you need five players to win a basketball game. And all of those players are in this book. Hell, forget reading all the passing b.s. from people who can’t write, the rock news, and read “Opal & Nev,” you’ll learn much more about the essence of the music business. And you’ll start to wonder about your path, your choices. Novels are supposed to inspire, you’re not supposed to just be able to read ’em and instantly forget ’em. You won’t forget “Opal & Nev.” As a matter of fact, you’ll be mad that it doesn’t continue, you want to know more of what happens to these people. And you also want to know more about their history and motivation, even though so much is delineated. That’s the essence of a great rock musician, they leave the fan wanting more. I want more of what “Opal & Nev” is selling instead of today’s two-dimensional music business where cash is the only consideration.

So, I think you now know enough to know whether “Opal & Nev” is for you.

But if you do read it, you’ll be a member of a club. Right now, relatively secret, although it could become bigger, and that’s what we’re looking for most, a place that resonates with us, where we belong. Good books deliver this. “Opal & Nev” does.

Dexter Holland is the lead singer and songwriter for the Offspring. We discuss his upbringing in Orange County, the formation of the band, his education, his Ph.D., his reaction to the band’s “overnight” success with “Come Out and Play,” label deals, his hot sauce, his plane and…

https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-bob-lefsetz-podcast/id1316200737

https://www.stitcher.com/show/the-bob-lefsetz-podcast

Spotify: https://spoti.fi/33xYSLe

YouTube: https://bit.ly/3ojVVYt

Some songs you just know.

And I don’t know how I know this one. But I’ve never forgotten its chorus. That’s a hook!

It’s hard to believe, but prior to the consolidation of the Warner, Elektra and Atlantic labels, music was a free-for-all. As in there were a zillion labels, you’d buy a single and discover a new one, you knew them by their logos, you’d watch them spinning around on your record player.

Actually, after the Beatles, when the British Invasion began, and then free-form FM radio in ’67, with album rock, the consolidation started, but before that…

My mother got a Falcon in the early sixties, a ’60. My dad bought it used, only after he brought it home did he learn that it had been a Hertz rental car, which was a no-no, this was back when turning back the odometer was de rigueur, never mind having a zillion people drive the automobile.

Before that…

My mother drove this monstrous green Chevy, I think it was a ’52. I can picture it in my mind, but this was before I became car addicted in the late sixties, when I turned the pages of car magazines and memorized the images and facts. Did your car have a Hurst shifter? And what exactly where headers anyway? But the image…you could tell all the cars apart, back when they used to redo them every year and every one looked different.

My father drove Chrysler, Plymouth and Dodge station wagons. I remember one orange and white, another blue. Word was that Chrysler products were the best engineered, and my father was trained as an engineer, but all those cars were dogs, one caught fire on the way home from the dealership.

But where I heard “Personality” I cannot tell you.

That Falcon? It had a radio without push buttons. And it would stay on even if the car was off. You had to make sure to turn it off or the battery would die.

That old Chevy? I don’t even remember it having a radio, although I do remember standing up in the front seat for the drive to Penfield Beach. My mother loved the beach, we used to go every day during the summer. You had a sticker on the car, you could get one if you lived in town, if you didn’t…you got one per car, and someone would always scrounge one up for friends in Trumbull, other towns without seashore.

And the Chrysler products? The radio push buttons were long thin slivers. Took me years until I realized you pulled them out to set them, and did and made my father go berserk, which was not that hard, but this was before then.

As for radio at home… We almost never listened to it. We had a slew of transistors, if there was a big news event my mom might turn it on, otherwise we just listened to the radio in the car. That’s where I must have heard “Personality.”

Or maybe it was at the pavilion, where we bought our hot dogs and french fries at the beach. Or maybe from someone’s transistor on a blanket on the sand. It was a hit back in ’59, I was only 6 years old, I don’t remember much from that era, but I do remember “Personality.”

