yacht rock christopher cross

Gilmour Plays Pink Floyd Rarities
Heart Adds More Tour Dates
Outlaws' Freddie Salem Dies
Did Band Sabotage Journey Set?
Journey Lineup Changes
Win Up to $30,000

Top 50 Yacht Rock Songs

Yacht rock was one of the most commercially successful genres to emerge from the '70s and yet has managed to evade concise definition since its inception. For many listeners, it boils down to a feeling or mood that cannot be found in other kinds of music: Simply put, you know it when you hear it.

Some agreed-upon elements are crucial to yacht rock. One is its fluidity, with more emphasis on a catchy, easy-feeling melody than on beat or rhythm. Another is a generally lighthearted attitude in the lyrics. Think Seals & Crofts ' "Summer Breeze," Christopher Cross ' "Ride Like the Wind" or Bill Withers ' "Just the Two of Us." Yes, as its label suggests, music that would fit perfectly being played from the deck of a luxurious boat on the high seas.

But even these roughly outlined "rules" can be flouted and still considered yacht rock. Plenty of bands that are typically deemed "nyacht" rock have made their attempts at the genre: Crosby, Stills & Nash got a bit nautical with "Southern Cross," leading with their famed tightly knit harmonies, and Fleetwood Mac also entered yacht rock territory with "Dreams" – which, although lyrically dour, offers a sense of melody in line with yacht rock.

Given its undefined parameters, the genre has become one of music's most expansive corners. From No. 1 hits to deeper-cut gems, we've compiled a list of 50 Top Yacht Rock Songs to set sail to below.

50. "Thunder Island," Jay Ferguson (1978)

Younger generations might be more apt to recognize Jay Ferguson from his score for NBC's The Office , where he also portrayed the guitarist in Kevin Malone's band Scrantonicity. But Ferguson's musical roots go back to the '60s band Spirit; he was also in a group with one of the future members of Firefall, signaling a '70s-era shift toward yacht rock and "Thunder Island." The once-ubiquitous single began its steady ascent in October 1977 before reaching the Top 10 in April of the following year. Producer Bill Szymczyk helped it get there by bringing in his buddy Joe Walsh for a soaring turn on the slide. The best showing Ferguson had after this, however, was the quickly forgotten 1979 Top 40 hit "Shakedown Cruise." (Nick DeRiso)

49. "Southern Cross," Crosby, Stills & Nash (1982)

CSN's "Southern Cross" was an example of a more literal interpretation of yacht rock, one in which leftover material was revitalized by Stephen Stills . He sped up the tempo of a song titled " Seven League Boots " originally penned by brothers Rick and Michael Curtis, then laid in new lyrics about, yes, an actual boat ride. "I rewrote a new set of words and added a different chorus, a story about a long boat trip I took after my divorce," Stills said in the liner notes to 1991's CSN box. "It's about using the power of the universe to heal your wounds." The music video for the song, which went into heavy rotation on MTV, also prominently displayed the band members aboard a large vessel. (Allison Rapp)

48. "Jackie Blue," the Ozark Mountain Daredevils (1974)

Drummer Larry Lee only had a rough idea of what he wanted to do with "Jackie Blue," originally naming it after a bartending dope pusher. For a long time, the Ozark Mountain Daredevils' best-known single remained an instrumental with the place-keeper lyric, " Ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh Jackie Blue. He was dada, and dada doo. He did this, he did that ... ." Producer Glyn Johns, who loved the track, made a key suggestion – and everything finally snapped into place: "No, no, no, mate," Johns told them. "Jackie Blue has to be a girl." They "knocked some new lyrics out in about 30 minutes," Lee said in It Shined: The Saga of the Ozark Mountain Daredevils . "[From] some drugged-out guy, we changed Jackie into a reclusive girl." She'd go all the way to No. 3. (DeRiso)

47. "Sailing," Christopher Cross (1979)

You’d be hard-pressed to find a more quintessential yacht rock song than “Sailing.” The second single (and first chart-topper) off Christopher Cross’ 1979 self-titled debut offers an intoxicating combination of dreamy strings, singsong vocals and shimmering, open-tuned guitar arpeggios that pay deference to Cross’ songwriting idol, Joni Mitchell . “These tunings, like Joni used to say, they get you in this sort of trance,” Cross told Songfacts in 2013. “The chorus just sort of came out. … So I got up and wandered around the apartment just thinking, ‘Wow, that's pretty fuckin' great.’” Grammy voters agreed: “Sailing” won Record of the Year, Song of the Year and Best Arrangement at the 1981 awards. (Bryan Rolli)

46. "Just the Two of Us," Bill Withers and Grover Washington Jr. (1980)

A collaboration between singer Bill Withers and saxophonist Grover Washington Jr. resulted in the sleek "Just the Two of Us." When first approached with the song, Withers insisted on reworking the lyrics. "I'm a little snobbish about words," he said in 2004 . "I said, 'Yeah, if you'll let me go in and try to dress these words up a little bit.' Everybody that knows me is kind of used to me that way. I probably threw in the stuff like the crystal raindrops. The 'Just the Two of Us' thing was already written. It was trying to put a tuxedo on it." The track was completed with some peppy backing vocals and a subtle slap bass part. (Rapp)

45. "Sara Smile," Daryl Hall & John Oates (1975)

It doesn't get much smoother than "Sara Smile," Daryl Hall & John Oates ' first Top 10 hit in the U.S. The song was written for Sara Allen, Hall's longtime girlfriend, whom he had met when she was working as a flight attendant. His lead vocal, which was recorded live, is clear as a bell on top of a velvety bass line and polished backing vocals that nodded to the group's R&B influences. “It was a song that came completely out of my heart," Hall said in 2018 . "It was a postcard. It’s short and sweet and to the point." Hall and Allen stayed together for almost 30 years before breaking up in 2001. (Rapp)

44. "Rosanna," Toto (1982)

One of the most identifiable hits of 1982 was written by Toto co-founder David Paich – but wasn't about Rosanna Arquette, as some people have claimed, even though keyboardist Steve Porcaro was dating the actress at the time. The backbeat laid down by drummer Jeff Porcaro – a "half-time shuffle" similar to what John Bonham played on " Fool in the Rain " – propels the track, while vocal harmonies and emphatic brass sections add further layers. The result is an infectious and uplifting groove – yacht rock at its finest. (Corey Irwin)

43. "Diamond Girl," Seals & Crofts (1973)

Seals & Crofts were soft-rock stylists with imagination, dolling up their saccharine melodies with enough musical intrigue to survive beyond the seemingly obvious shelf life. Granted, the lyrics to “Diamond Girl,” one of the duo’s three No. 6 hits, are as sterile as a surgery-operating room, built on pseudo-romantic nothing-isms ( “Now that I’ve found you, it’s around you that I am” — what a perfectly natural phrase!). But boy, oh boy does that groove sound luxurious beaming out of a hi-fi system, with every nuance — those stacked backing vocals, that snapping piano — presented in full analog glory. (Ryan Reed)

42. "What You Won't Do for Love," Bobby Caldwell (1978)

Smooth. From the opening horn riffs and the soulful keyboard to the funk bass and the velvety vocals of Bobby Caldwell, everything about “What You Won’t Do for Love” is smooth. Released in September 1978, the track peaked at No. 9 on the Billboard Hot 100 and went on to become the biggest hit of Caldwell’s career. It was later given a second life after being sampled for rapper 2Pac's posthumously released 1998 hit single “Do for Love.” (Irwin)

41. "We Just Disagree," Dave Mason (1977)

Dave Mason's ace in the hole on the No. 12 smash "We Just Disagree" was Jim Krueger, who composed the track, shared the harmony vocal and played that lovely guitar figure. "It was a song that when he sang it to me, it was like, 'Yeah, that's the song,'" Mason told Greg Prato in 2014. "Just him and a guitar, which is usually how I judge whether I'm going to do something. If it holds up like that, I'll put the rest of the icing on it." Unfortunately, the multitalented Krueger died of pancreatic cancer at age 43. By then, Mason had disappeared from the top of the charts, never getting higher than No. 39 again. (DeRiso)

40. "Crazy Love," Poco (1978)

Rusty Young was paneling a wall when inspiration struck. He'd long toiled in the shadow of Stephen Stills , Richie Furay and Neil Young , serving in an instrumentalist role with Buffalo Springfield and then Poco . "Crazy Love" was his breakout moment, and he knew it. Rusty Young presented the song before he'd even finished the lyric, but his Poco bandmates loved the way the stopgap words harmonized. "I told the others, 'Don't worry about the ' ooh, ooh, ahhhh haaa ' part. I can find words for that," Young told the St. Louis Dispatch in 2013. "And they said, 'Don't do that. That's the way it's supposed to be.'" It was: Young's first big vocal became his group's only Top 20 hit. (DeRiso)

39. "Suspicions," Eddie Rabbitt (1979)

Eddie Rabbitt 's move from country to crossover stardom was hurtled along by "Suspicions," as a song about a cuckold's worry rose to the Top 20 on both the pop and adult-contemporary charts. Behind the scenes, there was an even clearer connection to yacht rock: Co-writer Even Stevens said Toto's David Hungate played bass on the date. As important as it was for his career, Rabbitt later admitted that he scratched out "Suspicions" in a matter of minutes, while on a lunch break in the studio on the last day of recording his fifth album at Wally Heider's Los Angeles studio. "Sometimes," Rabbitt told the Associated Press in 1985, "the words just fall out of my mouth." (DeRiso)

38. "Moonlight Feels Right," Starbuck (1976)

No sound in rock history is more yacht friendly than Bruce Blackman’s laugh: hilarious, arbitrary, smug, speckled with vocal fry, arriving just before each chorus of Starbuck’s signature tune. Why is this human being laughing? Shrug. Guess the glow of night will do that to you. Then again, this is one of the more strange hits of the '70s — soft-pop hooks frolicking among waves of marimba and synthesizers that could have been plucked from a classic prog epic. “ The eastern moon looks ready for a wet kiss ,” Blackman croons, “ to make the tide rise again .” It’s a lunar make-out session, baby. (Reed)

37. "Same Old Lang Syne," Dan Fogelberg (1981)

“Same Old Lang Syne” is a masterclass in economic storytelling, and its tragedy is in the things both protagonists leave unsaid. Dan Fogelberg weaves a devastating tale of two former lovers who run into each other at a grocery store on Christmas Eve and spend the rest of the night catching up and reminiscing. Their circumstances have changed — he’s a disillusioned professional musician, she’s stuck in an unhappy marriage — but their love for each other is still palpable if only they could overcome their fears and say it out loud. They don’t, of course, and when Fogelberg bids his high-school flame adieu, he’s left with only his bittersweet memories and gnawing sense of unfulfillment to keep him warm on that snowy (and later rainy) December night. (Rolli)

36. "Eye in the Sky," the Alan Parsons Project (1982)

Few songs strike a chord with both prog nerds and soft-rock enthusiasts, but the Alan Parsons Project's “Eye in the Sky” belongs to that exclusive club. The arrangement is all smooth contours and pillowy textures: By the time Eric Woolfson reaches the chorus, shyly emoting about romantic deception over a bed of Wurlitzer keys and palm-muted riffs, the effect is like falling slow motion down a waterfall onto a memory foam mattress. But there’s artfulness here, too, from Ian Bairnson’s seductive guitar solo to the titular phrase conjuring some kind of god-like omniscience. (Reed)

35. "Somebody's Baby," Jackson Browne (1982)

Jackson Browne 's highest-charting single, and his last Top 10 hit, was originally tucked away on the soundtrack for the 1982 teen comedy Fast Times at Ridgemont High . That placed Browne, one of the most earnest of singer-songwriters, firmly out of his element. "It was not typical of what Jackson writes at all, that song," co-composer Danny Kortchmar told Songfacts in 2013. "But because it was for this movie, he changed his general approach and came up with this fantastic song." Still unsure of how it would fit in, Browne refused to place "Somebody's Baby" on his next proper album – something he'd later come to regret . Lawyers in Love broke a string of consecutive multiplatinum releases dating back to 1976. (DeRiso)

34. "Still the One," Orleans (1976)

Part of yacht rock’s charm is being many things but only to a small degree. Songs can be jazzy, but not experimental. Brass sections are great but don’t get too funky. And the songs should rock, but not rock . In that mold comes Orleans’ 1976 hit “Still the One.” On top of a chugging groove, frontman John Hall sings about a romance that continues to stand the test of time. This love isn’t the white-hot flame that leaves passionate lovers burned – more like a soft, medium-level heat that keeps things comfortably warm. The tune is inoffensive, catchy and fun, aka yacht-rock gold. (Irwin)

33. "New Frontier," Donald Fagen (1982)

In which an awkward young man attempts to spark a Cold War-era fling — then, hopefully, a longer, post-apocalyptic relationship — via bomb shelter bunker, chatting up a “big blond” with starlet looks and a soft spot for Dave Brubeck. Few songwriters could pull off a lyrical concept so specific, and almost no one but Donald Fagen could render it catchy. “New Frontier,” a signature solo cut from the Steely Dan maestro, builds the sleek jazz-funk of Gaucho into a more digital-sounding landscape, with Fagen stacking precise vocal harmonies over synth buzz and bent-note guitar leads. (Reed)

32. "Sail On, Sailor," the Beach Boys (1973)

The Beach Boys were reworking a new album when Van Dyke Parks handed them this updated version of an unfinished Brian Wilson song. All that was left was to hand the mic over to Blondie Chaplin for his greatest-ever Beach Boys moment. They released "Sail On, Sailor" twice, however, and this yearning groover somehow barely cracked the Top 50. Chaplin was soon out of the band, too. It's a shame. "Sail On, Sailor" remains the best example of how the Beach Boys' elemental style might have kept growing. Instead, Chaplin went on to collaborate with the Band , Gene Clark of the Byrds and the Rolling Stones – while the Beach Boys settled into a lengthy tenure as a jukebox band. (DeRiso)

31. "Time Passages," Al Stewart (1978)

