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Mitchell Cohen

Mitchell Cohen

Grew up in the Bronx, NY, fixated as a child on NYC top 40 radio in the early '60s: the WMCA Good Guys, the WABC All-Americans, and Murray the K's Swingin' Soiree on WINS. Fast-forward to NYU grad school (Cinema Studies); began writing about music and film for various publications, including Creem, Film Comment, Take One, Fusion, Phonograph Record Magazine. Wrote books on Carole King and Simon & Garfunkel for Sire/Chappell Books. While still writing regularly on music (for Creem, mostly, but also frequently for High Fidelity, Let It Rock, Who Put The Bomp, Country Music, Musician etc.), got a job in the publicity department at Arista Records, writing artist bios, press releases, that sort of thing. Which led to a position in the Creative Services department, writing print ads, producing radio spots (won a Clio Award for a Monty Python radio ad). Then made transition into Arista A&R, signed The Church, The Jeff Healey Band, made a pop-rock "comeback" album with Dion (‘Yo, Frankie’). Compiled and/or annotated reissues for Arista (The Monkees, Lee Dorsey, The Kinks, The Everly Brothers, lots of others) and Rhino (The Shirelles, Gene Pitney). Moved over to Columbia Records in 1993 and became Senior VP of A&R. Among Columbia projects: Maxwell, Nellie McKay, The Raveonettes, Savage Garden. Nominated for a Grammy Award as one of the producers of Sony 100 years multi-CD set. Voting member of NARAS and Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

175 articles

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The Beau Brummels: Beau Brummels: Stellar Studio Band

Overview by Mitchell Cohen, Fusion, November 1973

ONCE THE all-engulfing wave that was the British Invasion of 1964 had begun to subside, it began to be possible for some home-grown talent to ...

The Doors, Jim Morrison: Jim Morrison: Remembering Morrison

Retrospective by Mitchell Cohen, Fusion, June 1974

THE rock world was still staggering from the back-to-back deaths of Jimi Hendrix and Janis Joplin when they were suddenly and mysteriously joined in pop ...

The Shangri-Las: Shangri Las: A Teenage Melodrama

Retrospective by Mitchell Cohen, Let It Rock, December 1974

SHALL WE DANCE? ...

Bonnie Bramlett: The Bottom Line, NYC

Live Review by Mitchell Cohen, Phonograph Record, March 1975

THE PRESSURE is on Bonnie Bramlett now, in a way that it's never been before. As part of a group that served as a way-station ...

Average White Band: Winterland, San Francisco

Live Review by Mitchell Cohen, Phonograph Record, June 1975

THERE ARE THOSE who have had Average White Band pegged from the start as the best blue-eyed soul band since the Young Rascals, and these ...

Jefferson Starship: Central Park, NYC

Live Review by Mitchell Cohen, Phonograph Record, June 1975

THEY MAY HAVE changed their surname, but Jefferson Starship have arrived at a conciliatory relationship with their past, and with mixed results. With Marty Balin ...

Bob Marley & the Wailers: Bob Marley: Wollman Skating Rink, New York NY

Live Review by Mitchell Cohen, Phonograph Record, July 1975

IT WAS THE first one of those muggy nights this season, when the air is so close it cuts down your breathing, that Bob Marley ...

Emmylou Harris, Maria Muldaur: Maria Muldaur & Emmylou Harris Live

Live Review by Mitchell Cohen, Phonograph Record, July 1975

Maria Muldaur: Carnegie Hall, New York Emmylou Harris: Schaefer Music Festival, Central park, New York ...

The Beach Boys

Comment by Mitchell Cohen, Phonograph Record, July 1975

"THIS IS A SERIOUS surfing song," Mike Love announces from the stage of Madison Square Garden and the Beach Boys launch into a lively rendition ...

The Rolling Stones: Metamorphosis

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Phonograph Record, July 1975

THE FASCINATION of Metamorphosis, basically a collection of outtakes, oddities and alternate versions, lies in what it adds to our experience and knowledge of the ...

The Bay City Rollers: Bay City Rollers: Once Upon A Star

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Phonograph Record, September 1975

THE BAY CITY Rollers campaign is underway, and its components are familiar: screaming female fans in Great Britain, Sid Bernstein masterminding tour plans, back-to-back appearances ...

Bob Marley & the Wailers: Bob Marley et al: Jamaica

Overview by Mitchell Cohen, Phonograph Record, October 1975

FIRST DAY, RAIN. Thick clouds and then more rain. It is, I'm told, the wetter of Jamaica's two wet seasons. ...

Kokomo: Wollman Rink, New York NY

Live Review by Mitchell Cohen, Phonograph Record, October 1975

IF THERE'S ONE thing we don't need it's a group composed of exiles from second-line British boogie bands that has a tendency toward disco-oriented soul. ...

Carole King: On This Side Of Goodbye

Retrospective by Mitchell Cohen, Phonograph Record, January 1976

HE COMES HOME from a night of petting heavily in the back row of the RKO Fordham. Aching from the pains of halted passion, he ...

Queen: The New British Invasion

Interview by Mitchell Cohen, Phonograph Record, March 1976

"YOU'RE NOT going to ask me to interpret ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’, are you?" ...

Aerosmith: "We're the Hottest Band in America"

Profile by Mitchell Cohen, Phonograph Record, April 1976

NEW YORK — Photo sessions are a pain in the ass. 8 x 10 glossies are made, not born; press kits aren't built in a ...

Patti Smith: Avery Fisher Hall, NYC

Live Review by Mitchell Cohen, Phonograph Record, May 1976

FOR SOME OF US, Patti Smith is the girl of our rock and roll dreams. As a performer she doesn't merely flirt with danger, she ...