Lloyd Price just died. And his hits were so long ago, most of the world just shrugged. Yes, the younger generations are notorious for not caring about the past. And to tell you the truth, I knew the name but I couldn’t place the songs either, until I read the obits.

Turns out Price was from New Orleans, labels went down there to capture the sound. “Lawdy Miss Clawdy” came out on Specialty, and became a rock staple. Scratch an English rocker, and not only do they know the song, they’ve covered it! Joe Cocker most famously in my mind.

And then there was Price’s version of “Stagger Lee”…

“Lawdy Miss Clawdy” was released in ’52, before I was born!

“Stagger Lee” in ’58, but that’s not when I cottoned to it, I think it was a later version a decade or so later.

As for “Personality”…

There were so many covers… I just listened to contemporaneous ones.

Maybe my mother played the Anthony Newley one, she was a big fan of musical theatre. But no, that wasn’t the one.

Pat Boone? Well, his wasn’t really a hit.

Patti Page? Definitely not.

No, the one I remembered was the Lloyd Price original. 

“Over and over

I tried to prove my love to you

Over and over

What more can I do”

These lines are not that memorable, nor are those that follow them:

“Over and over

My friend says I’m a fool

But over and over

I’ll be a fool for you”

It’s a swinging band, even with a splashy horn, the groove is clear, it’s almost something Billy Crystal would make fun of. But THEN!

“Cause you got personality

Walk (with personality)

Talk (with personality)

Smile (with personality)

Charm (with personality)

Love (with personality)

And plus you’ve got

A great big heart”

Personality…that’s what mothers said was important to their not so good-looking kids. Yes, sometime, usually starts in junior high, looks become important. And you look into the mirror and you ain’t got ’em. And in the back of your mind you try to amplify your mom’s voice.

Now the truth is today’s men want to get rich to get some eye candy on their arm, they think it’s the most important thing. But do you really want to marry an uneducated model? What are you gonna talk about?

But the girls…they know personality is important, that it trumps looks, at least once they reach their twenties, if not before.

Personality, in this looks-based world, you never hear any discussion of this. Why did this happen? Was it MTV, requiring everybody to be good-looking to get traction? Is it today’s social media?

But…

There are certain people who just glow, that you want to be around, because of their personality, you smile when you think about hanging with them.

And the truth is personality shines. Irrelevant of looks. With the right personality it doesn’t matter what you look like, not that those with said personality realize this, but personality is what we truly desire. Someone to get the conversation started, to lead us where we’re afraid to go, to enrich our lives.

As a matter of fact the only musical artists with personality today are the rappers. The statements, the shenanigans, that’s half of the attraction, the music is just part of the package. Rockers used to fill this role, before they all became focused on their outfits and stage presentation. We’re interested in your identity, we’re even more interested in what’s under the skin, how you think, how you talk, how you act, how you light up a room…PERSONALITY!

Lloyd Price was just not the face of the song, he co-wrote “Personality.” And this one song would be enough to retire on if…he retained ownership. I don’t know if he did, he was a serial entrepreneur, did he need the cash, or did he just like coming up with ideas and executing them? And the truth is back then musicians were entrepreneurs, you couldn’t survive on record royalties, the records were just a key to fame, leading to gigs and sponsorships and…it was nearly cottage industry. That’s when all the excitement comes, when a business is new, full of renegades pushing the envelope, before consolidation. When it’s got personality.

Spotify: https://spoti.fi/3tJVvf3

YouTube: https://bit.ly/3eyGqbC

This is a HIT!

“It’s 12:45

Got your body on my mind

And in fifteen minutes

You might be the one

For the night”

You can see it, you can feel it!

Come on, you’re in the club, you’re sweating, maybe taking a breather at the bar and you see her across the room…

“When we get, when we get, get, get together”

Isn’t that what it’s all about? Getting together? After all, we’re just animals, driven by sex, just ask Jeff Bezos.

Baby boomers might not realize that the mores of the sixties and seventies are history, women can and do make the first move now, they feel empowered, they know what they want and nothing is going to prevent them from getting it!