Al Stewart followed up the first hit single of his decade-long career – 1976's "Year of the Cat" – with a more streamlined take two years later. "Time Passages" bears a similar structure to the earlier track, including a Phil Kenzie sax solo and production by Alan Parsons. While both songs' respective album and single versions coincidentally run the same time, the 1978 hit's narrative wasn't as convoluted and fit more squarely into pop radio playlists. "Time Passages" became Stewart's highest-charting single, reaching No. 7 – while "Year of the Cat" had stalled at No. 8. (Michael Gallucci)

30. "I Go Crazy," Paul Davis (1977)

Paul Davis looked like he belonged in the Allman Brothers Band , but his soft, soulful voice took him in a different direction. The slow-burning nature of his breakthrough single "I Go Crazy" was reflected in its chart performance: For years the song held the record for the most weeks spent on the chart, peaking at No. 7 during its 40-week run. Davis, who died in 2008, took five more songs into the Top 40 after 1977, but "I Go Crazy" is his masterpiece – a wistful and melancholic look back at lost love backed by spare, brokenhearted verses. (Gallucci)

29. "Biggest Part of Me," Ambrosia (1980)

Songwriter David Pack taped the original demo of this song on a reel-to-reel when everyone else was running late, finishing just in time: "I was waiting for my family to get in the car so I could go to a Fourth of July celebration in Malibu," he told the Tennessean in 2014. "I turned off my machine [and] heard the car horn honking for me." Still, Pack was worried that the hastily written first verse – which rhymed " arisin ,'" " horizon " and " realizin '" – might come off a little corny. So he followed the time-honored yacht-rock tradition of calling in Michael McDonald to sing heartfelt background vocals. Result: a Top 5 hit on both the pop and adult-contemporary charts. (DeRiso)

28. "Africa," Toto (1982)

Remove the cover versions, the nostalgia sheen and its overuse in TV and films, and you’re left with what makes “Africa” great: one of the best earworm choruses in music history. Never mind that the band is made up of white guys from Los Angeles who'd never visited the titular continent. Verses about Mt. Kilimanjaro and the Serengeti paint a picture so vivid that listeners are swept away. From the soaring vocals to the stirring synth line, every element of the song works perfectly. There’s a reason generations of music fans continue to proudly bless the rains. (Irwin)

27. "Hello It's Me," Todd Rundgren (1972)

“Hello It’s Me” is the first song Todd Rundgren ever wrote, recorded by his band Nazz and released in 1968. He quickened the tempo, spruced up the instrumentation and delivered a more urgent vocal for this 1972 solo rendition (which became a Top 5 U.S. hit), but the bones of the tune remain the same. “Hello It’s Me” is a wistful, bittersweet song about the dissolution of a relationship between two people who still very much love and respect each other a clear-eyed breakup ballad lacking the guile, cynicism and zaniness of Rundgren’s later work. “The reason those [early] songs succeeded was because of their derivative nature,” Rundgren told Guitar World in 2021. “They plugged so easily into audience expectations. They’re easily absorbed.” That may be so, but there’s still no denying the airtight hooks and melancholy beauty of “Hello It’s Me.” (Rolli)

26. "Smoke From a Distant Fire," the Sanford/Townsend Band (1977)

There are other artists who better define yacht rock - Michael McDonald, Steely Dan, Christopher Cross - but few songs rival the Sanford/Townsend Band's "Smoke From a Distant Fire" as a more representative genre track. (It was a Top 10 hit in the summer of 1977. The duo never had another charting single.) From the vaguely swinging rhythm and roaring saxophone riff to the light percussion rolls and risk-free vocals (that nod heavily to Daryl Hall and John Oates' blue-eyed soul), "Smoke" may be the most definitive yacht rock song ever recorded. We may even go as far as to say it's ground zero. (Gallucci)

25. "Dream Weaver," Gary Wright (1975)

Unlike many other songs on our list, “Dream Weaver” lacks lush instrumentation. Aside from Gary Wright’s vocals and keyboard parts, the only added layer is the drumming of Jim Keltner. But while the track may not have guitars, bass or horns, it certainly has plenty of vibes. Inspired by the writings of Paramahansa Yogananda – which Wright was turned on to by George Harrison – “Dream Weaver” boasts a celestial aura that helped the song peak at No. 2 in 1976. (Irwin)

24. "Reminiscing," Little River Band (1978)

The third time was the charm with Little River Band 's highest-charting single in the U.S. Guitarist Graeham Goble wrote "Reminiscing" for singer Glenn Shorrock with a certain keyboardist in mind. Unfortunately, they weren't able to schedule a session with Peter Jones, who'd played an important role in Little River Band's first-ever charting U.S. single, 1976's "It's a Long Way There ." They tried it anyway but didn't care for the track. They tried again, with the same results. "The band was losing interest in the song," Goble later told Chuck Miller . "Just before the album was finished, Peter Jones came back into town, [and] the band and I had an argument because I wanted to give 'Reminiscing' a third chance." This time they nailed it. (DeRiso)

23. "Heart Hotels," Dan Fogelberg (1979)

Ironically enough, this song about debilitating loneliness arrived on an album in which Dan Fogelberg played almost all of the instruments himself. A key concession to the outside world became the most distinctive musical element on "Heart Hotels," as well-known saxophonist Tom Scott took a turn on the Lyricon – a pre-MIDI electronic wind instrument invented just a few years earlier. As for the meaning of sad songs like these, the late Fogelberg once said : "I feel experiences deeply, and I have an outlet, a place where I can translate those feelings. A lot of people go to psychoanalysts. I write songs." (DeRiso)

22. "Year of the Cat," Al Stewart (1976)

Just about every instrument imaginable can be heard in Al Stewart's "Year of the Cat." What begins with an elegant piano intro winds its way through a string section and a sultry sax solo, then to a passionate few moments with a Spanish acoustic guitar. The sax solo, often a hallmark of yacht-rock songs, was not Stewart's idea. Producer Alan Parsons suggested it at the last minute, and Stewart thought it was the "worst idea I'd ever heard. I said, 'Alan, there aren’t any saxophones in folk-rock. Folk-rock is about guitars. Sax is a jazz instrument,'" Stewart said in 2021 . Multiple lengthy instrumental segments bring the song to nearly seven minutes, yet each seems to blend into the next like a carefully arranged orchestra. (Rapp)

21. "How Long," Ace (1974)

How long does it take to top the charts? For the Paul Carrack-fronted Ace: 45 years . "I wrote the lyric on the bus going to my future mother-in-law's," he later told Gary James . "I wrote it on the back of that bus ticket. That's my excuse for there only being one verse." Ace released "How Long" in 1975, reaching No. 3, then Carrack moved on to stints with Squeeze and Mike and the Mechanics . Finally, in 2020, "How Long" rose two spots higher, hitting No. 1 on Billboard's rock digital song sales chart after being featured in an Amazon Prime advertisement titled "Binge Cheat." (DeRiso)

20. "Brandy (You're a Fine Girl)," Looking Glass (1972)

Like "Summer Breeze" (found later in our list of Top 50 Yacht Rock Songs), Looking Glass' tale of an alluring barmaid in a busy harbor town pre-dates the classic yacht-rock era. Consider acts like Seals & Crofts and these one-hit wonders pioneers of the genre. Ironically, the effortless-sounding "Brandy (You're a Fine Girl)" was quite difficult to complete. "We recorded 'Brandy' two or three different times with various producers before we got it right," Looking Glass' principal songwriter Elliot Lurie told the Tennessean in 2016. The chart-topping results became so popular so fast, however, that Barry Manilow had to change the title of a new song he was working on to " Mandy ." (DeRiso)

19. "I Can't Tell You Why," Eagles (1979)

Timothy B. Schmit joined just in time to watch the Eagles disintegrate. But things couldn't have started in a better place for the former Poco member. He arrived with the makings of his first showcase moment with the group, an unfinished scrap that would become the No. 8 hit "I Can't Tell You Why." For a moment, often-contentious band members rallied around the outsider. Don Henley and Glenn Frey both made key contributions, as Eagles completed the initial song on what would become 1979's The Long Run . Schmit felt like he had a reason to be optimistic. Instead, Eagles released the LP and then promptly split up. (DeRiso)

18. "Sentimental Lady," Bob Welch (1977)

Bob Welch first recorded "Sentimental Lady" in 1972 as a member of Fleetwood Mac . Five years later, after separating from a band that had gone on to way bigger things , Welch revisited one of his best songs and got two former bandmates who appeared on the original version – Mick Fleetwood and Christine McVie – to help out (new Mac member Lindsey Buckingham also makes an appearance). This is the better version, warmer and more inviting, and it reached the Top 10. (Gallucci)

17. "So Into You," Atlanta Rhythm Section (1976)

Atlanta Rhythm Section is often wrongly categorized as a Southern rock band, simply because of their roots in Doraville, Ga. Songs like the seductively layered "So Into You" illustrate how little they had in common with the likes of Lynyrd Skynyrd . As renowned Muscle Shoals sessions ace David Hood once said, they're more like the " Steely Dan of the South ." Unfortunately, time hasn't been kind to the group. Two of this best-charting single's writers have since died , while keyboardist Dean Daughtry retired in 2019 as Atlanta Rhythm Section's last constant member. (DeRiso)

16. "Dreams," Fleetwood Mac (1977)

Stevie Nicks was trying to channel the heartbreak she endured after separating from Lindsey Buckingham into a song, but couldn't concentrate among the bustle of Fleetwood Mac's sessions for Rumours . "I was kind of wandering around the studio," she later told Yahoo! , "looking for somewhere I could curl up with my Fender Rhodes and my lyrics and a little cassette tape recorder." That's when she ran into a studio assistant who led her to a quieter, previously unseen area at Sausalito's Record Plant. The circular space was surrounded by keyboards and recording equipment, with a half-moon bed in black-and-red velvet to one side. She settled in, completing "Dreams" in less than half an hour, but not before asking the helpful aide one pressing question: "I said, 'What is this?' And he said, 'This is Sly Stone 's studio.'" (DeRiso)

15. "Minute by Minute," the Doobie Brothers (1978)

Michael McDonald was so unsure of this album that he nervously previewed it for a friend. "I mean, all the tunes have merit, but I don't know if they hang together as a record," McDonald later told UCR. "He looked at me and he said, 'This is a piece of shit.'" Record buyers disagreed, making Minute by Minute the Doobie Brothers' first chart-topping multiplatinum release. Such was the mania surrounding this satiny-smooth LP that the No. 14 hit title track lost out on song-of-the-year honors at the Grammys to "What a Fool Believes" (found later in our list of Top 50 Yacht Rock Songs) by the Doobie Brothers. (DeRiso)

14. "Lonely Boy," Andrew Gold (1976)

Andrew Gold’s only Top 10 U.S. hit is a story of parental neglect and simmering resentment, but those pitch-black details are easy to miss when couched inside such a deliciously upbeat melody. Gold chronicles the childhood of the titular lonely boy over a propulsive, syncopated piano figure, detailing the betrayal he felt when his parents presented him with a sister two years his junior. When he turns 18, the lonely boy ships off to college and leaves his family behind, while his sister gets married and has a son of her own — oblivious to the fact that she’s repeating the mistakes of her parents. Gold insisted “Lonely Boy” wasn’t autobiographical, despite the details in the song matching up with his own life. In any case, you can’t help but wonder what kind of imagination produces such dark, compelling fiction. (Rolli)

13. "Baby Come Back," Player (1977)

Liverpool native Peter Beckett moved to the States, originally to join a forgotten act called Skyband. By the time he regrouped to found Player with American J.C. Crowley, Beckett's wife had returned to England. Turns out Crowley was going through a breakup, too, and the Beckett-sung "Baby Come Back" was born. "So it was a genuine song, a genuine lyric – and I think that comes across in the song," Beckett said in The Yacht Rock Book . "That's why it was so popular." The demo earned Player a hastily signed record deal, meaning Beckett and Crowley had to assemble a band even as "Baby Come Back" rose to No. 1. Their debut album was released before Player had ever appeared in concert. (DeRiso)

12. "I'd Really Love to See You Tonight," England Dan & John Ford Coley (1976)

There aren't too many songs with choruses as big as the one England Dan & John Ford Coley pump into the key lines of their first Top 40 single. Getting there is half the fun: The conversational verses – " Hello, yeah, it's been a while / Not much, how 'bout you? / I'm not sure why I called / I guess I really just wanted to talk to you " – build into the superpowered come-on line " I'm not talking 'bout moving in ... ." Their yacht-rock pedigree is strong: Dan Seals' older brother is Seals & Croft's Jim Seals. (Gallucci)

11. "Hey Nineteen," Steely Dan (1980)

At least on the surface, “Hey Nineteen” is one of Steely Dan’s least ambiguous songs: An over-the-hill guy makes one of history’s most cringe-worthy, creepiest pick-up attempts, reminiscing about his glory days in a fraternity and lamenting that his would-be companion doesn’t know who Aretha Franklin is. (The bridge is a bit tougher to crack. Is anyone sharing that “fine Colombian”?) But the words didn’t propel this Gaucho classic into Billboard's Top 10. Instead, that credit goes to the groove, anchored by Walter Becker ’s gently gliding bass guitar, Donald Fagen’s velvety electric piano and a chorus smoother than top-shelf Cuervo Gold. (Reed)

10. "Rich Girl," Daryl Hall & John Oates (1976)

It’s one of the most economical pop songs ever written: two A sections, two B sections (the second one extended), a fade-out vocal vamp. In and out. Wham, bam, boom. Perhaps that's why it’s easy to savor “Rich Girl” 12 times in a row during your morning commute, why hearing it just once on the radio is almost maddening. This blue-eyed-soul single, the duo’s first No. 1 hit, lashes out at a supposedly entitled heir to a fast-food chain. (The original lyric was the less-catchy “rich guy ”; that one change may have earned them millions.) But there’s nothing bitter about that groove, built on Hall’s electric piano stabs and staccato vocal hook. (Reed)