The Beatles, Wings: Wings: The Band On The Road

Report by Mitchell Cohen, Phonograph Record, May 1976

THE WINGS LIVE show has been evolving over the past three years, and McCartney deliberately kept a low profile during its earliest stages, a university ...

Rick Derringer, Cynthia Weil: The New Derringer: Rick Derringer & Cynthia Weil

Interview by Mitchell Cohen, Phonograph Record, June 1976

DERRINGER: ANOTHER PUNK INCORPORATES ...

Jackson Browne, Winning

Interview by Mitchell Cohen, Phonograph Record, November 1976

JACKSON BROWNE sat in a locker room beneath a domed hall at the University of Virginia in Charlottesville. It had been a particularly successful college ...

Alex Chilton: The Big Star of New York's Underground

Report by Mitchell Cohen, Phonograph Record, June 1977

CHAPTER THREE in the adventures of a bona-fide, under-acknowledged rock hero is currently in progress. At the moment, the story is mostly taking place in ...

Nils Lofgren: I Came To Dance

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, June 1977

MAYBE NILS LOFGREN always was sort of a dummy. But his heart was in the right place (on his sleeve), he was capable of inventing ...

Southside Johnny and the Asbury Jukes: This Time It's For Real

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, June 1977

The songs of Miami Steve Van Zandt are like found objects; he zeroes in on particular species of East Coast rhythm and blues, mixes together ...

The Beach Boys: The Beach Boys Love You

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, July 1977

There is no TM song, no music-is-swell song, or "unfolding enveloping missiles of soul," or political/ecological commentary. Instead, what we have here is a collection ...

Dennis Wilson: Pacific Ocean Blue (Caribou)

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Phonograph Record, August 1977

"WE DO SOLO projects for ourselves," Dennis Wilson said during an interview eighteen months ago. "There are hundreds of tunes that we've recorded, a tremendous ...

The Small Faces: Small Faces: Playmates

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, December 1977

ONE SOLO CAREER going nowhere, two sidemen left in the, lurch, and a convenient reconciliation. The Faces have gotten Small again, with their original lead ...

Elvis Costello: My Aim Is True (Columbia)

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, February 1978

THIS BANDIT SUMMER, this snatcher of heroes, loved ones and possibilities, will be remembered also for leaving behind intoxicating rock and roll, with this album ...

Neil Young: Decade (Reprise)

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, March 1978

First off, I'm only Canadian on my mother's side. ...

Tuff Darts: Tuff Darts

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, April 1978

TUFF DARTS ARE closer to the eleven-year old (male) state of mind than Shaun Cassidy. Pre-teen boys say things like, "Fran-ceen? I'd rather chew bubble ...

Waylon Jennings, Willie Nelson: Willie Nelson and Waylon Jennings: Waylon & Willie (RCA)

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, April 1978

'PICK UP The Tempo' again. 'It's Not Supposed To Be That Way' again. Tracking these guys separately or in tandem means a hell of a ...

Muddy Waters: I'm Ready (Blue Sky)

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, May 1978

IT ISN'T JUST the natural process of attribution and the creative stagnation afflicting his competitors that have made Muddy Waters the premier master of his ...

David Johansen: David Johansen (Blue Sky)

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, June 1978

A TRUE GEM... NOT A GEMETTE ...

Cheap Trick: Heaven Tonight (Epic)

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, August 1978

DANIEL AND GLORIA met at a rock flea market when their hands reached for the one over-priced copy of Hackamore Brick's One Kiss ...

Bruce Springsteen: Darkness On The Edge Of Town (Columbia)

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, September 1978

If I walk away from this, he thought, I'll be an old man – all ghosts and hangovers and mellow recollections. Fuck it, he thought, ...

Allan Clarke, Colin Blunstone: Colin Blunstone: Never Ever Thought (Rocket); Allan Clarke: I Wasn't Born Yesterday (Atlantic

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, October 1978

WHAT'S MISSING on these LPs is the quality of delight. Nobody would consider the early records of The Zombies or The Hollies particularly well-crafted, but ...

Boston: Don't Look Back (Epic)

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, November 1978

SHE'S THE ONE dreams were invented for, and you've had her. The pursuit was long and arduous, the affair sudden and turbulent. You've gone madly ...

Debby Boone, Shaun Cassidy: Debby Boone: Midstream (Warner/Curb); Shaun Cassidy: Under Wraps (Warner/Curb)

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, November 1978

THIS IS some trap. Can a writer for this magazine retain some credibility and still say kind things about Shaun and Debby, without fixing one's ...

The Ramones: Ramones: Road To Ruin (Sire)

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, December 1978

"Sometimes timing is everything, you know?""How do you mean?" ...

Greg Kihn: Kihn-Esthetic Responses

Interview by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, January 1979

GREG KIHN is up for this one. ...

Queen: Jazz (Elektra)

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, March 1979

FOR A FEW weeks in 1978, an FM radio station in New York City was trying, earnestly and imaginatively, to create rock 'n' roll counter-programming. ...

McGuinn, Clark & Hillman: McGuinn, Clark & Hillman

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, May 1979

HAD RECORDS LIKE 'The World Turns All Around Her', 'She Don't Care About Time', and 'I Feel A Whole Lot Better' been products of your ...

Donna Summer: Bad Girls (Casablanca)

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, August 1979

‘HOT STUFF’ just isn't that terrific a record, no matter what the charts or current critical backlash dogma say, and it doesn't do any good ...

The Rubinoos: Rubinoos: Theoretical Boys In Search Of The Summer Single

Interview by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, August 1979

IT IS A PERFECT world: the date is anywhere between May 15 and June 28; you are fourteen years old, and the days are getting ...