I can’t say I check out every new David Guetta tune. But it was atop this playlist a guy sends me every week and usually it takes me just a matter of minutes to listen to the twenty-odd tracks, I’m skipping through the dreck, some of it even famous, but I let “Get Together” slip, and suddenly I realized that my body was moving, I WAS INTO IT!

You can like AC/DC. You can like Joni Mitchell. You can even like Social Distortion. AND YOU CAN STILL LIKE THIS!

That’s one of the breakthroughs of Madonna, she taught us that pop wasn’t always anathema.

Then again, today’s pop? When Justin Bieber’s inane “Peaches” is number one it’s hard not to lose faith in the music business and today’s youth. But “Get Together”?

“Peaches” is number two worldwide, but it is slipping in the U.S., and “Get Together” is…NOWHERE!

Well, not completely, it does have a million and a half streams on Spotify in only four days, YouTube is pulling up the rear, it’s got 224,546 views, proving once again that YouTube has been superseded as the world’s primary music site, and it skews young, for the prepubescent, those still in school, those whose parents are afraid they might run up charges and want them nowhere near their credit cards.

So, maybe “Get Together” will stall, won’t become a worldwide hit, then again in Ibiza, in clubs…assuming they open this summer, this is not molly mindlessness, anybody can get and appreciate it.

Have you been to Ibiza, have you been to a dance club, one thing is for sure, you’ll realize there’s something happening there, you can either reject it outright, afraid of stretching to experience the new and different, too invested in who you are to open your horizons, or you could stay and survey the landscape…you’ll desire nothing so much as to be involved. You might think yourself too old, you might not be able to take the leap, but there’s no denying this group of people is having FUN! You remember fun, don’t you? And this ain’t a concert, with all that pushing needing security to keep order, everybody’s friendly and nice.

“There’s only one thing you can’t forget

You’ve got only one life

This is one night

And you’ll never see her again”

God, we’ve been dead, this virus has killed us emotionally if not physically, we’ve been so focused on politics, we’ve forgotten what it’s like to let our senses lead us, which is what music specializes in, it puts intellect in the back seat and you flow with the sound, lifting your mood.

As for not seeing her ever again… That may not be true, this could be a one night affair, but the reason you go out is because…you never know who you’ll run into, tonight could truly be the first night of the rest of your life, just ask the aforementioned boomers, who were in the marketplace before the internet, when you just couldn’t dial up a date.

And the truth is “Get Together” is reminiscent of C+C Music Factory’s “Gonna Make You Sweat (Everybody Dance Now),” which is now a sports staple, it’s how you rev up the room, just like “Get Together” does, it raises the energy in the room instantly. And sure, it’s derivative, but not completely…

I needed to check myself. I listened to a bunch of similar tracks. I was surprised how good many of them were, Saweetie’s “Fast (Motion)” was very listenable, Cheat Codes’ “Lean on Me” even more, but they still came up shy to “Get Together,” because of the HOOK!

Oh, like most of today’s numbers, “Get Together” is laden with hooks, but there’s this one hook that grabs you, that appeals to your heart as opposed to your body and draws you right in. It’s undeniable:

“It’s 12:45

Got your body on my mind

And in fifteen minutes

You might be the one

For the night

But my number you can call

And the writing’s on the wall

Yeah, yeah

When we get, when we get, get, get together”

It’s the twist after the big hill of the roller coaster, it’s the invitation, the green light, it’s so sensual, without being completely mindless, you hear it and you’ve got to hear it again, because it feels so good!

That’s one of the things missing from today’s music. It’s one chord, without changes, but this twist in “Get Together”…and then the explosion…

“When we get, when we get, get, get together”

You’ve seen her, she’s more than a body, she’s got a personality, she’s inviting you, she wants you to…GET TOGETHER!

“It’s time I close my eyes

I see your skin on mine

When we get, get, get together

Yeah

When we get, get, GET TOGETHER!”