9. "Fooled Around and Fell in Love," Elvin Bishop (1975)

Elvin Bishop made his biggest pop-chart splash with "Fooled Around and Fell In Love," permanently changing the first line of his bio from a former member of the Paul Butterfield Blues Band to a solo star in his own right. There was only one problem: "The natural assumption was that it was Elvin Bishop who was singing,” singer Mickey Thomas told the Tahoe Daily Tribune in 2007. Thomas later found even greater chart success with Starship alongside Donny Baldwin, who also played drums on Bishop's breakthrough single. "A lot of peers found out about me through that, and ultimately I did get credit for it," Thomas added. "It opened a lot of doors for me." (DeRiso)

8. "Baker Street," Gerry Rafferty (1978)

Gerry Rafferty already had a taste of success when his band Stealers Wheel hit the Top 10 with the Dylanesque "Stuck in the Middle With You" in 1973. His first solo album after the group's split, City to City , made it to No. 1 in 1978, thanks in great part to its hit single "Baker Street" (which spent six frustrating weeks at No. 2). The iconic saxophone riff by Raphael Ravenscroft gets much of the attention, but this single triumphs on many other levels. For six, mood-setting minutes Rafferty winds his way down "Baker Street" with a hopefulness rooted in eternal restlessness. (Gallucci)

7. "Dirty Work," Steely Dan (1972)

In just about three minutes, Steely Dan tells a soap-opera tale of an affair between a married woman and a man who is well aware he's being played but is too hopelessly hooked to end things. " When you need a bit of lovin' 'cause your man is out of town / That's the time you get me runnin' and you know I'll be around ," singer David Palmer sings in a surprisingly delicate tenor. A saxophone and flugelhorn part weeps underneath his lines. By the time the song is over, we can't help but feel sorry for the narrator who is, ostensibly, just as much part of the problem as he could be the solution. Not all yacht rock songs have happy endings. (Rapp)

6. "Ride Like the Wind," Christopher Cross (1979)

“Ride Like the Wind” is ostensibly a song about a tough-as-nails outlaw racing for the border of Mexico under cover of night, but there’s nothing remotely dangerous about Christopher Cross’ lithe tenor or the peppy piano riffs and horns propelling the tune. Those contradictions aren’t a detriment. This is cinematic, high-gloss pop-rock at its finest, bursting at the seams with hooks and elevated by Michael McDonald’s silky backing vocals. Cross nods to his Texas roots with a fiery guitar solo, blending hard rock and pop in a way that countless artists would replicate in the next decade. (Rolli)

5. "Summer Breeze," Seals & Crofts (1972)

Jim Seals and Dash Crofts were childhood friends in Texas, but the mellow grandeur of "Summer Breeze" makes it clear that they always belonged in '70s-era Southern California. "We operate on a different level," Seals once said , sounding like nothing if not a Laurel Canyon native. "We try to create images, impressions and trains of thought in the minds of our listeners." This song's fluttering curtains, welcoming domesticity and sweet jasmine certainly meet that standard. For some reason, however, they released this gem in August 1972 – as the season faded into fall. Perhaps that's why "Summer Breeze" somehow never got past No. 6 on the pop chart. (DeRiso)

4. "Lowdown," Boz Scaggs (1976)

As you throw on your shades and rev the motor, the only thing hotter than the afternoon sun is David Hungate’s sweet slap-bass blasting from the tape deck. “This is the good life,” you say to no one in particular, casually tipping your baseball cap to the bikini-clad crew on the boat zooming by. Then you press “play” again. What else but Boz Scaggs ’ silky “Lowdown” could soundtrack such a moment in paradise? Everything about this tune, which cruised to No. 3 on the Billboard Hot 100, is equally idyllic: Jeff Porcaro’s metronomic hi-hat pattern, David Paich’s jazzy keyboard vamp, the cool-guy croon of Scaggs — flexing about gossip and “schoolboy game.” You crack open another cold one — why not? And, well, you press play once more. (Reed)

3. "Lido Shuffle," Boz Scaggs (1976)

Scaggs' storied career began as a sideman with Steve Miller and already included a scorching duet with Duane Allman . Co-writer David Paich would earn Grammy-winning stardom with songs like "Africa." Yet they resorted to theft when it came to this No. 11 smash. Well, in a manner of speaking: "'Lido' was a song that I'd been banging around, and I kind of stole – well, I didn't steal anything. I just took the idea of the shuffle," Scaggs told Songfacts in 2013. "There was a song that Fats Domino did called 'The Fat Man ' that had a kind of driving shuffle beat that I used to play on the piano, and I just started kind of singing along with it. Then I showed it to Paich, and he helped me fill it out." Then Paich took this track's bassist and drummer with him to form Toto. (DeRiso)

2. "Peg," Steely Dan (1977)

"Peg" is blessed with several yacht-rock hallmarks: a spot on Steely Dan's most Steely Dan-like album, Aja , an impeccable airtightness that falls somewhere between soft-pop and jazz and yacht rock's stalwart captain, Michael McDonald, at the helm. (He may be a mere backing singer here, but his one-note chorus chirps take the song to another level.) Like most Steely Dan tracks, this track's meaning is both cynical and impenetrable, and its legacy has only grown over the years – from hip-hop samples to faithful cover versions. (Gallucci)

1. "What a Fool Believes," the Doobie Brothers (1978)

Michael McDonald not only steered the Doobie Brothers in a new direction when he joined in 1975, but he also made them a commercial powerhouse with the 1978 album Minute by Minute . McDonald co-wrote "What a Fool Believes" – a No. 1 single; the album topped the chart, too – with Kenny Loggins and sang lead, effectively launching a genre in the process. The song's style was copied for the next couple of years (most shamelessly in Robbie Dupree's 1980 Top 10 "Steal Away"), and McDonald became the bearded face of yacht rock. (Gallucci)

Top 100 Classic Rock Artists

Gallery Credit: UCR Staff

More From Ultimate Classic Rock

LATEST REVIEWS

Supertramp’s ‘Breakfast in America’
Bob Seger – Final Tour
Janis Joplin Biography Review
CSNY’s ‘Deja Vu’
Rolling Stones – 2019 Concert Review
Eric Clapton Celebrates at MSG
Roger Waters ‘Us + Them’ Tour
Warren Zevon’s ‘Excitable Boy’
Tom Petty 40th Anniversary Concert
1971: Year That Rock Exploded – Book
Steppenwolf’s Debut: Heavy Metal Thunder
‘Who’s Next’ – Album Rewind
Privacy Policy

When the Christopher Cross Classic ‘Yacht-Rock’ Debut Went Sailing to the Top

Answer: They are the only artists who have won the four major Grammy Awards (Album of the Year, Song of the Year, Record of the Year and Best New Artist) in the same year. They achieved this feat in 1981 and 2020, respectively: Eilish is 50 years younger than the man born Christopher Charles Geppert in San Antonio, Tex. Only time will tell if she endures the kind of backlash that, after a spectacular start with hits “Ride Like the Wind” and “Sailing,” cast Cross into music business purgatory and back to fame again. Good luck to her.

Christopher Cross was originally the name of a band, not a person. In the early ’70s, Geppert had graduated from wailing “Wipe Out” as drummer with his junior high group the Psychos to local stardom as a hot guitar-slinger with a quartet called Flash, which featured his buddies Rob Meurer on keyboards and bass player Andy Salmon. (Meurer once quipped, “Anyone who thinks all Chris can play is ‘Sailing’ doesn’t know he started out with a Flying V and a Marshall stack and hair out to here.”)

As a frequent opening act at San Antonio’s hotspot the JAM Factory, Geppert was also called upon as a gofer for the club’s owner Joe Miller, picking up the Peter Green-era Fleetwood Mac from the airport (never imagining he would tour with them a decade later), and once subbing for Ritchie Blackmore during a Deep Purple concert.

As Cross recalled in a 2012 interview with the Austin Chronicle ’s Margaret Moser, “Blackmore had a reaction to the flu shot, and he got sick. The show was sold out, and Joe Miller suggested to Jon Lord he use me to sub, and Joe would issue refunds to anyone who wanted. Ian Gillan was not for it, but Jon Lord made the call, and they said okay. Eric Johnson was opening, so I used his Marshall amp. I played the Deep Purple tunes I knew and some blues and got through it. I drove them to the airport, and when they left, I met Ritchie. He gave me his pick and was very nice.”

Cross in a recent photo

After a move to Austin, drummer Tommy Taylor was recruited to transform Flash into Christopher Cross the group, which eventually became Geppert’s stage name when he was signed, ostensibly as a solo artist, to Warner Bros. Records in 1979. In a town where freaky country-rock dominated, Cross says he never went to music meccas Antone’s or Armadillo World Headquarters, where Jerry Jeff Walker, Rusty Weir and Willis Alan Ramsey ruled. Still, he was influenced by fellow Texans Buddy Holly, Doug Sahm and San Antonio big band leader Sunny Ozuna, from whom Cross admits he borrowed a Latin-American rhythmic tinge for the new songs, all solo compositions, gestating in Austin.

“We did feel slighted by Austin,” Cross told Moser after he’d become a resident in the city once again, “but we never related to the songwriting or music being celebrated here and always looked to a more West Coast star. My attitude was to do the cover music. It paid the bills better. But keep your own music under your hat and shop it to the labels. That took us out of the mainstream.” Those demos, done at Austin’s Pecan Street Studios, got him a recording contract.

Christopher Cross in a Warner Bros. Records publicity photo

In July 1979, hunkered down at WB’s Amigo Studios in North Hollywood, the four band members were supplemented by a raft of top session players and singers, under the direction of producers Michael Omartian and Michael Ostin. Recording on the new 3M Digital Recording System, the eponymous Christopher Cross LP took shape quickly. Released on Dec. 20 of that year, it began throwing off hit singles immediately, moving toward sales of five million copies in the U.S. alone and still counting.

“Say You’ll Be Mine” kicks off the album with a Latin rhythm, Lenny Castro’s percussion, and more than a hint of Brian Wilson in Cross’ lead and the background vocal arrangement. Nicolette Larson is on hand to harmonize, and Jay Graydon brings some of his work with Steely Dan to his mercurial guitar solo. Unfortunately, as a lead-off track it’s fairly pedestrian, and the lyrics don’t exactly signal the words are going to matter on the album: “Say you’ll be mine/Say you’ll be mine until the sun shines/Say you’ll be mine/And bring me the dream of a lifetime.”

“I Really Don’t Know Anymore” has more energy, and gets considerable help from Michael McDonald, who joins Cross for a soaring chorus after two verses, and carries some nice counter-lines throughout. Unfortunately, the lyrics are once again bland, replying to the question “What do you think about love?” with “I really don’t know anymore/I really can’t say/I really don’t know anymore/I’m just that way.” A five-piece horn section, made up of studio aces including trumpeter Chuck Findley and saxophonist Jim Horn, provides a Chicago-type drive, and the guitar solo, full of audacious twists, turns and effects, is by another Steely Dan go-to, Larry Carlton.

“Spinning” has a lovely instrumental intro with a hint of “Rikki Don’t Lose That Number.” The first voice heard is that of Valerie Carter, whose work as songwriter, solo artist and harmonizer-to-the stars should be better known. She pairs very well with Cross, and Findley’s flugelhorn work midway is perfection. Victor Feldman provides a subtle vibraphone part, and concertmaster Assa Drori blends a string section with Meurer’s synth. This is the album’s first truly impressive track.

“Never Be the Same” was tapped to be the set’s third single release, and deserved to make it higher than #15 in Billboard . Cross’ vocal is confident and perfectly mixed into an impressive arrangement. The background vocals for the peppy choruses and under another excellent Graydon solo are spot on, and with the light Latin rhythm the combo of Castro, Feldman, Taylor and Salmon pays dividends.

“Poor Shirley” borrows a bit of the string quartet of “Eleanor Rigby” and piano-driven rhythm of the Beach Boys’ “Sail On, Sailor,” but it goes way beyond mere imitation. Cross makes a creditable stab at poetry in the lyrics: “Dearly held are the friends/Left in the years and lost in the war/Dearly held are the loves/Save for the ones you lose on your own.” Cross’ Brian Wilson-infused lead vocal, complete with falsetto passages, might be his best on the album. (He also handles the multiple backing vocals.) If anyone needs evidence that Cross can really sing with emotion and great attention to detail, here it is. He handles the guitar solo himself too, ending the side with a flourish.

“Ride Like the Wind,” with its infectious rhythm and gliding melodies, is a group effort par excellence , as Castro’s congas, Omartian’s acoustic piano, McDonald’s echo-vocal, the horn section and a fantastic blend of synth, strings and wordless chorus all do their parts. Kudos to engineers Chet Himes and Stuart Gitlin for keeping it all sparkling, and to Cross, who is on fire for his lead vocal and concluding, quite gnarly, guitar solo. Released as a slightly edited single Feb. 15, 1980, “Ride Like the Wind” hung in at #2 on Billboard ’s Hot 100 for a month, stymied by Blondie’s “Call Me” in the top spot.

Don Henley and J.D. Souther help Cross sing “The Light Is On,” which is full of little percussion touches from Feldman and Castro, and contains a pair of Carlton’s thrilling solos, each with a character of its own. The future #1, Song of the Year and perennial radio staple “Sailing” follows, and deserves the accolades. It casts a spell from the opening bars, and Cross finds a restrained, sensitive timbre in his voice that fits his dreamy lyrics perfectly: “Well, it’s not far down to paradise/At least it’s not for me/And if the wind is right you can sail away/And find tranquility.”

Watch Cross perform it on The Midnight Special on Sept. 12, 1980

The LP’s longest track, “Minstrel Gigolo,” is placed last in the sequence. Cross’ Austin pal Eric Johnson gets a lengthy solo in the middle, and saxophonist Thomas Ramirez has a spotlight in the final minute, snaking in beautifully after Johnson’s second terrific solo. Cross might have been thinking of some Austin lothario when he wrote “All the young and lonely girls wait for you/There by the backstage door/And they’re hoping to be the one,” but if it was wishful thinking it worked, as he became a heartthrob for audiences as the success of Christopher Cross grew and he graduated to huge venues himself after serving as opening act on Fleetwood Mac’s Tusk tour.