Wings: Back To The Egg (Columbia)

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, September 1979

FOR ME, the most pertinent phrase on Back To The Egg comes in the second half of ‘The Broadcast’, a piece near the end of ...

The Cars: Candy-O

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, October 1979

Candy-O Is Peggy Sue's daughter. Candy-O is this year's model. (Is the band furious that such an obvious title for their second had already been ...

The Records: The Records

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, November 1979

MEMORANDUMFrom: Carraway LP Analysts, Inc.To: CREEM MagazineRe: THE RECORDS ...

Randy Newman: Born Again

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, December 1979

AFTER FIVE ALBUMS and almost ten years of intermittent brilliance, Randy Newman achieves a number one single with a nastily amusing ditty. ...

The B-52s: Climate Control In The Land Of 16 Dances

Interview by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, December 1979

MOST PEOPLE, when discussing/remembering the beach party movies, don't take Jody McCrea into account. There was a nerd in the surf. This relates to The ...

Fleetwood Mac: Tusk: From Shining Platinum To Dull Ivory

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, January 1980

WHITE ELEPHANT is more like it, heffalumping into the thick four-sided forest, stomping on moby grapes, swatting at the metaphysical graffiti carved into the tree ...

Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers: Tom Petty: Damn the Torpedoes (Backstreet/MCA)

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, February 1980

DAMN THE TORPEDOES takes the American Stand: "Don't tread on me" When you've been ‘raised on promises’ like the heroine of Tom Petty's bicentennial debut, ...

Marianne Faithfull: Broken English

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, March 1980

"I never lied to my lover/But if I did I would admit it/If I could get away with murder/I'd take my gun and I'd commit ...

The Romantics: The Romantics

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, April 1980

I CAN'T ACCEPT Shelley Hack as a Charlie's Angel (Spelling-Goldberg should burn in Nielsen purgatory for rejecting Claudia Jennings, who proceeded to smash up her ...

Warren Zevon: Bad Luck Streak In Dancing School (Asylum)

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, May 1980

IT'S EASY to see why the music of Warren Zevon — make that the idea of the music of Warren Zevon — has the more ...

The Ramones: What Price Glory? The Ramones Soldier On

Interview by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, June 1980

"Survival of the fittest. And besides, it's fun." – Daffy Duck, helping a wabbit-hunting Elmer corner Bugs in Rabbit Fire ...

Pete Townshend: Empty Glass

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, August 1980

"Heroin" does not rhyme with "mellowing." ...

Roxy Music: Flesh & Blood

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, October 1980

Voices: "NBC, proud as a peacock!"Announcer: "Fred Silverman presents The Roxy Music Flesh and Blood Comedy Hour starring Bryan Ferry. With The Doomdiggers, Brian Eno ...

The Tremblers: Twice Nightly

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, November 1980

YOU DON'T HEAR much about "personality crises" any more. But people still have them. People like Peter Blair Dennis Bernard Noone. ...

Van Morrison: Common One

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, December 1980

ANYONE WHO CAN make the phrase "William Blake and the eternals" sound like the evocation of a metaphysical doo-wop group, as Van Morrison did on ...

Talking Heads: Remain In Light (Sire)

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, January 1981

Play That Funky Music White Boy ...

Blue Angel: Blue Angel

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, February 1981

FOR A FEW YEARS, roughly coinciding with the campaign and administration of John Fitzgerald Kennedy, rock 'n' roll was the music of an era on ...

John Lennon, Yoko Ono: John Lennon & Yoko Ono: Double Fantasy (Geffen GHS 2001)

Review by Mitchell Cohen, High Fidelity, February 1981

John Lennon's Last ...

Steely Dan: Gaucho

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, March 1981

SHE STOMPED into the living room, as much as one can stomp in pink slippers and an extra-large Close Encounters t-shirt, and conspicuously clicked the ...

Dexys Midnight Runners: Dexy's Midnight Runners: Searching For The Young Soul Rebels

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, May 1981

WHAT A GASEOUS hoot this album is. Such a conglomeration of goofy pretentions, cornball horn charts and blowsy singing hasn't been heard since the pre-War ...

Marvin Gaye, Smokey Robinson: Smokey Robinson: Being With You (Tamla)/Marvin Gaye: In Our Lifetime (Tamla)

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, June 1981

THESE ALBUMS are blueprints for romantic strategies. Hearing them together is like eavesdropping on both halves of a double date, comparing style of seduction. ...

Squeeze: East Side Story (A&M)

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, August 1981

CONSIDER. A band with decidedly bent pop bearings (and more than a light touch merseybeat croon-a-toon McCartneyatrics), associated with John Cale in the founding phase ...

George Harrison: Somewhere In England

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, September 1981

"SHE'S A DRAG. A well-known drag. We turn the sound down on her and say rude things." – George Harrison, A Hard Day's Night, 1964. ...

Joe Jackson's Jumpin' Jive: Joe Jackson's Jumpin' Jive

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, October 1981

JUMPIN' JIVE IS about a musician with an attitude messing with music that is about style. ...

Bob Dylan: Shot Of Love

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, November 1981

BOB DYLAN AND Lenny Bruce once shared a taxi for about a mile and a half. According to Dylan, the ride felt as though it ...

Meat Loaf: Dead Ringer

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, December 1981

MEAT 'ANYWHERE he wants to' Loaf is waxing rhapsodic once more. Who among us has not missed the grandiloquent sound of the corpuscles in his ...

Merle Haggard: Big City (Epic FE 37593)

Review by Mitchell Cohen, High Fidelity, January 1982

THERE ISN'T much on Big City that's unfamiliar to the contemporary country milieu: yearning to break away from urban life and flee to "the middle ...

