Thursday, September 18, 2008
Number One With A Bullet: Behind the Music
Posted by PJ Tobia on Thu, Sep 18, 2008 at 5:02 AM
This week’s cover story details the rollercoaster life of the late Phil Gernhard, the Music Row hitmaker with a golden ear and a troubled mind. One of the most bizarre aspects of the story is that Gernhard’s fourth wife, Anna Maria, is a Stockholm-based escort available for “dates” if the price is right. As you can see at her website—which includes prices per hour (in Swedish krona) and pictures of what you’ll get for your money—she's not exactly bashful about her services. Definitely NSFW.
Then there are Gernhard’s hits. In a 40-year career as a songwriter, producer and A&R man, Gernhard left his thumbprint all over the Billboard charts. After the jump are videos of some songs that Gernhard wrote or produced.
The first is "Snoopy Vs. The Red Baron" by The Royal Guardsmen, which Gernhard co-wrote and produced. It wasn't his first hit—that would be "Stay" by Maurice Williams & the Zodiacs—but it was one of his biggest. My favorite part of this video is the guy who does nothing but shout in fake German and throw the occasional "Sieg heil!"
Next up is 1972's “I’d Love You to Want Me,” by Lobo. I'll leave the comments to you.
Finally, I couldn’t find a video for “Cleaning This Gun” by Rodney Atkins, a song Gernhard picked as a single, which charted the week he killed himself. But I found this shaky-cam concert footage with terrible sound. A die-hard honky-tonk fan I know complains that Atkins’ music “isn’t country, it’s redneck.” I make no judgments except to note that in this clip, Atkins doesn’t play the guitar he’s holding, just uses it during the chorus as a toy gun.
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