Related: See where the album ranked among the top-selling LPs of 1980

His second album, Another Page, couldn’t match his debut, and Cross’ last major hit occurred in 1981 with “Arthur’s Theme (Best That You Can Do),” an Oscar-winner and #1 pop hit he wrote with Burt Bacharach and Carole Bayer Sager. For whatever reason, even as he continued to issue high-quality recordings, he quickly went out of fashion, until his rediscovery as an icon of so-called “yacht rock.” The term was coined by a cult comedy web series of that name in 2005, which imagined the likes of Kenny Loggins, the Doobie Brothers, Hall and Oates, and Christopher Cross hanging out together in L.A.’s Marina del Rey. “Sailing” took on a new, albeit fictional, meaning.

Cross “and Friends” in Oct. 1981

Defending yacht rock in a 2016 article in The Guardian , cultural historian Jennifer Otter Bickerdike asked, “Why be ashamed of appreciating a carefully crafted, meticulously produced song, which, technically speaking, most tracks in the yacht category are? The very care and attention to detail that had gone out of style is now being embraced and appreciated. A decade after Spin magazine touted the cover headline ‘Why Hall and Oates are the New Velvet Underground,’ its presence is still strong.”

After releasing a mostly instrumental album, Take Me As I Am, in 2017, Cross helped form Freedonia, a new band (named for a nation in the Marx Brothers’ Duck Soup) which issued its debut CD in 2018. During 2019, Cross was part of an all-star tour in celebration of the White Album, doing five Beatles songs, including “Martha My Dear” and “Mother Nature’s Son,” and by popular demand performed “Sailing” and “Ride Like The Wind” every night. As of this writing, he’s been suffering from the lingering effects of Covid, but according to his website he hopes to get back on the road for his 40th Anniversary Tour as soon as possible.

Watch Cross and Larson perform “Say You’ll Be Mine” on The Midnight Special in 1980

Watch Cross perform “Ride Like the Wind” in 1998 with Michael McDonald

Latest Posts

The Stills-Young Band One-Off Album: ‘Long May You Run’ - 09/20/2024
Pete Townshend/Ronnie Lane: ‘Rough Mix’—An Overlooked Gem - 09/16/2024
Crosby/Nash ‘Wind On the Water’: And Then There Were Two - 09/15/2024

Stories We Want You to Read

Moody Blues’ John Lodge Adds to ‘Performs Days of Future Passed’ 2024 Tour

No Comments so far

No comments yet, click here to cancel reply..

Your data will be safe! Your e-mail address will not be published. Also other data will not be shared with third person.

Comment * -->

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed .

Loading, Please Wait!

Christopher Cross: I filled in for Ritchie Blackmore on Deep Purple's US debut

In a new book about Yacht Rock, Ride Like The Wind hitmaker Christopher Cross reveals how he filled in for a sick Ritchie Blackmore at Deep Purple's first US show

Did AOR legend Christopher Cross really fill in for Ritchie Blackmore at Deep Purple’s first ever American show? That’s the claim he makes in Greg Prato’s new book about Yacht Rock , which is published this week. The Yacht Rock Book: The Oral History of the Soft, Smooth Sounds of the 70s and 80s tells the story of soft rock through the voices of those who made it, from Walter Becker to Dave Mason and beyond.

In this excerpt, Christopher Cross talks about his grounding in electric guitar, and how he came to fill in for Blackmore at a show at The Jam Factory in San Antonio, Texas.

Playing electric guitar is not a thing that people know I do, really. I’m more known as a songwriter-singer. So that’s my time to kind of blow a little bit and have a little bit of fun with that, interacting with the players [onstage]. Not that many people know that I grew up playing guitar in Texas with Eric Johnson, Billy Gibbons, and Stevie Ray Vaughan, so it’s part of what I do.

[I was friends with] Stevie, rest his soul, and his brother Jimmie, and then of course Billy I still see quite a bit. I run into him quite a bit. Eric Johnson has been on almost every record I’ve made. He’ll be on the new one, as well. But Eric and I remain very, very close. I miss Stevie—as everybody does in Austin. But yeah, I see the guys a lot.

It would have been interesting [to have collaborated with Stevie]. He used to come out to gigs and sit in at the end. But the thing about him was he was younger. So he was sort of like ‘the kid in town.’ And people were sort of like, ‘OK, let the kid sit in at the end.’ He was so much better than everybody else. So it was amazing to watch him grow as a player. He was always pretty gifted, but it’s crazy how good he got. And I used to leave my fraternity club gigs where I played cover music and go down to the Rome Inn where Stevie was playing his own stuff. But maybe for fifty people. He was always very dedicated to what he wanted to do and didn’t ever really sort of sell out.

I had a promoter friend who I did a lot of kind of gopher work for and stuff like that. And I had a local band, and Joe [Miller] was promoting that [Deep Purple] show, at a place called the Jam Factory. It was their very first show in the United States ever and someone advised them to get flu shots. So they did, and Ritchie Blackmore got very sick. And so the decision was made that they didn’t really want to cancel the show if they could help it. And Joe Miller—who was kind of managing me at the time—said, ‘Y’know, there’s this guitarist in town who’s a big fan of Ritchie’s and he could probably step in.’

Deep Purple: Exit The Man In Black...
Our TeamRock+ offer just got bigger. And louder.
Rock Icons: Ritchie Blackmore by Opeth's Fredrik Åkesson
Ian Gillan: The Day I Left Deep Purple

The singer [Ian Gillan] was in favour of it, I remember, but Joe pretty much ran the band and was the one that made the decision that it was better to play than not play. So I came down, and I had a Flying V and long hair, and I’m this big Ritchie fan. So we played the songs that I knew and then we jammed some blues. And they told the crowd Ritchie wouldn’t be there. It was a great moment for me. And then, when they left town, I went to the airport and got to meet Ritchie, and he thanked me for covering for him. He was cool. But what’s funny is, Eagle Rock Records, which released Dr. Faith , my last album in 2011, they have Deep Purple on the label. So Max Vaccaro, who runs the label, says he mentioned the story to Jon Lord, and Jon Lord said that never happened, ever.

Classic Rock Newsletter

So Max Vaccaro was kind of like, ‘I think you’re bullshitting.’ Eric [Johnson] had a band called Mariani at the time, and they opened the show. So when Max said Jon Lord said it didn’t happen, I called up Eric, and I said, ‘Man, is this a flashback or something? Am I imagining this?’ He goes, ‘No way. I was there. We opened and you played with them. Jon Lord’s lying.’

But it’s like I told Max later: ‘This is something that Jon Lord wanted to forget and I wanted to remember.’ Because it was a nightmare for them.

It was just horrible. Their very first show, and their star, Ritchie, was a pretty big part of it. But it’s a very cool thing.

I should probably [try to find photographic evidence of that show] at some point.

Greg Prato’s The Yacht Rock Book: The Oral History of the Soft, Smooth Sounds of the 70s and 80s is out this week, and can be pre-ordered now .

Editor’s Note: According to Setlist.FM , the show in question did not take place on Deep Purple’s debut US tour (which was in late 1968), but on the American leg of the In Rock tour, in 1970.

Hello Sailor: The Hipsterisation of Yacht Rock

Contributing writer at Classic Rock magazine since 2004. He has written for other outlets over the years, and has interviewed some of his favourite rock artists: Black Sabbath, Rush, Kiss, The Police, Devo, Sex Pistols, Ramones, Soundgarden, Meat Puppets, Blind Melon, Primus, King’s X… heck, even William Shatner! He is also the author of quite a few books, including Grunge Is Dead: The Oral History of Seattle Rock Music , A Devil on One Shoulder And An Angel on the Other: The Story of Shannon Hoon And Blind Melon , and MTV Ruled the World: The Early Years of Music Video , among others.

“I had become Musical Director, which I always hate. But I took the money and took the title and did the job!”: The Cure’s Reeves Gabrels on the time he became David Bowie’s touring MD

“The aim was to be ‘the best group in the world’… this easily becomes confused with ‘the most successful group in the world,’ at which point the music may get lost”: Robert Fripp’s observation of King Crimson

“We were torn between trying to make it big and making our music more crossover, but failing… that happened because we became conscious of what we were doing”: The Power And The Glory signalled the beginning of the end for Gentle Giant

Entertainment

How to Watch
My watchlist
Stock market
Biden economy
Personal finance
Stocks: most active
Stocks: gainers
Stocks: losers
Trending tickers
World indices
US Treasury bonds
Top mutual funds
Highest open interest
Highest implied volatility
Currency converter
Basic materials
Communication services
Consumer cyclical
Consumer defensive
Financial services
Industrials
Real estate
Mutual funds
Credit cards
Balance transfer cards
Cash back cards
Rewards cards
Travel cards
Online checking
High-yield savings
Money market
Home equity loan
Personal loans
Student loans
Options pit
Fantasy football
Pro Pick 'Em
College Pick 'Em
Fantasy baseball
Fantasy hockey
Fantasy basketball
Download the app
Daily fantasy
Scores and schedules
GameChannel
World Baseball Classic
Premier League
CONCACAF League
Champions League
Motorsports
Horse racing

New on Yahoo

Privacy Dashboard

Sail Away: The Oral History of ‘Yacht Rock’

This story was originally published on June 26, 2015

I n the late 1970s and early 1980s, musical artists like Kenny Loggins, Michael McDonald, Steely Dan, Toto, Hall and Oates, and dozens of others regularly popped up on each other’s records, creating a golden era of smooth-music collaboration.

More from Rolling Stone

The Second Coming of Steely Dan

Michael McDonald on the Doobie Brothers Entering the Rock Hall: 'They Deserve the Nod'

Stormy Daniels Versus the World

And on June 26th, 2005, an internet phenomenon was born. In 12 short but memorable episodes — first via the the short-film series Channel 101 and then online — JD Ryznar, Hunter Stair, Dave Lyons, Lane Farnham and their friends redefined an era and coined a term for the sultry croonings of McDonald, Fagen, et al.: “yacht rock.”

As “Hollywood” Steve might say, these guys docked a fleet of remarkable hits. This is the story of Yacht Rock, told from stem to stern — a reimagining of a bygone soft-rock renaissance, courtesy of hipsters with fake mustaches, impeccable record collections and a love of smoothness. Long may it sail.

The Michigan Connection JD Ryznar (Director, “Michael McDonald”): I moved from Ann Arbor to L.A., and ended up making friends with all these other guys from Michigan, like “Hollywood” Steve Huey, Hunter Stair, and David Lyons. Pretty much every weekend I’d have “Chinese Thanksgiving” at my apartment — we’d eat BBQ chicken and burgers, drink beer and listen to records of what I called “yacht rock.” You know, like Michael McDonald is singing background vocals and like there’s guys on boats on the covers; it feels like you’re on a yacht listening to it. And the guys were like, oh, we know this music.

Dave Lyons (“Koko”): You know how, in the Seventies, these big bands started playing arena rock? We liked the idea of these smooth bands playing “Marina Rock.” I thought it was a better name.

“Hollywood” Steve Huey (“Hollywood Steve”): What I mostly remember is JD playing Journey records all the time. He was so into Journey that he had photocopied a photo of Steve Perry and pasted it onto his liquid soap dispenser. He wrote “Steve Perry Soap: Clean as all fuck” on it.

Lane Farnham (editor, “Jimmy Messina”): JD and I had talked about Journey for a year before we did Yacht Rock. In the third episode, that whole “you need to fly like a pilot” bit? Those are direct lines from Steve Perry in this crazy documentary we found. He’s coked to the gills, in the Eighties, just blabbering about who knows what. We got a kick out of that stuff.

Ryznar: My musical tastes are not that interesting, and they never were.

Huey: I turned 30 right before we started doing the series, and I thought, well, this is a nice round number. What do 30-year-olds do? I feel like it’s time I get into Steely Dan. I bought most of the catalogue and was like, This is my new identity. I’m gonna unwind, start listening to Steely Dan, and leave parties early.

Channel 101 Hunter Stair (“Kenny Loggins”): At the time, JD had helped me get a job at a production company, and he asked if I wanted to shoot this thing they were doing for something called Channel 101. I didn’t know anything about it, but I saw that it was started by Dan Harmon and Rob Schrab — who I knew because I had a copy of Heat Vision and Jack [the failed 1999 pilot they wrote that became a huge underground hit, directed by Ben Stiller and starring Jack Black ]. So I was super pumped.

Ryznar : It was a cool scene at the time: Justin Roiland had [Channel 101 series] House of Cosbys, Dan Harmon had Laser Fart. Our friends Drew Hancock and Wade Randolph, who would go on to play Hall and Oates, they had a show about a regular guy who got angry, and turned into a smaller, shirtless weaker guy who didn’t turn green or anything.

Drew Hancock (“Oates”): That was called “Man to Man: Metamorphosis Ultra.” It was the lowest stakes Incredible Hulk show you could possibly have.

Justin Roiland (co-creator of Rick & Morty and House of Cosbys, “Christopher Cross”): Every single month you’re making something, and then you’re testing it in front of a live audience. You see what works, what doesn’t work.

Ryznar : It was a January 2005 screening where we started the school of Channel 101, where you’re showing the stuff you made in front of 200, maybe 300 people. And then they put it on the “internet,” which was very hard to do back then. There was no “YouTube.” Listen to Old Man Ryznar here.

Farnham: JD and I would go down to the beach and play something called “smash ball” — there’s no rules to the game, so we’d just make them up. And he said, this is fucking hilarious, we should make a short film about this. So we got Hunter to direct SmashBoys — and it was funny.

Lyons: Two paddles and a ball that you hit back and forth on the beach. We turned it into a soap opera .