Prince: Controversy (Warner Bros. BSK 3601)

Review by Mitchell Cohen, High Fidelity, January 1982

CONTROVERSY IS a presumptuous title for an album, but it's in keeping with Prince's tactics of provocation. Prince, in his early twenties, is a musician ...

The Police: Ghost In The Machine

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, January 1982

GARRY AHRENBERG couldn't get into the Police, an esthetic predeliction that caused him no small amount of derisive peer pressure. ...

Marianne Faithfull: Ses Liaisons Dangereuses

Interview by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, February 1982

"I'VE ALWAYS KNOWN who I was," she says in a raspy, Bette Davis voice. "Whether I could achieve to express that to everyone else was ...

Joan Jett: I Love Rock 'N' Roll (Boardwalk)

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, March 1982

IF ANY OF rock's male marauders (say Triumph, or Rush) opened up an LP with a stop 'n' start thumper about spotting a 17-year-old number ...

Huey Lewis and the News: Huey Lewis: Picture This

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, May 1982

HO HUM, you might say. One more slick-surfaced pop rock band with hooks to spare (many made out of spare parts), sax breaks, high-pitched harmonies ...

Del Shannon: Fugitive Kind of Love: Del Shannon

Interview by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, June 1982

"THERE WAS A girl I thought was really in love with me. I mean, my heart would pound when she came around. She gave me ...

The Human League: Dare

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, June 1982

IF THE GUY who built a pinochle-playing computer for his Science Techniques Lab in high school married the gal who wrote poems called "alien/nation" for ...

Laurie Anderson: Big Science (Warner Bros.)

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, August 1982

‘I NO LONGER love the way you hold your pens and pencils’ is a line that any one of a thousand writers might write. But ...

Indeep: Last Night a D.J. Saved My Life (Sound of New York SNY 1201)

Review by Mitchell Cohen, High Fidelity, September 1982

THE IDEA behind Indeep is that in matters sexual, women have all the leverage. "You'd be a fool for a kiss," Rose Marie Ramsey says ...

Rick James: Throwin' Down (Gordy)

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, September 1982

HE HAS A VOICE that's like a Looney Tunes imitation of Edward G. Robinson. His priorities (or those of the character he's created) are getting ...

Rosanne Cash: Somewhere In The Stars (Columbia)

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, October 1982

MOST OF the songs on Somewhere In The Stars, the third album by Rosanne Cash, are about the pitfalls of contemporary liaisons, the moments when ...

Richard Hell: Destiny Street

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, November 1982

SAY YOU AND these other guys used to hang out in this neighborhood, and you all had pretty much the same goals, the same diversions, ...

ABC: The Lexicon Of Love

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, December 1982

DESIRE SOMETIMES goes unreciprocated. Sad, but it happens. Martin Fry, the leader of ABC, does not accept this with equanimity. He stares at his blueprint ...

David Johansen: Position Of A Vagabond Missionary

Interview by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, December 1982

IN AN OFFICE that overlooks Central Park, David Johansen finds the videotape he's looking for, a recording of his New Year's morning show at the ...

Altered Images: Pinky Blue

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, January 1983

CLARE GROGAN has this itsy little boop-be-doop of a voice, and she twists phrases into odd curlicues while her four-piece band plays zesty, danceable (mustn't ...

Darlene Love: Bottom Line, New York NY

Live Review by Mitchell Cohen, Musician, January 1983

WHATEVER INCONGRUITY exists in the idea of a mature woman getting onstage and protesting that she's not too young to get married, or defiantly proclaiming ...

Michael Jackson: Thriller (Epic QE 38112)

Review by Mitchell Cohen, High Fidelity, March 1983

A Thriller with a Difference ...

Bob Seger: The Distance

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, April 1983

THERE'S A NEW furrowed-brow earnestness now emerging in American rock 'n' roll, a grainy neo-realism that depicts workaday lives in ways that were once the ...

Def Leppard: Pyromania (Mercury)

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, May 1983

IT ALL COMES down to how many ways there are to conjugate the regular verb "to rock" in a context that suggests endurance of a ...

Nile Rodgers: Adventures In The Land Of The Good Groove

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, July 1983

SINCE NILE RODGERS (A) is democratic enough to include Wall Street within the borders of good-groove land (see the map on the album cover), and ...

Stevie Ray Vaughan & Double Trouble: Texas Flood (Epic AL 38734)

Review by Mitchell Cohen, High Fidelity, August 1983

STEVIE RAY Vaughan's guitar playing is designed to elicit gasps: Every cluster of notes is an invitation to amazement. This multiple-climax approach could easily prove ...

The Belle Stars: The Belle Stars

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, August 1983

THERE'S NO LACK of traumatic incident on The Belle Stars' first album: lovers treat each other abominably, separate, commit crimes of passion. ...

Marshall Crenshaw: Field Day

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, September 1983

MARSHALL CRENSHAW'S first album was like a tuneful adaptation of an ad from the Voice's personal/classified columns: Lookin' for a brand new lover, a cynical ...

New Edition: Candy Girl (Streetwise SWRL 3301)

Review by Mitchell Cohen, High Fidelity, October 1983

NEW EDITION'S hit 'Candy Girl' is an uncanny re-creation of the early Jackson 5's pop-soul effervescence, down to the last vocal inflection. But it's not ...

Rickie Lee Jones: Girl At Her Volcano

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, October 1983

IT SEEMS APT that Rickie Lee Jones's Girl At Her Volcano begins at a point near the end of her live set ("We love you!" ...

The Chocolate Watchband, The Fleshtones, The Standells: The Fleshtones: Hexbreaker!, plus Standells and Chocolate Watchband best-ofs

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, November 1983

WE'VE HEARD THIS before, and the Fleshtones know it: "Your scene isn't really so strange/Some things never really change." Hornet-nest guitar. Gnarly vocals. Lyrics that ...

