THE GREATEST RECORD EVER MADE: Freedom

This was adapted from an earlier piece to serve as a potential chapter in my long-threatened book The Greatest Record Ever Made! (Volume 1). It is not part of that book's current blueprint.

An infinite number of tracks can each be THE greatest record ever made, as long as they take turns. Today, this is THE GREATEST RECORD EVER MADE!

WHAM!: Freedom

Written by George Michael

Produced by George Michael

Single from the album Make It Big, Epic Records [UK], 1984

It has never been cool to like George Michael. He sold something like, I dunno, a billion gazillion records, both solo and as the front face of Wham! (the latter alongside cohort Andrew Ridgely), so somebody must have thought he was okay. Critics grew to like him, too. 

But rock 'n' rollers hated him. I'm a rock 'n' roller. I think I'm supposed to hate him; loathing of teen-idol pop stars is listed in the rock 'n' roller's job description, right between hoping to die before we get old and yelling for punters to get off of our lawn...er, cloud. Nonetheless, George Michael's records never bothered me. I'd stop short of saying I was a fan, but nor were his songs an automatic prompt for me to change the station. It was, at worst, a peaceful co-existence; at best, it's possible I may have tapped my toes a time or two.

My first awareness of Wham!--then referred to as "Wham! U.K." here in the States--came in a Joey Ramone interview I read in some rock rag circa...1983? Maybe earlier. Joey dismissed Wham! as the sort of crap kids were listening to when they shoulda been diggin' the rock 'n' roll. My loyalty to the Ramones was (and is) unshakable, so I had no reason to question Bruddah # 1's distaste for this Wham thing, whatever it was. The first Wham! song I ever heard was "Wham Rap (Enjoy What You Do)," an inoffensive, slight 1982 single that I probably didn't hear until '83. I didn't hate it, Joey's admonishment notwithstanding. 

In late 1984, I started a job at a record store. Wham! became suddenly ubiquitous, with the # 1 smash single "Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go" and the mega-selling album Make It Big. "Careless Whisper" gave the group its second U.S. # 1, and would eventually be named the top single of 1985. 

I objected to none of it, not the bubbly confection "Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go," not even the slick ballad "Careless Whisper," with its much-mocked line "Guilty feet ain't got no rhythm." It was pop music, and to my ears it was better radio fare than a number of Wham!'s contemporaries. I mean, there were certainly dozens of other 1985 hits (and non-hits) that I preferred to Wham!, from the Bangles and Prince to Los Lobos and the Long Ryders. I remained neither acolyte nor dissident. Wham! was Wham!, and there were plenty of other things more worthy of my devotion or my derision, whichever one applied.

In the summer of '85, I decided I needed to supplement my record store paycheck with part-time employment at McDonald's. At the ripened age of 25, I was the oldest cook on the crew, but still energetic enough to work retail all day, work a closing fast-food shift three nights a week, and hit the bars after midnight before going home, showering, napping, and heading back to retail in the morning.

You could say it was a foolish slog. To me, it felt like a second shot at being a teenager. Freedom. And there just happened to be a song on the radio that bore that title.

"Freedom" was Wham!'s fourth single off Make It Big ("Everything She Wants" was the third), and the only one to miss the tippytop of the Billboard Hot 100, settling for a peak at # 3. Compared to the '80s bubblechirp of "Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go," the mournful regret of "Careless Whisper," and the relative anonymity of "Everything She Wants," "Freedom" was something else again: it was pure, over-the-top, capital letters POP, almost (if not quite) bordering on power pop. Its giddy exuberance exploded from cheap speakers everywhere, demanding volume, delivering the irresistibly agreeable swoon of hooks and melody cranked to a deep-red, blissful saturation point. The Raspberries could have done this song. Smokey Robinson and the Miracles could have done this song. The Monkees should have done this song. Any of those prospects would have been intriguing. And I doubt that any of them would have surpassed Wham!'s incredible rendition.

It was product. Sure. It was disposable CHR fodder with no pretense of grit or substance. It was the 1980s in microcosm, and I'm not terribly fond of the '80s. It is all these sins and more. And yet, there are moments when I think it's The Greatest Record Ever Made. I confess this transgression without apology.

The song's title contrasts with its story. The lyrics tell us that the singer is madly in love with a hinge-heeled girl who thinks relationships should be open and free, non-exclusive, and she laughs and tells our besotted hero he should go out and try it. But he doesn't want that kind of freedom; he wants commitment, trust, stability, an everlasting and monogamous meeting of hearts. I don't want your freedom/I don't want to play around. All he wants right now is her, not some other floozy de la nuit. He wants the true love promised in pop songs. 

Wham! itself wasn't built to last. George Michael went on to a successful and well-regarded solo career; he called his second album Listen Without Prejudice Vol. 1. Guilt-free pleasure, right? I never again embraced any of his work to anywhere near the degree I exulted in Wham!'s transcendent pop song "Freedom." But I respected him. He was one of the many casualties of 2016, a year which took away so many of our pop idols, a year that seemed crueler than any other cruel, cruel year before it.

Before Michael's death, I had already reconnected with my delight in Wham!'s wonderful pop song "Freedom." The track's a bit too long--pop songs sound best with running times of two to three and a half minutes, not over five--but its charm remains, and I love it without reservation or shame. It sounds great with some Motown and some Badfinger, some Aretha Franklin, Kai Danzberg, Dusty Springfield, Squeeze, the Isley Brothers, Lisa Mychols, Herman's Hermits, and yes, even alongside some Ramones. Joey Ramone was wrong, at least this one time. But you know that I'll forgive you/Just this once, twice, forever. 

Forever. Let it ring.

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Carl's new book Gabba Gabba Hey! A Conversation With The Ramones is now available, courtesy of the good folks at Rare Bird Books. Gabba Gabba YAY!! https://rarebirdlit.com/gabba-gabba-hey-a-conversation-with-the-ramones-by-carl-cafarelli/

If it's true that one book leads to another, my next book will be The Greatest Record Ever Made! (Volume 1). Stay tuned. Your turn is coming.

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