Stair : We started playing Kenny Loggins’ “Playing With the Boys” [from Top Gun ] on repeat as we drove a convertible around Playa del Rey. Just to get in the mood.

Ryznar : There were some Phil Collins music cues, I think. A lot of sports music from Eighties movies — “You’re the Best Around” and whatnot. We used a great Kenny Loggins song for the climax. It’s from Caddyshack II . . .

Stair : “Nobody’s Fool”! It ended up winning the Best Failed Pilot of that year; we lost by eight votes to the Lonely Island guys, who did “The ‘Bu.” They just stuck their middle fingers up at everybody and said, we didn’t make a show but we made a hilarious music video. That was the night I had the idea for Y acht Rock.

Christening the Ship Ryznar : Hunter and Dave Lyons came up with an idea for a show about a couple of jewel thieves who lived on a yacht and listened to that music.

Stair : That was actually called Steal Away.

Lyons: I believe Hunter and I were talking about a private eye detective team called Loggins & Loggins that lived on a houseboat and solved mysteries — like Simon & Simon.

Ryznar : I said: How about we play Kenny Loggins and Michael McDonald as they co-write “What a Fool Believes” together? We had Stevie Nicks in there originally, for some reason. And then Drew Hancock and Wade Randolph said, we want to be Hall and Oates. I had gotten into the H&O song “Portable Radio” pretty hard. I needed to introduce it to the world. That was very important to me.

Stair : The seed of Koko the manager is . . . there’s a Doobie Brothers album that has a sweet looking manager dude on it. I remember sitting there with JD and being like, look how awesome this guy is.

Ryznar : Dave Lyons invented the Koko character while out drinking with Hunter one night. He just put on a bunch of garbage Seventies clothes he had around the house, and had a little stupid whistle around his neck. All these little touches — that’s what Dave is so great at.

Lyons: No, [Dan Harmon] wasn’t an immediate fan. That’s because he doesn’t get music. Just listen to the theme song for Community — it’s terrible. Dan looks at things differently than most people, and I don’t think he loves music the way we do. But he came around. He came to really enjoy it. [Harmon would eventually play record producer Ted Templeman in two episodes.]

Ryznar : We thought maybe people would get it, maybe they won’t. But we submitted it. At the prime time panel, everybody but Dan Harmon like it. I think that because he’d never heard of the guys, he didn’t realize how much that music had meant to other people. People knew who everybody was. That’s why we put Hollywood Steve in there to say, hey, this is the deal. Hollywood Steve was a friend and an actual music critic. If you look up a lot of Nineties rap albums on All Music Guide, chances are Hollywood Steve wrote the review.

Huey: I was a published music writer, and that lent me a voice of authority that I might not have otherwise had amongst a hardcore group of music nerds. “Oh this guy’s viewpoint has to be legitimate! He’s published.”

Steve Agee (“Steve Porcaro”): Channel 101 at that point in time was really known for people making videos kind of purposely shitty. So we couldn’t tell if it was made to look bad on purpose.

Hancock: When Wade and I saw the first episode, we were like, eh, this isn’t very good. We didn’t like it. I didn’t understand it. So when it had this meteoric response, I was very surprised.

Ryznar : So Yacht Rock got screened, we were very nervous, and it went over like gangbusters. Just bona fide love from beginning to end from the audience. And we got voted number one on our first try, which hadn’t been done too often on Channel 101.

Stair : It got the biggest laugh of the night. As soon as it was over, we knew we were in. We weren’t totally sure it was going to be number one, but we knew we’d be up there.

Ryznar : A lot of people wanted parts. People had ideas. So we got to work with people we wanted to work with. Before we even knew we were picked up for a second episode, Hunter came up to me and said, “Uh, just talking to Doug Benson. I told him he could play Peter Cetera in the next episode.”

Lyons: The thing about the Channel 101 screenings, they’re always at a place that serves lots of alcohol. And after we saw how well it went over, we’re all drinking at the bar; Dan Harmon is doing a show with Sarah Silverman [ The Sarah Silverman Program ] at the time, and Doug was there with her. Yes, Hunter promised him the role of Peter Cetera. Which is great casting.

Episode Two: The Songwriting Contest In the second episode, Hall and Oates challenge Loggins and Messina to songwriting contest. It ends with the creation of some of the greatest smooth music ever.

Ryznar : I mean, imagine if you saw Hall and Oates where Oates, with all that hair and the mustache, was the top, and Hall was the bottom? They were sort of the opposite of the smooth California scene. So they sort of made the perfect antagonists.

Huey: The only reason they were picked as antagonists is because they’re from Philadelphia, which is a mean place.

Hancock: The wigs we got from our friend Willy, who just happened to have two of the most perfect wigs ever.

Wade Randolph (“Daryl Hall”): The Hall wig is named the De Carlo. I don’t know why.

Hancock: I remember for the mustache, I think I tried a regular handlebar mustache but it just wasn’t thick enough. So I just ended up taking a lock of the wig and fashioning a mustache out of that.

Stair : And Justin Roiland coming in, doing “Sailing.” The way the whole thing flowed, it’s so fast and perfect. I think that was Yacht Rock ‘s the finest hour.

Roiland: JD asked me, would you play Christopher Cross? I’d never heard “Sailing” before, believe it or not. I remember the first few listens going I don’t get the appeal of this fucking song. It’s an acquired taste.

Huey: We didn’t quite know what we had at that point, and so you kind of had to establish the value system. Smoothness is the main value in this world. The second episode, when that screened for the live audience, I’ve never seen a Channel 101 audience go that apeshit for anything. I remember walking out of the screening going, we’re rock stars! Granted, it’s only this one room, with like 300 people in it, but in that one room of 300 people, I think we might be rock stars.

Koko Makes His Final Voyage Lyons: As soon as we got in for the first one, JD called me and said here’s the idea for the second one: I’m gonna kill off Koko. Well, thanks a pantload, JD. He’s like, no it’ll be great. You’ll come back later as a ghost or something.

Stair : So JD wanted this guy Koko to have this totem at this fight; I suggested a trident, since it’s more nautical. But Anchorman had come out, and they had the fight scene with the trident. We still needed something, so we settled on a harpoon.

Lyons: In the second one, I’m supposed to get run through with my own harpoon. And Hunter showed up with a child’s little trident, taped to the handle of a barbecue fork. I was like Hunter, we can do better than this. So my roommates had a woodshop in the backyard; I went out there and drilled some holes, made some dowel rods, and wrapped the handle in rope. When I showed up with it, everyone said holy shit — you made a fucking harpoon, dude! It also split in the middle, so you could run it through someone. And that episode elevated Koko to this mythic level that nobody expected, least of all me.

Stair : You can’t kill Loggins. You can’t kill McDonald. These are real people. Koko had to die.

Lyons: My thought is that Koko fell on his own harpoon and martyred himself. I like to think that Koko was the Jesus Christ of Yacht Rock. [ Pause ] That’s going to sound arrogant. How about: Koko died to deliver smooth music to the rest of the musicians.

Huey: I don’t think it was ever decided who killed Koko until the very end. The important thing is, like Jesus, he died for a cause. Which, in this case, was smooth music. But you know what’s gonna happen if you’re in the middle of a melée with a bunch of guys from the mean streets of Philadelphia. You’re going to die of a harpoon injury. That’s why they call it the city of harpoon murders.

Randolph: I always assumed it was Oates.

Wyatt Cenac (“James Ingram”): Who killed Koko? You know, very good question. If I had to go with anybody… I’d say maybe Loggins and McDonald together. That’s the secret twist. I think they’d been slowly poisoning him for years, and the harpoon was just to throw people of their scent.

Ryznar : I don’t know. Is Tony Soprano dead? Hollywood Steve took the “Koko” answer to his grave.

Stair : I would never name names. Only Hollywood Steve knows for sure, and someone would have to give him big Hollywood dollars to spill.

Any Port in a Storm After 10 stellar installments, including a guest appearance by “Cleveland” Drew Carey , a case for Jethro Tull (the 18th century farmer, not the band) to be considered smooth and a primer on how Michael McDonald influenced Nineties G-Funk , Yacht Rock was canceled by Channel 101 after “FM” — about a gang war between the Eagles and Steely Dan. But help was on the horizon.

Ryznar : The record at the time was 12. We really wanted to beat it — but we didn’t. There might have been Yacht Rock fatigue in the audience.

Lyons: It’s not one of my favorites. I’m not a fan of the Eagles, and not a lot of people get Steely Dan.

Huey: Some people come back to Channel 101 month after month after month. But you always get some new people in there who don’t know what’s going on. You cross your fingers that general audience goodwill is enough to get you by this month. Unfortunately, in this case, it wasn’t.

Ryznar : It was heartbreaking, man. Because the great thing about Channel 101 is, you can feel when the audience isn’t into it. And the audience was not into this. I knew the 101 days were over as soon as the screening was done.

Stair : Nowadays, things have two- or three-year runs at Channel 101. Back then, 10 episodes was a lot.

Ryznar : Not even two weeks after we were canceled, I got an email from someone who booked a bar in Chicago — The Empty Bottle — and wanted to screen all the Yacht Rocks. I forget if they flew us out or if we just happened to be there, but we screened all the episodes back to back. There was a line down the block; the place was filled to capacity. People were quoting lines.

Huey: The show had started to go viral. Working lower level jobs in reality television, and then walking into a bar and being the most famous person in that room didn’t match up with my everyday experience at all.

Cast Off . . . Again After successfully touring the country, JD & co. starting making new episodes, beginning with Footloose. Featuring the likes of Jason Lee and Wyatt Cenac, it tells the story of how Loggins being kidnapped by Jimmy Buffett led to one of the Eighties’ most rockin’ soundtracks.

Huey: Yeah I was really excited to get back into it, because I didn’t really have too much else going on at that point. Let’s do that thing that made me semi-famous again!

Ryznar : We did the Footloose episode. And it turned out even better than I could have imagined. It was nice, since we weren’t limited to five minutes, even though we tried to keep it close: one of the keys to Yacht Rock is jamming everything into five minutes. I had done some work with Jason Lee, who would quote lines every time I saw him. So I asked if he’d play Kevin Bacon, and he was throwing chairs around.

Lyons: We kept talking about the stories that we never got to tell, one of them being Footloose. And I hate Jimmy Buffett ‘s music; I think it’s a soundtrack to date rape. I think it’s garbage music for people who have no interest in listening to anything good.

Ryznar : We portrayed parrotheads being brainwashed idiots. You kind of have to be if you’re into Jimmy Buffett. Or just want to be so tuned out of life, that like hey, whatever — kick back with flip flops, drink some margs, listen to some sweet Jimmy Buffett music and let him paint a rosy picture of a reality that does not exist.

Lyons: I always like that artists like Bertie Higgins, Rupert Holmes and Andy Kim have an authentic longing in their music. Buffett is a rich dude getting richer off of the lack of taste of the poor and stupid. He represents the lowest common denominator in music, even worse than country singers profiting off of 9/11. To summarize: I’m not really a fan.

Ryznar : You might be able to argue that Jimmy Buffett music is about escaping from a dark place, but there’s no soul in there. So we just wanted to make him an absolute idiot. Our good friend Vatche Panos, who is super funny, really hit a home run with that one.

Cenac: I remember when we were shooting that, I had no idea there was a song called “Cheeseburgers in Paradise.” Much less that people actually listened to it and liked it.

Ryznar : I hope he doesn’t mind me telling this story, but Wyatt Cenac had just auditioned for The Daily Show , and he was flat broke.

Cenac: Yeah, I was definitely very broke. That isn’t why I did it. I did enjoy it. But there was also a part of being broke where you’ll do anything.

Ryznar : And then a month later, he becomes Wyatt Cenac, the international sensation.

Cenac: Do I want to say that Yacht Rock was the thing that changed my life? Someone can say it. You can find someone to connect the dots and make that leap on the Internet.

Huey : We did one more, and I didn’t feel like the last episode came together as well as it could have for whatever reason. I think Footloose was a more cohesive episode. Also the original idea for the finale was Gene Balboa was going to kidnap all these people from the “We Are the World” session , take them to an island, and force them to write soundtrack hits for him. Anyone who tried to escape would get hunted down like in The Most Dangerous Game.

Ryznar : That was a hard one to write — the space battle, Hall and Oates shooting lasers, Loggins starting his soundtrack phase. I’m proud of killing off Hollywood Steve and making it a pain drug-induced hallucination. I think that let us go nuts with it. The “We Are the World” part was a fun shoot. You just look around and go, wow, I know so many talented people that are bringing so much to this thing.

Stair : The Hollywood Steve “character” was on morphine, not Huey. Well, he might have been on morphine, I don’t know. That’d be an awesome salacious story about Yacht Rock. Just write that, it’s even better.

Huey : When I was using, it did get increasingly harder to tell where the character stopped and I began. Once you’ve been on VH1’s “100 Greatest Songs of the Nineties,” the public expects you to maintain a certain image, and I guess I got caught up in a myth. [ Pause ] I’m kidding. But I did murder a homeless woman. Just to see what it felt like.

Farnham: One of my favorite moments of all of Yacht Rock is when Giorgio Moroder is whispering into Kenny Loggins’ ear about “the Danger Zone.” I love that. It’s such a good moment.

Ryznar : Loggins going soundtrack is kind of like the end of Yacht Rock. If “Sailing” is one of the greatest yacht-rock songs ever, and that’s in Episode Two, it’s all death from then on. “Danger Zone” — there’s just nothing smooth about that song at all. By 1985, Michael McDonald had released his last great album. The Doobie Brothers were done. Toto didn’t have any more good songs in them. Steely Dan was broken up. It was over.

How did the actual musical artists react to their portrayal in the show? John Oates (speaking to the Seattle Weekly in 2007): “I think Yacht Rock was the beginning of this whole Hall & Oates resurrection. They were the first ones to start to parody us and put us out there again, and a lot of things have happened because of Yacht Rock. “

Ryznar : People actually contacted me and wanted to see if I wanted tickets to [their] shows at the Hollywood Bowl. We went backstage and met Hall and Oates. There’s a picture out there somewhere of Drew Hancock and Wade Randolph with Hall and Oates — and it’s awesome.