Big Country: The Crossing

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, December 1983

EVERYTHING'S AN "ANTHEM" these days, every song that asserts the simplest preference, celebrates any individual or social identity or activity (oh, "Flashdance...What A Feeling," or ...

NRBQ: Grillin' At The Roadside

Interview by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, December 1983

THINK OF NRBQ as a diner somewhere off the main highway, serving up Tex-Mex chili, Kansas City barbeque, Philadelphia cheese steaks, New England clam chowder, ...

The Doors: Alive, She Cried

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, January 1984

WHAT WAS that he said? "No time to wallow in the mire." Tell that to the folks who have somehow managed to turn a band ...

Peech Boys: N.Y.C. Peech Boys: Life Is Something Special (Island 7 900941)

Review by Mitchell Cohen, High Fidelity, February 1984

THERE ARE too many dance records that, like werewolves, lose their power in the glare of daylight. They may he frisky enough to get club ...

Paul McCartney: Pipes of Peace (Columbia QC 39149)

Review by Mitchell Cohen, High Fidelity, February 1984

PAUL McCARTNEY just wants everyone to play nice. When he addresses any topic pertaining to the outside world, he takes on the wheedling tone of ...

Paul Simon: Hearts And Bones

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, February 1984

ON HEARTS AND BONES, Paul Simon turns the basic philosophical pop question inside out. Instead of "Why do fools fall in love?" (or its variation, ...

Let's Active: Afoot

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, April 1984

MITCH EASTER is like a kid who only has a box of eight Crayolas – the basic set, no burnt sienna, no vermillion, no cornflower ...

Womack and Womack: Womack & Womack: Love Wars (Elektra 60293)

Review by Mitchell Cohen, High Fidelity, May 1984

THE MEN and women that Cecil and Linda Womack portray on Love Wars almost never want the same thing at the same time which makes ...

Slade: Keep Your Hands Off My Power Supply

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, June 1984

HERE IS NODDY HOLDER, raspy lead singer of Slade, putting a move on a member of the opposite sex: "You want equality/You won't get none ...

Joe Ely: Hi-Res

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, July 1984

JOE ELY'S Hi-Res has a feverish, jittery seediness, a buzz you can't shake off. Remember the first episode of Cheers, where the guys argued about ...

Bananarama: Bananarama (London)

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, August 1984

BANANARAMA CAN'T BE bothered to raise their voices; it's just not worth it. The attitude is cool deadpan, the image is ye'-ye' girls with a ...

Elvis Costello and the Attractions: Goodbye Cruel World (Columbia)

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, September 1984

IT'S ALMOST Elvis Costello and the Distractions this time out. Goodbye Cruel World, LP #10 (here in America, at least), has such a desperate busyness ...

Box of Frogs, Rod Stewart, Vanilla Fudge: Box Of Frogs: Bench Strength/Rod Stewart: Camouflage/Vanilla Fudge: Mystery

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, October 1984

IT'S BEEN ONE Old Timers Day after another for Hall of Fame axe-handler Jeff Beck over the past year or so. ...

Patty Smyth, Scandal featuring Patty Smyth: Scandal Featuring Patty Smyth: Warrior

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, November 1984

THIS RECORD SHOULD come in a plain white package, like generic elbow macaroni; it has every 1984 mainstream (AORMTV) rock mannerism so down pat that ...

Quincy Jones, Frank Sinatra: Frank Sinatra with Quincy Jones and Orchestra: L.A. Is My Lady (Quest)

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, December 1984

FRANKIE RUNS OVER HOLLYWOOD ...

The dB's: The dBs: Like This

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, February 1985

CENSUS-TAKERS have determined that there is a core audience of 19,422 citizens with a susceptibility toward charmingly weird, clever, and sensitive pop-rock with a foundation ...

Julian Lennon: Valotte

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, March 1985

GIVE MY REGARDS To Broad Street, a motion picture written by, and starring, Paul McCartney, opens across America in October, closes across America by November. ...

John Fogerty: Centerfield

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, April 1985

I have a better title, except Malamud already claimed it: The Natural. John Fogerty's sound could never be pinned down to time or ...

Van Morrison: A Sense Of Wonder

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, June 1985

ONE OF THE SMARTEST things Martin Scorsese did in The King Of Comedy was bracket it with songs by Ray Charles and Van Morrison. The ...

Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers: Tom Petty: Southern Accents

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, July 1985

PRETTY SOON, it will be an established practice for earnest rockers to start off albums by announcing the circumstances of their birth. ...

Lone Justice: Lone Justice

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, September 1985

LONE JUSTICE'S Maria McKee is one tough cookie. Barely out of her teens, she comes on with a spitfire defiance and a repertoire of yelps, ...

The Beach Boys: The Beach Boys

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Creem, October 1985

SAY YOU'RE AT your high school reunion – a far-fetched thought, but bear with me for a moment – and some creep corners you by ...

Phil Spector: The Agony Of Phil Spector

Comment by Mitchell Cohen, Rock's Backpages, 8 July 2010

I CAN LISTEN to six hours of Phil Spector recording sessions, some of which amount to take after take of Spector instructing the lead singer ...

Adele, Whitney Houston, Taylor Swift: The Girls Most Likely

Comment by Mitchell Cohen, Rock's Backpages, February 2012

SHE WAS ANOINTED, for sure. Behind the curtain, all the machinery was being cranked up for her debut, all the fanfare that was possible back ...