Randolph: I don’t know who contacted who, but Oates had seen the show and was apparently a fan of it. Hall didn’t give a fuck about us at all. He was just like whatever.

Hancock: Oates actually understood what we were doing. First of all, he’s the shortest dude on the planet. I’m 5’8, and he looked at me and said, man you’re way too tall to play me. I think he’s 5’4 and had thick heels on too.

Cenac: Oates is the unsung hero in that group. The moment he decides to turn the jets on, watch out.

Lyons: The only negative thing I’ve ever heard from any of the actual people we’ve portrayed was that Kenny Loggins wasn’t a huge fan. My wife met him once, and said my husband played Koko in Yacht Rock. He just got all, huh. Not mean, not nasty. Just: Huh.

Stair : I’m not sure Loggins liked it, [but] I know his son did. A lot of the kids of the guys in the show like. You know, some serious artists. Michael McDonald, I’m pretty sure he liked it.

“I met Steve Porcaro at a book-release party, and he asked, ‘Do you guys hate us?’ We’re writing a love letter to this music and we meant no ill will toward anybody. Except for Jimmy Buffett.”

Michael McDonald (speaking to Time Out New York in 2008): “I thought Yacht Rock was hilarious. And uncannily, you know, those things always have a little bit of truth to them. It’s kind of like when you get a letter from a stalker who’s never met you. They somehow hit on something, and you have to admit they’re pretty intuitive.”

Lyons: Did JD tell you the story of when we went to see Steely Dan? We got contacted by somebody in their camp, I don’t remember who, but they gave us four or five tickets to see them in Irvine. We were in the third or fourth row, and Michael McDonald was the opening act. Those guys got recognized at the concert. Later, when Michael McDonald came out to perform with Steely Dan, they were all wearing captain’s hats. They were singing the song “Showbiz Kids”: “Showbiz kids, showbiz kids making movies themselves/Showbiz kids, don’t give a fuck about anybody else.” And during that line they threw their hats on the ground and stomped on them. We just looked at each other and went, oh my god, they know who we are.

Agee: About a year ago, I was at Largo, and one of the guys that works there is married to Steve Porcaro’s daughter. He was like, yeah, Steve is actually here tonight; he loves Yacht Rock, and said he wanted to meet me. I cut out early because I was honestly too nervous.

Stair : I met Steve Porcaro at a book-release party, and he kind of pulled me aside and asked, “Do you guys hate us?” And I was like, oh no, I hope that’s not the impression we gave anybody. We’re writing a love letter to this music and we meant no ill will toward anybody. Except for Jimmy Buffett.

Farnham: I actually worked with an editor who was good friends with the Toto folks, and they said it’s uncanny how close some of these stories are. Apparently there’s a lot more truth than we know.

Agee: So I can see how bands would be like, oh, they’re making fun of us. But I’ve known JD for awhile now, and I know for a fact that he loves that music. I don’t think someone who hated what’s now called yacht rock . . they wouldn’t spend so much time making videos about it.

Stair : The way I always looked at Yacht Rock was that we kind of did what the Blues Brothers did. We took the music that we really loved that we weren’t really part of, and reintroduced it to our own generation a little bit. The one thing that I hope we got across is that the music is really good, and that we were huge fans of it. The whole reason we did the show is because we loved it.

Lyons: I felt we always treated the music lovingly. It was always treated with respect; what we were trying to make fun of was all these guys hanging out and the ridiculous things they were into. I heard a story that Kenny Loggins got married in the nude. I don’t know if it’s true or not. But that’s the kind of late Seventies/early Eighties Southern California horse shit that is so delightful about Yacht Rock. Like wanting to find out what your root chakra is. That’s what’s funny about it. [ Pause ] I mean of course Kenny Loggins and Steve Perry are going to be into karate!

Best of Rolling Stone

The 50 Greatest Eminem Songs

All 274 of Taylor Swift's Songs, Ranked

The 500 Greatest Albums of All Time

Ranking the NBA's No. 2 options: Lakers, Celtics boast the league's best co-stars

Within all 30 teams is a hierarchy. Here's a look at each franchise's second go-to player.

TikTok Music is on its way out

It never made it to the US.

This knit jacket is better than J.Crew's coatigan, fans say — it's over 50% off

Why wait for chilly weather? This polished bestseller, just $34, will keep you toasty even if the A/C is still blasting.

Hurricane tracker: Tropical Storm Helene intensifies, Florida declares state of emergency and starts evacuations

The National Hurricane Center said that a major hurricane will make landfall along the Florida gulf coast on Thursday.

Data platform Airbyte can now create API connectors by reading the docs

If your startup is only remotely related to working with data pipelines, you're probably trying to figure out how to capitalize on the current moment: Enterprises are trying to figure out how to best use data to power generative AI products, and to do that, they need robust data services. Airbyte, which launched in 2020, started with a focus on building a low-code/no-code open source data integration platform. Since then, Airbyte raised a total of $181.2 million, including a massive $150 million Series B round during the somewhat anomalous days of late 2021.

Behaviour Interactive snaps up Darkest Dungeon developer Red Hook Studios

Dead by Daylight publisher Behaviour Interactive is continuing to expand. It has acquired Darkest Dungeon developer Red Hook Studio.

A startup from ex-Revolut employees uses AI to automate accounts — but hopes to keep accountants in jobs

Successful startups can give rise to "startup mafias" -- groups of former founders who go on to create other startups. A few years ago, Anita Koimur led the Rewards Product for fintech unicorn Revolut, while Lasse Kalkar was its country manager for the Nordic region. LiveFlow allows companies to sync real-time data from their accounting services, banks, and payment platforms into their custom reports, thereby automating workflows, consolidating company accounts, and allowing more company-wide collaboration.

ByteDance is shutting down TikTok Music globally

ByteDance said it is shuttering its music streaming service, TikTok Music, in November. "We are sorry to inform you that TikTok Music will be closing on 28 November 2024," a notice on TikTok Music's website reads. Users who want to transfer their playlists to other streaming services would need to do so by October 28, and refund requests would need to be submitted by November 28.

The best portable monitors in 2024

Portable monitors have been around for years, but their importance skyrocketed in recent years. These are the best portable monitors we've tried that will make it easier for you to get work done anywhere.

an image, when javascript is unavailable

How Yacht Rocker Christopher Cross Almost Sank The 1975’s New Album

Singer Matty Healy goes deep on the 22-track "Notes on a Conditional Form."

By Katherine Turman

Katherine Turman

Tool Mesmerizes the Faithful at Madison Square Garden: Concert Review 8 months ago
Queen + Adam Lambert Unveil North American ‘Rhapsody’ Tour Dates: ‘These Are New Glory Days’ 2 years ago
‘The Story of Anvil’: Beloved (but Oscar-Snubbed) Rock Doc Gets Theatrical Re-Release 2 years ago

In an alternate universe, singer/guitarist Matthew Healy would be onstage at Madison Square Garden with his chart-topping, Grammy-nominated band The 1975 delivering for 20,000 fans the foursome’s canon of songs that run the gamut from shimmering electro pop to snarly, punky rock.

Instead, Healy’s excited, rapid-fire, articulate musings on music and culture — specifically The 1975’s new, fourth album, “Notes on a Conditional Form” and its previous, sort of counterpart, 2018’s “A Brief Inquiry into Online Relationships” — are interrupted by unholy shriek. It seems a bird has flown into the recording studio in Oxford, England, narrowly missing the singer’s head. “It really freaked me out! My heart’s going!” he says, breathless, before quickly charging back into the task at hand.

Annapurna-Remedy Deal Is Smart Solution to Gaming’s Funding Woes

'Monopoly Go!' to Launch Marvel Crossover Event Featuring Spider-Man, Wolverine, Deadpool and the Avengers (EXCLUSIVE)

It’s an apt interruption for a singer who can turn on a dime from a whisper to a scream. The 1975 is unarguably more popular in their home country of England where they’ve won at the Brit Awards and Ivor Novello Awards and earned a Mercury Prize nomination. But Spotify streams of 345 million for 2016’s “Somebody Else” track, and the strength of the lilting, summery “Me & You Together” from the new release, have brought arena-sized success Stateside.

Popular on Variety

With “Notes on a Conditional Form,” the band members — Healy, drummer George Daniel, guitarist Adam Hann and bassist Ross MacDonald — have created a mysterious, 80-minute masterwork, which they’re obviously currently unable to support on the planned American arena tour. But any disappointment was quickly tempered by gratitude. “We got quite appreciative of the fact that we make music and can continue to do that,” says Healy. “We knew there was a [studio] environment where we could go and feel safe, so we were counting our chickens in that regard, as opposed to the amount of people who completely have had even their ability to ‘be’ dismantled. We’re in a privileged situation, you know?”

As a singer-songwriter whose mind is in overdrive and who loves the creative process — Healy has sought various, sometimes illegal chemically induced means to quiet his brain — he’s finding grace in the pause. “The past couple of years my presence on social media has become quite binary in regards to the way that it will be like a joke or some information,” he explains. “It will very seldom be an opinion.” Now Healy has the definition of an LP — long playing record — and press platforms that allow him to ruminate in more measured terms, as he did recently with Variety .

The album opens with a spoken word track by Greta Thunberg. How did that come about?

Well, it kinda came from the fact that our albums always start with that same piece of music; in the way that like Sega or Microsoft has a startup sound. That was kind of the idea. … We were talking about what it should be this time; what would be the most modern version of that? That very quickly became ‘what is the most modern statement?’ Then, ‘who is saying the most s–t?’ We kind of had the same moment we had with “The Man Who Married A Robot” on the last album, because I was going to read that spoken word, and then we were like, ‘What if it was Siri?’ We were ‘ha ha ha.’ Then: ‘oh, shit, no, that’s legit.’ So we said, ‘What if Greta Thunberg read the words to “The 1975’?” And we were like, ‘ha. But wait, what if it was Greta saying the Greta speeches that we send each other where we’re like, ‘bro, this kid’s crazy, she’s wild.’ We love her.

Had you met her previously?

I met her and it was crazy. I come from punk and hardcore, right? I’ve kind of made it not a duty, but I’ve tried and managed to meet a lot of my heroes from that scene. They’ve all been bad-ass. But the most legit person I have met is Greta Thunberg. Straight up, in regards to no time wasted, no words wasted. It’s just really inspiring.

After that happened, you do interviews and people ask you ‘why?’ You don’t think ‘why’ a lot in your life. I mean, we’re talking about like purpose and stuff. But I think the thing that I’m proudest of is that I really wanted to capture her words in a formal way in pop culture, because I think there’s been countless endorsements and thumbs up and retweets and ‘likes,’ but this is a record that people can find in 500 years and understand what people were striving for. Like, you’re not going to find like a tweet in the rubble. You’re going to find artifacts, and this is like our record of a time.

It seems like she doesn’t really care about popular music.

I asked her what was the last thing she listened to and she looked at me really confused and said, “the radio.” I was like, “I didn’t mean literally, but okay, cool.” She doesn’t give a f–k, man. She just wants to save the world. I met her at a studio in Stockholm. She turned up on her bike with her Dad. She’s just real. I really appreciated the time.

At what point in your writing and recording did it become clear that you felt you needed to do two records sort of back to back? Was there a dividing of the songs?

Not at all. Probably a lot of artists can work like that, but if I [did], I would see that as me coming from a place of fear. For example, saying, ‘Oh, I’m not going to put this really good thing on this album, because I want to spread my good stuff across two.’ When we were making “A Brief Inquiry,” we were making “A Brief Inquiry.” After we’d announced that we were doing another album, every Friday before we’d finished the first one of the two, we would sit there and be a bit like ‘fuuuuck, this is crazy.’

But… I knew that that was the statement for now: one album. It’s not that it wasn’t enough, it’s just that ironically, I wanted to tour for however long and I wanted to basically exist in the modern era in the way that the best artists do. People like Drake can feed into and be part of the zeitgeist because, partially, they’re also singles artists, so they can just be dropping single after single after single. They’re professionals at holding people’s attention for three minutes. For me, I was thinking, ‘well, I’m not a contemporary artist unless I have a presence.’ Or what I feel like is a prolific presence. But I don’t really do singles as my thing. So I suppose I just think: two records.

The song “The Birthday Party” is harrowing lyrically: “I depend on my friends to stay clean, sad as it seems,” and “impress myself with stealth and bad health and my wealth and progressive causes / Drink your kombucha buy an Ed Ruscha.” A lot has happened since you wrote it…

The reason it was inspiring is because I have kind of two ways of writing. It’s either really short-form or really long-form. So if I find a piece of music—like ‘Sincerity is Scary’ or ‘The Birthday Party’ it basically gives me an ability to use a lot of words, and to be able to express myself in that long-form way. I think because it was the first song, my fears would be, ‘do I have another album in me?’ But then, ‘Is that even a genuine concern?,’ seeing as I believe that if you turn up it will happen. So I just started turning up and it started happening, and I was like, ‘Oh f–k, yeah. This is cool.’

If ‘The Birthday Party’ was first, what was the last song written?

“Bagsy Not in Net” which is just before the end of the record. I was so excited, basically just in this studio or on tour making a record. So whenever Reddit was like, ‘Oh it’s been delayed,’ I was like, ‘I don’t f–king care. It’s like my best record. I’ll finish it in a minute.’ But I do run a label and understand how it works. So I delivered the track list cause Apple were a bit like ‘come on!’ I told them it was 22 tracks, which it was. So we’re finishing the record, then mastering it. And there were 21 songs. Me and George were looking at each other.

Then we realized that an intro had become a track or something like that. And so for, for two minutes we were in this, in this place of like, “f–k, we don’t have a song.” But then I said to George, “do you remember last night when we were listening to music, some yacht rock compilation and ‘Sailing’ by Christopher Cross came on?” The intro to that song, “Bagsy Not in Net,” is just the strings from [“Sailing”] with a weird beat.