Fiona Apple: The Idler Wheel Is Wiser Than the Driver of the Screw and Whipping Cords Will Serve You More Than Ropes Will Ever Do

Review by Mitchell Cohen, Rock's Backpages, 21 June 2012

THE AUDACITY of the new Fiona Apple album makes me so happy, because I can imagine what went on over at her record company when ...

The Beatles, Buddy Holly: The Day the Music Died? Feb. 3, 1959 – Feb. 7, 1964

Comment by Mitchell Cohen, Rock's Backpages, 4 February 2013

THE WHOLE "Day The Music Died" mythology is a crackpot idea of rock history. Buddy Holly died for somebody's sins, but not to become a ...

Burt Bacharach: "He writes in hat sizes. Seven and three-fourths." Frank Sinatra on Burt Bacharach

Comment by Mitchell Cohen, Rock's Backpages, 27 April 2013

IF THE DETAILS of Burt Bacharach's romantic escapades — and there were many, since as Sammy Cahn once said, Burt was the only songwriter who ...

The Rolling Stones: No Expectations: The Stones at the Staples Center

Live Review by Mitchell Cohen, Rock's Backpages, 5 May 2013

PEOPLE AT THE Staples Center in L.A. this week spent a considerable chunk of cash to be in the same room as the Rolling Stones. ...

Merry Clayton: That Background Sound: Merry Clayton

Retrospective by Mitchell Cohen, Rock's Backpages, 30 June 2013

BY THE TIME Merry Clayton got the call one night that got her out of bed and into the studio to unleash her window-rattling voice ...

It's in the Mud: Muscle Shoals

Film/DVD/TV Review by Mitchell Cohen, Rock's Backpages, 2 August 2013

MUSCLE SHOALS, directed by Greg "Freddy" Camalier, is one of the latest in a loosely-linked series of music documentaries – Standing In The Shadows of Motown, The ...

Rockpile: How Rockpile Tried (and Failed) to Save Rock and Roll

Retrospective by Mitchell Cohen, Music Aficionado, 2016

THERE WAS technically only one album released by the band Rockpile, a jaunty, good-natured collection called Seconds of Pleasure that came out in its original ...

The Blues Project, The Lovin' Spoonful: How the Lovin' Spoonful and the Blues Project Electrified New York City

Retrospective by Mitchell Cohen, Music Aficionado, 2016

THE LOVIN' SPOONFUL were NYC's Beatles. Lillian Roxon, in her indispensable Rock Encyclopedia, called them "our own little moptops, born, bred and raised right here ...

Jan & Dean & the Rise of L.A. Pop

Retrospective by Mitchell Cohen, Music Aficionado, 2016

AS MUCH AS anyone else, including the Beach Boys, Jan & Dean helped establish the mythology of Los Angeles. When the city was still in ...

Janis Joplin: Janis Breaks the Chain

Retrospective by Mitchell Cohen, Music Aficionado, 2016

NOT COUNTING outtakes and alternates, songs on which she didn't sing lead, and the instrumental she never got around to adding her vocal to for ...

The Rolling Stones, Bobby Troup: 'Route 66' is the Quintessential American Tune

Essay by Mitchell Cohen, Music Aficionado, 2016

FOR SIX DECADES, Bobby Troup's '(Get Your Kicks on) Route 66' has been a musical guidebook, transcending styles and fashion, recognizing no boundaries. ...

Bert Berns, The McCoys: 'Sloopy' Hangs On: How a Latin-R&B Song Became a Pop-Rock Anthem

Retrospective by Mitchell Cohen, Music Aficionado, 2016

'HANG ON SLOOPY' is one of the dozen or so songs (along with 'Wild Thing,' 'Gloria,' 'Louie Louie,' 'Twist and Shout,' 'Hey Joe') that make ...

The Beau Brummels: Were The Beau Brummels America's Unluckiest Band?

Retrospective by Mitchell Cohen, Music Aficionado, 2016

EVERYTHING BEGAN so well. Almost a year after the all-consuming British Invasion began, the Beau Brummels were one of the first new homegrown bands to ...

Paul Revere & The Raiders: Loud on the Ledge: The Bumpy Ride of Paul Revere & the Raiders

Retrospective by Mitchell Cohen, Music Aficionado, August 2016

EVERYTHING ABOUT Paul Revere and the Raiders was contrived and corny, except their music. There's no rational excuse for why they shouldn't be routinely counted ...

Donovan: Tripping Out: How Two Donovan Songs Defined the '60s

Retrospective by Mitchell Cohen, Music Aficionado, August 2016

'SUNSHINE SUPERMAN' and 'Season of the Witch' each kicked off a side of Donovan's 1966 Epic Records debut, an album that he's celebrating next month ...

Bert Berns: The Ecstatic Agony of a Producer/Songwriter

Report and Interview by Mitchell Cohen, Best Classic Bands, 7 August 2016

The Rock Hall member behind such classics as 'Brown Eyed Girl,' 'Twist and Shout' and more. ...

The Animals, The Beatles, Georgie Fame, The Hollies, The Kinks, Manfred Mann, The Rolling Stones, Spencer Davis Group, Dusty Springfield, The Zombies: 10 Unjustly Overlooked British Invasion Albums (1964–1966)

Retrospective by Mitchell Cohen, Music Aficionado, September 2016

SO MANY artists in the tsunami of music from the U.K. that flooded America in the mid-'60s went on to make extraordinary albums over a ...

Rick Nelson: Restless Kid: Rick Nelson at the Cusp of Country-Rock

Retrospective by Mitchell Cohen, Music Aficionado, September 2016

IT'S TOO BAD Rick Nelson recorded a top 5 single called 'Teen Age Idol', not just because the song is dreary fan-pandering, but because it ...