I told him, “Remember when we heard this when we were teenagers? We said, “Wouldn’t that be an amazing sample for a kind of garage song like ‘The Streets’ kind of song?” When I reminded him of that, George was like, “f–k yeah.” That’s an idea I want to do regardless of whether we’ve got a hole to fill on the album. So we got it up and made it really crudely; sometimes that level of excitement can really, really inspire. Sometimes things take two years, like ‘what should I say?’ And sometimes things take just a minute, and it was just this moment in time and that’s it. The reason that we knew it was it was because you never know what your album is until it’s kind of done.

And 22 songs is a pretty hefty collection.

We understood what this record was — us trying to capture that feeling of garage music when we were younger. And that sample was almost like the lost sample of the album. We used it, then we get in touch with Christopher Cross. With everybody I’ve sampled — The Temptations, Joy Division — I normally just say, “Hey guys, we’ve used this bit of the song. What publishing do you want?” No one ever goes, “You can’t use it.” But Christopher Cross’ team comes back and goes “No.” I’m like, “What do you mean ‘no?'” They were, like, “Hard, no, don’t do it. If you fu–ing do it, we’ll go mental.”

What a bummer; do you know why?

I was like, “What’s going on? Like just Chris Cross surely doesn’t… I’m not like a bad…. this is really confusing!’ We just kept going back to them and trying to explain ourselves. He also had Coronavirus at the time. So it’s just like a f–king nightmare. So I can’t like ring him and be like, ‘Hey Chris, I know you’re probably feeling a bit bad, but…’ So I get in touch with Curt [Smith] from Tears for Fears. He’s a friend of mine, weirdly. And so it’s the most ‘80s fucking thing in the world.

I’ve just released “If You’re Too Shy (Let Me Know),” I’m ringing Curt to get in touch with Chris Cross. I got in touch with his manager and he said, “Oh, that song has been sampled so much in so many kinds of bad ways.” They basically get a request that every week and just say no. Then his manager was like, “I get it. When [Chris] gets better, let me actually take it to him.” Anyway, it was fine in the end.

Wait, if he had COVID-19, this was a few weeks before the album came out?

Dude, I was going to pull the album! I’d been fronting for the past month. It was like I delivered it to fu–ing iTunes. It was out there. I already pressed it onto vinyl. It was on its way to people’s houses. I had made such a massive assumption.

Greta’s speech is a reminder that there exits music which incites change. Were people like Bob Geldof or Joe Strummer influential to you as a kid?

Massively. Joe Strummer in particular. The Clash for me, are the ultimate rock ‘n’ roll band. When I got to 13, I got involved in like scenes; I got into emo music, alternative music. But the impetus of what I love is conviction. So that’s why I was drawn to punk. My dad, or even my mum at times, I recall being almost sat down, and listening to Wilson Pickett, James Brown, Donny Hathaway, Sam Cooke, real important artists in black music.

Or white artists that came from black music, like Joe Cocker or the Rolling Stones. Protest songs were present in my real life. Music to transform has always really inspired me. I think that what’s interesting about my band now is that I kind of come from soul music into heavy music, which you find with [a band] like the Jesus and Mary Chain. We are inherently a heavy band, and it’s kind of been misinterpreted a lot throughout our career.

Not so much anymore. Heavy music as an alternative died in my hands when I was part of it. By the time you get to Limp Bizkit and true commercialized rebellion, it was no longer an antidote to commercialism. So basically the reason that my band makes — in air quotes — beautiful music, pretty music, is because it’s the sharpest tool in the box. If you want people to listen, present something beautiful; they sit up and they listen to it. The thing is, I’ve got heavy songs like “People.” They’re great, but they’re linear. They’re easy; it’s like aggression met with aggression. You don’t get to present the ethical dilemma that you do in beautiful music, that if you make something beautiful and then provide ideas within it that are not, then there’s this amazing subversive, ethical dilemma that it puts people through. You don’t get to do that three-chording your whole life and just shouting.

Was the sequence for these 22 songs immediately obvious? Is “Guys,” your “love song to the band,” the last track so as to open the door for a fresh start or what’s next?

That was always going to be the end of the record. I just knew, because it was the first time that I’d ever looked back on myself as this character who’s not necessarily in the band. I’ve never really made a retrospective statement like that and I think it was important that it came at the end, because it was a really beautiful reflection. At the time I was thinking that this was going to be the end of The 1975 for a significant amount of time. But it’s a different world now. I feel like that record was relevant in the old world and it’s amazing that it’s coming out now. But I wouldn’t be comfortable not focusing on a statement that is about now.

English majors will remember that “the conditional from” is sort of an imaginary “if this, then that” construction. Is that how you think in general?

That’s a whole conversation for another day! I think that my records are very much about the search for the definitive itself. Like ‘Who the f–k am I?’ And ‘if I am this, then why am I like that and why am I also these contradictions?’ I think that “Notes on a Conditional Form” is me opposing “A Brief Inquiry into Online Relationships,” which was very much me telling people what to think. It was like the title of an essay. It gives the idea of “this is what this is about. Form your opinions based on that.” So I give people a framework to hang their opinions off.

With “Notes on a Conditional Form,” I created a title that was literally unable to express anything. I wanted to challenge myself. I wanted to challenge people that ‘I’m not telling you what this is about’ and that’s why some of the reviews are five stars and some of them are two stars, because people are bringing their own s–t to it. People are like, ‘It’s got no direction’ or ‘It’s a beautiful mess’ or whatever they’re saying. It’s because it’s so interpretive, this record. That’s what really excites me.

More from Variety

LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA - SEPTEMBER 15: Richard Gadd, winner of the Outstanding Limited or Anthology Series for “Baby Reindeer”, poses in the press room during the 76th Primetime Emmy Awards at Peacock Theater on September 15, 2024 in Los Angeles, California. (Photo by Frazer Harrison/Getty Images)

Netflix Inks First-Look Deal With Richard Gadd Despite $170 Million ‘Baby Reindeer’ Lawsuit: ‘We’re Very Proud of Richard and the Story He Told’

Virtual Production Growth in Focus at IBC Event

‘Emily in Paris’ Renewed for Season 5 at Netflix

HOLLYWOOD, CALIFORNIA - MARCH 27: Anthony Hopkins attends the 94th Annual Academy Awards at Hollywood and Highland on March 27, 2022 in Hollywood, California. (Photo by David Livingston/Getty Images)

Biblical Epic ‘Mary’ With Anthony Hopkins Acquired By Netflix (EXCLUSIVE)

Tattered white flag flying with a streaming symbol

The Postwar Streaming Market: A Special Report

‘Fool Me Once,’ ‘Bridgerton,’ ‘Baby Reindeer’ Were Netflix’s Most-Viewed TV Shows in First Half of 2024

More from our brands, watch linkin park’s new video for their ‘league of legends’ anthem.

Forget Diesel. The World’s Largest Sportfishing Yacht Will Run on Vegetable Oil.

Pickleball Slam 3 Heading to Agassi’s Las Vegas Home Turf

The Best Loofahs and Body Scrubbers, According to Dermatologists

All American Mass Exodus: 5 Cast Members Out Ahead of Season 7

Sail away with Kenny Loggins and Christopher Cross During Their Concert Cruise

Kenny Loggins and Christopher Cross performing live on a boat? You’ve yacht to be kidding me!

SiriusXM celebrated the summer season with the two soft-rock legends during a special invitation-only concert cruise for SiriusXM listeners — airing on Yacht Rock Radio and available to stream anytime on the SiriusXM app.

SiriusXM Presents Yacht Rock the Boat with Kenny Loggins and Christopher Cross features Loggins and Cross performing their smoothest hits for fans as they set sail around New York City on the Horizon’s Edge yacht.

Yacht Rock Radio features smooth-sailing soft rock from the late ’70s and early ’80s by artists like Michael McDonald, Kenny Loggins, Steely Dan, Christopher Cross, Toto, America, Ambrosia and more. It’s the kind of rock that doesn’t rock the boat. Yacht Rock Radio will be available all summer long from June 1 through September 5 on SiriusXM radios (Ch. 14) and on the SXM App . The channel is also available year-round on SiriusXM Channel 311.

Rock Bryan Adams Reveals His Next Album Is ‘Already in the Can’

Rock Sammy Hagar Wants to Open Van Halen’s Music Vault

Rock Cast Away Your Worries with Smooth-Sailing Yacht Rock

Rock Hear Guitar-Driven Music Across Genres and Eras from Your Favorite Six-String Heroes

Music, Sports, News and more

All in one place on the SiriusXM app

Take a walk through the most ancient Kremlin in Russia

The Novgorod Kremlin, which is also called ‘Detinets’, is located on the left bank of the Volkhov River. The first fortified settlement was set here during the reign of prince Vladimir Yaroslavich, the son of Yaroslav the Wise. During these times, all the state, public and religious life of Novgorod was concentrated here. It was the place where people kept chronicles and copied the texts of books. The Novgorod Kremlin, the most ancient one in Russia, was founded here in the 15th century.

St. Sophia Cathedral (11th century), The Millennium Of Russia Monument, Episcopal Chamber (15th century) and the main exhibition of The State Novgorod Museum-reservation located in a public office building of the 18th century are all situated in the Novgorod Kremlin. The exhibition will tell you about the whole Novgorod history from ancient times to the present day. There are also restoration workshops, a children’s center, a library and a philharmonic inside the Kremlin walls.

Send a letter with the State Novgorod Museum-reservation stamp

While visiting the main building of the Novgorod Kremlin museum, you’ll see a small bureau near the souvenir area. Two more bureaus like that can be found in the Fine Arts Museum and the Museum information centre. This is the Museum Post, the joint project of the State Novgorod Museum-reservation and Russian Post.

The tradition to exchange letters (at that time written on birch bark sheets) dates back to the 11th century so it’s hardly surprising that such a project appeared here. The bureaus are desks and mailboxes at the same time, so you can send your friends a postcard with a view of Novgorod right from the museum.

Find the famous Russian poet Alexander Pushkin among the figures of The Millennium Of Russia Monument

In 1862, 1000 years after the Varangians were called to Russia, a monument dedicated to this event was launched in Novgorod. To tell the story of Russia’s one thousand years, the sculptor used 129 bronze figures: from state and military leaders to artists and poets.

One of figures portrays Afanasy Ordin-Nashchokin, a politician and reformer who was responsible for Russia’s diplomatic relations in the middle of the 17th century. He is believed to be the father of international and regular mail in Russia. He was also the person who came up with the idea of the first Russian Post official emblem — a post horn and a double-headed eagle.

Cross the Msta River over the first arch bridge in Russia

The steel bridge in Borovichi town that connects two banks of the Msta river was built at the beginning of the 20th century. The project of the bridge was created by Nikolay Belelyubsky, engineer and professor of St. Petersburg State Transport University. This is the first arch bridge in Russia.

In 1995, it was included in the national cultural heritage register. More than 100 bridges across Russia were developed by Belelyubsky, but only this one is named after him.

Cast a virtual bell

When in the Novgorod region, you’ll definitely hear bells ring and learn about the Novgorod Veche Bell. During the siege of the city, tsar Ivan III ordered to remove this bell from the bell tower and send it to Moscow. Legend says that the bell didn’t accept his fate, fell to the ground near the border of the Novgorod region and broke to pieces against the stones.

In the biggest Museum Bell Centre in Russia located in the Valday town, you can see bells from across the world and learn why Novgorod bells are unique. The museum’s collection represents bells from different countries and ages, some of them dating back to the 3rd century BC. You’ll learn about the history of casting and modern bell-making technologies and also play games on a touch table. For example, harness virtual ‘troika’ (three) horses with bells or cast a virtual bell.

Spot the pigeon on the cross of St. Sophia Cathedral

St. Sophia Cathedral was built in Novrogod between 1045 and 1050 by Kievan and Byzantine masters. It was conceived as the main cathedral of the city, and during its first years it was the only stone building in Novgorod. So where does the pigeon on the cross of the cathedral’s biggest dome come from?

Legend says that while tsar Ivan the Terrible and his Oprichniki were cruelly killing peaceful city folk in 1570, a pigeon suddenly sat down to the cross of the city’s main cathedral. It looked down, saw the massacre, and was literally petrified with horror. Since then the pigeon has been considered the defender of the city. People believe that as soon as the pigeon flies away from the cross, Novgorod will come to an end.

Visit a monastery, that was founded by Patriarch Nikon

The Valday Iver Monastery is situated on the island in the middle of the Valday lake. It is considered to be one of the most important and picturesque orthodox shrines.

The monastery was founded in 1653 by the initiative of Nikon who had just been elected Patriarch. Nikon wanted the monastery to look like the Iviron Monastery on Mount Athos, including the architectural style and monk’s clothes. Legend says that Nikon saw the spot for the monastery in a dream.

Check out Fyodor Dostoevsky’s country house

Fyodor Dostoevsky, a famous Russian writer, first visited Staraya Russa town in 1872 during a summer trip with his family. They liked it so much that the next year they rented a house near the Pererytitsa River’s embankment and spent every summer here ever since.

Dostoevsky loved this house, called it ‘his nest’ and considered it the perfect place to work and to be alone. In Staraya Russa he wrote his novels ‘The Adolescent’, ‘The Brothers Karamazov’ and ‘Demons’. Today, this place is a museum where you can explore what Dostoevsky’s house looked like and see his family’s personal belongings, photos and letters.

Visit an authentic Russian ‘izba’ (wooden house)

If you want to really enjoy the atmosphere of the old Novgorod, you should come to the Vitoslavlitsy Museum of folk wooden architecture that is located on the Myachino lake not far away from Veliky Novgorod. In this open-air museum you’ll see the best examples of Russian wooden architecture, including authentic old ‘izbas’ (wooden houses), rural chapels and churches.

During the year, the museum hosts fairs of crafts and folklore, christmastides, and even an international bell ringing festival.