NRBQ: The Best American Band You Might Not Know About

Retrospective by Mitchell Cohen, Music Aficionado, November 2016

FOR DECADES, critics, musicians, and a slew of civilian devotees have testified to the idiosyncratic brilliance of NRBQ, and yet they've had to endure endless ...

James Brown, Aretha Franklin, Marvin Gaye, Donny Hathaway, Isaac Hayes, The Isley Brothers, Curtis Mayfield, O'Jays, Ike & Tina Turner, Bill Withers: Why the early '70s was the greatest period for live soul albums

Guide by Mitchell Cohen, Music Aficionado, December 2016

JAMES BROWN invented the modern live soul album with the release of Live at the Apollo in 1963, and Sam Cooke, Otis Redding, and Etta ...

Van Morrison, Patti Smith, Them: How 'Gloria' Became the Ultimate Rock Anthem

Retrospective by Mitchell Cohen, Music Aficionado, 2017

'GLORIA', WRITTEN more than fifty years ago by Van Morrison for his band Them, is the simplest song. Just three chords – my musician friends ...

Phil Ochs: How Phil Ochs Went from Folk Hero to Rock & Roll Revolutionary

Retrospective by Mitchell Cohen, Music Aficionado, 2017

PHIL OCHS had been on the stage of Carnegie Hall before. He first headlined there in January 1966, armed with incendiary topical material and witty ...

The Beatles, Chuck Berry, Bob Dylan, The Everly Brothers, Marianne Faithfull, The Hollies, Graham Nash: In Praise of the Hollies

Retrospective by Mitchell Cohen, Music Aficionado, 2017

WITH THEIR EXUBERANT three-part harmony, chiming guitar riffs, and keen sense of what makes a memorable hook, the Hollies created a signature sound. At first, ...

Blood Sweat & Tears, The Blues Project, Dion, Bob Dylan, Al Kooper, Gary Lewis & the Playboys, Gene Pitney, The Rolling Stones: Kooper Sessions

Retrospective by Mitchell Cohen, Music Aficionado, 2017

IF HE'D DONE nothing before or after he dropped by a Bob Dylan recording session in June 1965, sat down at the Hammond organ – ...

Whitney Houston, Janet Jackson: The Girls of Rhythm Nation

Retrospective by Mitchell Cohen, Music Aficionado, 2017

THEY COULD have been rivals in a pop soap opera. Whitney Houston prim and buttoned-up, Janet Jackson frisky and up for anything. Whitney was a ...

The Mamas and The Papas: The Strange Vibrations of the Mamas & the Papas

Retrospective by Mitchell Cohen, Music Aficionado, 2017

THERE WAS a melancholy guitar, and then the voices came in: "All the leaves are brown, and the sky is grey." That was the beginning ...

Colin Blunstone, Jack Bruce, Al Kooper, Tracy Nelson, Michael Nesmith, Paul Revere & The Raiders, Sam the Sham and the Pharaohs, Ringo Starr, Bob Weir, Zal Yanovsky: What happened when these '60s artists decided to go solo?

Retrospective by Mitchell Cohen, Music Aficionado, 2017

GOING SOLO IS an ancient musical tradition. Probably there was a Gregorian monk whose yearning for the spotlight made him think, "I can do this ...

Manfred Mann: Why Manfred Mann Is the Most Underappreciated Group of the British Invasion

Retrospective by Mitchell Cohen, Music Aficionado, January 2017

MANFRED MANN were one of only two British groups to have a #1 single in 1964 without a Lennon-McCartney song. They were endorsed by Bob ...

Kris Kristofferson: How Kris Kristofferson saved Nashville

Retrospective by Mitchell Cohen, Music Aficionado, February 2017

THERE ARE SO many reasons to be in awe of Kris Kristofferson. He survived Barbra Streisand's A Star Is Born, Heaven's Gate, and the movie ...

When Jazz Started Feelin' Groovy

Guide by Mitchell Cohen, Music Aficionado, July 2017

IT WAS SO SIMPLE: pop music was for kids, and kids bought 45s. Jazz fans were older, hipper, and collected LPs. Two different constituencies, and ...

The Bangles, The Blasters, Cruzados, Lone Justice, Los Lobos, Rainy Day: The Other Side of '80s L.A. Rock

Retrospective by Mitchell Cohen, Music Aficionado, 2018

THE IMAGE OF Los Angeles rock in the '80s is imprinted like a tacky tattoo: bands with poofed-up hair and eyeliner, girls with poofed-up hair ...

Eric Carmen, Raspberries: Why (the) Raspberries Mattered

Retrospective by Mitchell Cohen, Music Aficionado, 2018

THEY HAD TO be kidding, right? "Raspberries"? That's only a few degrees removed from "1910 Fruitgum Company." And then there were the poufy hair, the ...

The Byrds, Flying Burrito Brothers, Emmylou Harris, Gram Parsons: How the Ghost of Gram Parsons haunts Alt-Country

Retrospective by Mitchell Cohen, Music Aficionado, January 2018

GRAM PARSONS didn't care much for the term "country-rock". And he wasn't thrilled by some of the more candy-coated bands who were able to capitalize ...

Rosanne Cash, Rodney Crowell, Steve Earle, Foster and Lloyd, Alan Jackson, Alison Krauss, k.d. lang, Lyle Lovett, Randy Travis, Dwight Yoakam: Five Years That Revolutionized Country Music

Retrospective by Mitchell Cohen, Music Aficionado, 2019

THE COUNTRY MUSIC situation in 1985 was so dire that The New York Times published an article that, if not quite an obituary, was a ...

Grin, Nils Lofgren: How Nils Lofgren Almost Became the Next Big Thing

Retrospective by Mitchell Cohen, Music Aficionado, 2019

THE ADVERTISEMENT for Grin, the first album that positioned Nils Lofgren front-and-center in his own band, said "until recently, only insiders could be absolutely certain ...