Learn what Brick Gothic looks like

The Episcopal Chamber of the Novgorod Kremlin is the only non-religious German Gothic building of the 15th century preserved in Russia. You can have a good look at the facets of the gothic cross-domed vaults inside the chamber. This is why this building is also called ‘Faceted Chamber’ or ‘Chamber of Facets’.

The chamber was part of Vladychny Dvor, the place where all important city events took place: court hearings, gatherings of the Council of Lords of the Novgorod Republic, ambassador’s receptions and feasts. The seals of the city’s lords were kept here. The decree of tsar Ivan III on merging the Novgorod Republic with the Moscow State was first announced in 1478 in Episcopal Chamber. This is when the name of the new state, Russia, was first pronounced.

See the murals by Theophanes the Greek

The Byzantine Empire had a huge impact on the development of the Russian culture. Many works of art and architecture in ancient Russia were created by Byzantine artists and masters. Theophanes the Greek was one of them. He was born in Byzantine and created icons and murals in Constantinople and Caffa (modern Feodosia). After that he moved to Novgorod where he was commissioned to paint the walls of the Church of the Transfiguration of the Savior on Ilyina Street. You can enjoy his unique and expressive style if you look at the murals inside the dome of the church and the Trinity side chapel.

The most recognizable and the only monumental work of Theophanes the Greek that is preserved today is the chest-high portrait of the Savior the Almighty in the dome of the Church of the Transfiguration of the Savior.

Take a photo with an ancient Novgorod citizen who is learning how to read and write

In 1951, a letter written on birch bark dating back to the 14–15th centuries was found in Veliky Novgorod. Many decades later, in 2019, a sculpture designed by Novgorod artist and sculptor Sergey Gaev appeared on this exact site.

The sculpture portrays an 8–year old boy sitting on a stool and holding a piece of birch bark. At this age children in Novgorod started to learn how to read and write. During archaeological excavations in Novgorod, scientists often found ancient handwriting practice books and children’s drawings on birch bark sheets.

Feel like an ancient viking or prince Rurik’s guest

Novgorod is one of the waypoints of the famous trade route from the Varangians to the Greeks. The route passed through the Volkhov river. In the 9–10th centuries there was a fortified settlement of the Viking Age here.

Some scientists believe that Novgorod is named after this area which was called ‘Stary Gorod’ (‘Old City’) at that time. Some historians and archeologists consider this place to be the residence of Prince Rurik who was asked to rule the city in 862. That’s why this ancient settlement is called ‘Rurikovo Gorodische’ (‘Ruruk’s Old City’).

Learn more about the Soviet modernist architecture

On the bank of the Volkhov river near the Novgorod Kremlin, there is an incredible building that looks like a spaceship and contrasts strongly with the ancient buildings of the city.

This is the Fyodor Dostoevsky Theater of Dramatic Art that was built in 1987. It is one of the most striking examples of the Soviet modernist architecture. The theater was built for 10 years according to the project of architect Vladimir Somov.

See what an everyday life of Old Believers looks like

The Krestsy town in the Novgorod region has always been considered to be the center of the Novgorod Old Belief community, and it still is. Before the Soviet revolution there were three Old Believers churches here.

The Lyakova village, which is located not far from the town, used to be inhabited completely by Old Believers. You can learn more about their lifestyle in the local interactive museum. You’ll be introduced to Old Believers’ traditional crafts and ceremonies, drink tea with healing herbs and learn how to chop wood and use an old spinning wheel.

Buy a traditional embroidered tablecloth

A unique embroidery style that is now famous all over the world was born in the Staroye Rakhino village in the Novgorod province. By the middle of the 19th century, it had become a folk craft. Since then, linen tablecloths, towels and clothing items decorated with unusual ornaments have been popular not only among the locals, but also travellers.

In 1929, the first cooperative partnership of embroidery masters was created in Kresttsy. Later it turned into a factory that still operates today. The factory has a museum where embroidery traditions are preserved and new ornaments and technologies are created.

Find yourself in the Middle Ages

In the Middle Ages, Staraya Russa town could be called ‘the salt cellar of Russia’. That’s because salt making was the main trade here up to the 19th century. A few years ago, the old craft was brought back to life, and construction of salt works began. Later, an interactive museum was launched based on the results of archaeological findings.

This museum recreates a typical medieval manor of Staraya Russa of the 12th century with living rooms, a bathhouse, workshops, a livestock pen and traditional peasant household items. In this museum, you can also buy salt which is made in the same way as 1000 years ago.

See the place where Suvorov started his Italian campaign

Alexander Suvorov’s manor in the Konchanskoe village, which has now become the museum of the great commander, was originally the place of his exile. Suvovor openly disagreed with the reform of Russian’s army based on the Prussian model, and Emperor Paul the First didn’t appreciate such behaviour. He first fired Suvorov and then sent him away to his family estate.

However, the exile lasted for only two years. The great commander started the military campaign straight from his house in the Konchanskoe. During this legendary expedition, he crossed the Alps and defeated the French army.

Become a real hiker

If you dream of having a hike in the Novgorod region, but at the same time you are afraid that a tourist’s life may be too hard, you should try the Big Valday trail. This is a five-day 59-kilometer walking route. Its central part goes right through the Valday National Park’s territory.

You won’t have to cope with difficulties and inconveniences of camping life here. The route is marked with signs, and there are camping sites where you can find everything you need for an overnight stay from shelters and places for a fire to toilets. The trail finishes at the Dunayevshchina village where you can take a bus back to Valday. To take the trail, you have to fill out a special form and register on the Ministry of Emergency Situations of the Russian Federation website.

Russian Post has launched a limited series of products dedicated to the cultural heritage of the Novgorod region.

In autumn 2020, Russian Post announced an open contest to create the design for its limited series dedicated to Novgorod region. The project was supported by the Government of the Novgorod region, ‘Russ Novgorodskaya’ (Novgorod Russia) project, the State Novgorod Museum-reservation and Yandex.

Stamps and envelopes are traditionally used to spread information about historic dates and figures and famous landmarks. Now we can also use parcel boxes, packaging tape and postcards. The limited series products will travel around the world, introducing the most popular Russian attractions to six million Russian Post clients daily.

The participants were to create the design for the limited series featuring three iconic attractions of the Novgorod region, the Novgorod Kremlin, the Millennium Of Russia Monument and the Belelyubsky Bridge in Borovichi. Moscow designers and graduates of the Higher School of Economics’ Art and Design School Alena Akmatova and Svetlana Ilyushina won the contest. Their project was chosen via an open vote and by the expert jury.

COMMENTS

Top 50 Yacht Rock Songs
47. "Sailing," Christopher Cross (1979) You'd be hard-pressed to find a more quintessential yacht rock song than "Sailing." The second single (and first chart-topper) off Christopher Cross ...
Christopher Cross
Christopher Cross 'Sailing' official music Video from the album Christopher Cross.Listen to 'Sailing' on Apple Music: https://apple.co/3SeJsEOSubscribe for m...
Christopher Cross
You're listening to the official audio for Christopher Cross - "Sailing" from his debut album 'Christopher Cross'. "Sailing" reached No. 1 on the Billboard H...
The Choppy Waters Underneath Christopher Cross's "Sailing"
Yacht rock, and Christopher Cross's music in particular, does have a placating effect, which is one reason it's so widely derided. But beneath the unrippled studio sheen, "Sailing" is an ...
Sailing
Christopher Cross performs "Sailing" live for SiriusXM. Hear more from Yacht Rock on our app! Click here for your trial subscription: https://siriusxm.com/yt...
Christopher Cross and Kenny Loggins Played Yacht Rock
Christopher Cross and Kenny Loggins each played sets last night (June 13) on the actual yacht The Horizon's Edge as part of a SiriusXM event. ... Cross, 71, remains a figurehead of yacht rock ...
Sailing (Christopher Cross song)
Sailing (Christopher Cross song) " Sailing " is a 1979 soft rock song written and recorded by American singer-songwriter Christopher Cross. It was released in June 1980 as the second single from his self-titled debut album (1979), which was already certified gold by this time. The song was a success in the United States, reaching number one on ...
When Christopher Cross' Classic 'Yacht-Rock' Debut Went Sailing to the
Don Henley and J.D. Souther help Cross sing "The Light Is On," which is full of little percussion touches from Feldman and Castro, and contains a pair of Carlton's thrilling solos, each with a character of its own. The future #1, Song of the Year and perennial radio staple "Sailing" follows, and deserves the accolades.
Yacht rock
Yacht rock (originally known as the West Coast sound [4] [5] or adult-oriented rock [6]) is a broad music style and aesthetic [7] commonly associated with soft rock, [8] one of the most commercially successful genres from the mid-1970s to the mid-1980s. Drawing on sources such as smooth soul, smooth jazz, [1] R&B, and disco, [7] common stylistic traits include high-quality production, clean ...
Christopher Cross: I filled in for Ritchie Blackmore on Deep ...
Features. Classic Rock. Christopher Cross: I filled in for Ritchie Blackmore on Deep Purple's US debut. By Greg Prato. ( Classic Rock ) published 26 February 2018. In a new book about Yacht Rock, Ride Like The Wind hitmaker Christopher Cross reveals how he filled in for a sick Ritchie Blackmore at Deep Purple's first US show.
Christopher Cross
Christopher Cross (born Christopher Charles Geppert; May 3, 1951) is an American singer, songwriter, musician, and composer from San Antonio, Texas. Cross won five Grammy Awards for his eponymous debut album released in 1979. The singles "Sailing" (1980), and "Arthur's Theme (Best That You Can Do)" (from the 1981 film Arthur) peaked at number one on the U.S. Billboard Hot 100.
Sail Away: The Oral History of 'Yacht Rock'
The way the whole thing flowed, it's so fast and perfect. I think that was Yacht Rock's the finest hour. Roiland: JD asked me, would you play Christopher Cross? I'd never heard "Sailing ...
Christopher Cross: The Best Of [Greatest Hits Playlist: This Is
This is The Best of Christopher Cross (cristopercross). A greatest hits playlist featuring Cross' iconic hits "Sailing", "Arthur's Theme (Best That You Can D...
Christopher Cross by Christopher Cross (Album, Yacht Rock): Reviews
Christopher Cross, an Album by Christopher Cross. Released 20 December 1979 on Warner Bros. (catalog no. QBS 3383; Vinyl LP). Genres: Yacht Rock, Soft Rock. Rated #408 in the best albums of 1979. Featured peformers: Christopher Cross (lead vocals, arranger, songwriter), Andy Salmon (bass guitar), Tommy Taylor (drums), Rob Meurer (arranger), Jim Horn (saxophone), Jackie Kelso (saxophone), Lew ...
How Yacht Rockers Christopher Cross Almost Sank The 1975's ...
How Yacht Rocker Christopher Cross Almost Sank The 1975's New Album. Singer Matty Healy goes deep on the 22-track "Notes on a Conditional Form." In an alternate universe, singer/guitarist ...
Sail away with Kenny Loggins and Christopher Cross During ...
Yacht Rock Radio features smooth-sailing soft rock from the late '70s and early '80s by artists like Michael McDonald, Kenny Loggins, Steely Dan, Christopher Cross, Toto, America, Ambrosia and more. It's the kind of rock that doesn't rock the boat. Yacht Rock Radio will be available all summer long from June 1 through September 5 on ...
Christopher Cross
Christopher Cross (born Christopher Charles Geppert; May 3, 1951) is an American singer-songwriter and guitarist from San Antonio, Texas.He won five Grammy Awards for his eponymous debut album released in 1979. The singles "Sailing" (1979), and "Arthur's Theme (Best That You Can Do)" (from the 1981 film Arthur) peaked at number one on the U.S. Billboard Hot 100.
Sail away with Kenny Loggins and Christopher Cross during their Yacht
SiriusXM Presents Yacht Rock the Boat with Kenny Loggins and Christopher Cross will feature Loggins and Cross performing their smoothest hits for fans as they set sail around New York City on the Horizon's Edge yacht. The performances will be heard on Yacht Rock Radio (Ch. 14) on Friday, June 17th at 8 pm ET. "At the time we were creating ...
Trip to Veliky Novgorod: the birthplace of Russia
The easiest and quickest way is by train: from Saint Petersburg to Veliky Novgorod it takes around 3 hours and from Moscow the journey is about 5 hours. From the Novgorod railway station you can reach the city center by walking in about 10 minutes. : two fast trains depart daily (Lastochka), the first train leaves at 7 in the morning and ...
Christopher Cross
Official music video of "Sailing" by Christopher CrossSubscribe to the Christopher Cross YouTube channel and tap the bell to turn on notifications: https://s...
Novgorod for Day Trip From Cruise Ship in St. Petersburg
We are taking a Baltic Cruise, and we have three days in St. Petersburg.This will be our second cruise to the Baltics and St. Petersburg. We have arranged for the same private guide all three days that we used last time - she's so wonderful that she's become a personal friend and came to visit us in the USA as our house guest for a week!
Yacht Rock Crew
#christophercross #sailing #yachtrockyachtrockcrew bringing back a golden era of music, Playing all the smoothest #yachtrock from the 70's & 80's #tinhutsses...
Veliky Novgorod
Veliky Novgorod (/ v ə ˈ l iː k i ˈ n ɒ v ɡ ə r ɒ d / və-LEE-kee NOV-gə-rod; Russian: Великий Новгород, IPA: [vʲɪˈlʲikʲɪj ˈnovɡərət]; lit. ' Great Newtown '), [10] also known simply as Novgorod (Новгород), is the largest city and administrative centre of Novgorod Oblast, Russia.It is one of the oldest cities in Russia, [11] being first mentioned in ...
20 reasons to visit Veliky Novgorod and the Novgorod region
Cross the Msta River over the first arch bridge in Russia. The steel bridge in Borovichi town that connects two banks of the Msta river was built at the beginning of the 20th century. The project of the bridge was created by Nikolay Belelyubsky, engineer and professor of St. Petersburg State Transport University. This is the first arch bridge ...