Elvis Presley: Elvis Faces His Final Curtain

Retrospective by Mitchell Cohen, Music Aficionado, June 2019

THE ANNOUNCEMENT of Elvis Presley's shows at Madison Square Garden was startling. It was as though the media were reporting that aliens were about to ...

Paul Simon and the Road to Redemption

Retrospective by Mitchell Cohen, Music Aficionado, June 2019

YOU COULD ARGUE whether Paul Simon's Still Crazy After All These Years deserved its trophy for Album of the Year when the Grammys were handed out in ...

Guy Clark's Triumphant Last Act

Retrospective by Mitchell Cohen, Music Aficionado, July 2019

IF YOU WERE watching television after midnight on July 21, 1998, you may have witnessed a musical performance that belongs in the history books. David ...

Maren Morris, Kacey Musgraves: Kacey Musgraves, Maren Morris and the Politics of Joy

Comment by Mitchell Cohen, Music Aficionado, July 2019

NOT MANY people in the audience at Irving Plaza in New York knew who Kacey Musgraves was when she opened there for Little Big Town ...

The Dave Clark Five: Who Put the Thump?: The Deep Footprints of the Dave Clark 5

Retrospective by Mitchell Cohen, Music Aficionado, July 2019

THE SONGS OF the Dave Clark 5 were louder, denser, and more raucous than anything else on Top 40 radio, so echo-and-reverb-laden that even a ...

Smokey Robinson, Smokey Robinson & The Miracles: Smokey Robinson and the Art of Pop

Retrospective by Mitchell Cohen, Music Aficionado, August 2019

"I DON'T LIKE you, but I love you." Those eight words, the ones that start off 'You've Really Got a Hold on Me', were the ...

Eric Church: How Eric Church Is Keeping Classic Rock Alive

Essay by Mitchell Cohen, Music Aficionado, September 2019

ERIC CHURCH was born too late, and no one knows that better than he does. His music is nostalgic for an era he wasn't alive ...

Neil Diamond Is Not (Just) Who You Think He Is

Retrospective by Mitchell Cohen, Music Aficionado, September 2019

THERE'S A SCENE in Ted Demme's 1996 film Beautiful Girls where Uma Thurman strolls into a bar, turns heads, and has all the local guys ...

Linda Ronstadt: Why Linda Ronstadt is the Quintessential "Girl Singer"

Retrospective by Mitchell Cohen, Music Aficionado, September 2019

I FIRST SAW her at the Bitter End on Bleecker Street in the early '70s; I was in the second row, sipping on an ice ...

The Mavericks: Why the Mavericks are the Bar Band of Your Dreams

Retrospective by Mitchell Cohen, Music Aficionado, September 2019

IT FELT LIKE some kind of a trick, the way the Mavericks seduced the world of country music when they came on the scene in ...

Chet Atkins, Dolly Parton: How Dolly Parton Became America's Sweetheart

Retrospective by Mitchell Cohen, Music Aficionado, October 2019

THE LAST SONG on Dolly Parton's My Tennessee Mountain Home, her autobiographical concept album from 1973, is a three-minute story about how she arrived in ...

The Rascals and the Rock-Soul Explosion

Retrospective by Mitchell Cohen, Music Aficionado, October 2019

THE SEPTEMBER 2014 event at NYU's Provincetown Playhouse was formally billed as a Songwriters Hall of Fame Master Session, but when it concluded with John ...

The Beatles, Bert Berns, The Isley Brothers: How 'Twist and Shout' Shook the World

Retrospective by Mitchell Cohen, Music Aficionado, November 2019

UNLIKE MOST stories, this one begins with a twist. "Come on, baby," Hank Ballard commanded, "let's do the Twist," immortalizing a dance that was catching ...

Johnny Rivers: When Everything Went a Go-Go

Retrospective by Mitchell Cohen, Music Aficionado, November 2019

IT WAS EARLY 1964, a couple of months after JFK was killed, and everyone just wanted the heavy clouds of mourning to lift. A new ...

Tim Hardin: The Haunted Saga of Tim Hardin

Retrospective by Mitchell Cohen, Music Aficionado, November 2019

TIM HARDIN DIED in December 1980, not quite a week after his 39th birthday, and to the extent that his passing was felt in the ...

Burt Bacharach and the Invention of Modern Cosmopolitan Pop

Retrospective by Mitchell Cohen, Music Aficionado, March 2020

GENERALLY, SONGWRITERS who aren't also performers don't become celebrities. They don't get to host television specials, or appear in commercials alongside their glamorous wives, or ...

How West Side Story Taught Broadway How to Rumble

Retrospective by Mitchell Cohen, Music Aficionado, March 2020

THE FIRST PEOPLE we meet after the curtain goes up on Leonard Bernstein and Stephen Sondheim's West Side Story are the members of a street ...

Count Basie: How Count Basie Brought Big Band Jazz Into the Atomic Age

Retrospective by Mitchell Cohen, Music Aficionado, April 2020

POST-WORLD WAR II America was a bleak period for the big-band business. It was the sound that accompanied the country during the Depression and through ...

Clive Davis and Arista Records

Book Excerpt by Mitchell Cohen, 'Looking for the Magic' (Trouser Press Books), Summer 2022

This is the second of two excerpts on RBP from Mitchell Cohen's book Looking for the Magic: New York City, the '70s and the Rise ...

Larry Uttal and Bell Records

Book Excerpt by Mitchell Cohen, 'Looking for the Magic' (Trouser Press Books), Summer 2022

This is the first of two excerpts on RBP from Mitchell Cohen's book Looking for the Magic: New York City, the '70s and the Rise ...

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