Adapted from a previous piece, this will probably serve as a chapter in my long-threatened book The Greatest Record Ever Made! (Volume 1).
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!
SUZI QUATRO: I May Be Too Young
Written by Nicky Chinn and Mike Chapman
Produced by Nicky Chinn and Mike Chapman
Single, RAK Records [UK], 1975
Teen idolatry--the sort of starry-eyed quasi-romantic longing that conjures adolescent yearning for long walks in the moonlight hand-in-hand with the teen heartthrob du jour--has been part of pop music for as long as there has been pop music. I can't speak for the probability of giggling young girls once makin' ga-ga noises over noted hottie Ludwig von Beethoven, but Frank Sinatra? King Elvis I? Paul McCartney, Mark Lindsay, Bobby Sherman, and the lads in One Direction? Girls swooned over posters and magazines, LP covers and 45 sleeves, and kissed Monkees bubblegum cards with earnest, whispered wishes to one day become Mrs. Davy Jones: I'll be true to you, yes I will.
That was the girls. Boys? Not so much.
That's the image, anyway. In reality, kids won't always follow the rigid scripts adults throw at them. There were girls who found this whole notion of getting wobbly-kneed over a pretty face just absurd. There were boys and girls whose pop dreams favored teen idols with whom they shared a gender. And there must have been boys dreaming of sweet pecks on the lips from Marianne Faithfull, or Chaka Khan. In North Syracuse in 1975, there was certainly one fifteen-year-old boy who saw Suzi Quatro on the cover of a magazine, and promptly fell in love.
I don't know how that particular issue of Rolling Stone found its way into my living room, except that it wasn't me who put it there. Siblings? Parents? Divine intervention? However it arrived, it was the cover of the Rolling Stone, dated January 2, 1975, that introduced me to this unfamiliar rock 'n' roll chick named Suzi Quatro.
Lovestruck. Immediately, irrevocably lovestruck.
Why? I have answer beyond Because! It wasn't even like Rolling Stone's pictures of her were overtly sexy or deliberately provocative (though the cover and one interior photo did show how her leather pants loved to hug her derriere). I wish I could claim I was a budding feminist at 15, engaged not by Quatro's looks but by her intelligence and personality, and by her music...but I'd be lyin'. I'd never heard her music, and I don't know how much of her wit and wisdom could be ascertained from a casual read of a rock rag piece where she discussed the pros and cons of getting a tattoo on her butt. No, I have to admit it was something about her look. I was fascinated. And I was in love with her, as surely as all those girls reading 16 and Tiger Beat were in love with Donny Osmond.
It was a love with no kindling to feed its fire. In the immediate aftermath of discovering her, I didn't see any more articles about Suzi Quatro. I didn't hear her music on the radio. I didn't see her on TV. I'm not sure if I saw any of her records at Gerber Music. I was in love with a face, and a body wrapped tightly in leather; I had no idea if that was enough to make me a fan of the Suzi Quatro sound.
On May 1st of 1975, Alice Cooper was scheduled to play a concert in Syracuse...WITH SUZI QUATRO OPENING...?! Glorioski! I thought Alice Cooper was one of the coolest things on AM radio at the time. With Suzi Quatro on the bill, I knew I had to be there.
My parents did not agree with the inevitability of this rendezvous.
Years later, I would realize that my Dad was concerned about my seemingly fragile machismo, and was not going to allow his son to see a guy named Alice, no way, no how. I don't know if Dad would have felt differently if he suspected my potentially prurient interest in Suzi Quatro. I missed my chance to see Alice Cooper, and my initiation into the musical world of Suzi Quatro's music was likewise deferred.
That initiation finally took place visa television. Supersonic was a British rock 'n' roll TV series, showcasing performers in a cheesy studio setting, lip-syncin' their hits and wannabe hits. It was briefly carried on Saturday afternoons by WPIX in New York City, and available to cable subscribers in Syracuse's suburbs.
That initiation finally took place visa television. Supersonic was a British rock 'n' roll TV series, showcasing performers in a cheesy studio setting, lip-syncin' their hits and wannabe hits. It was briefly carried on Saturday afternoons by WPIX in New York City, and available to cable subscribers in Syracuse's suburbs.
I saw some familiar acts on Supersonic, from the Hollies to the Bay City Rollers to the Crazy World Of Arthur Brown. I saw a number of other performers my memory won't surrender. Supersonic looms largest in my legend for one thing only:
Suzi Quatro. On my TV.
One Saturday afternoon in the mid 1970s, the date long faded away, but the image still vivid in my mind. Suzi Quatro. She was beautiful. And hey, whaddaya know? She rocked!
I was transfixed. Hey, ya heard about Suzi from Baton Rouge? She wasn't asking me, but I shook my head, jaw agape, as she continued, Well, lemme tell you 'bout it! Guitars and drums, a churning Me Decade bop, grinding forward, Suzi Quatro's bass booming as she not-quite-sneered, not-quite-smiled her way through.
This deal was sealed as far as I could see. Marry me, Suzi!
It was the only time I saw Suzi on Supersonic, or anywhere else for a while thereafter. And I didn't catch the damned title of the song! I spent years looking for something called "Little Suzi From Baton Rouge," or "I'm Just Waitin' For You," or, I dunno, "Suzi Quatro's Love Theme From Supersonic," all to no avail. I bought a copy of Quatro's eponymous debut album, and that song was not on the album. And the album...aw, the album didn't do all that much for me, dammit.
Suzi Quatro ain't exactly a bad record. mind you. It contains not one, but two of her all-time signature tunes, "Can The Can" and "48 Crash," plus "Glycerine Queen" and covers of Elvis' "All Shook Up" and the Beatles' "I Wanna Be Your Man." At the time, I only knew the latter as a track on Meet The Beatles, not realizing that John and Paul had originally written it for Mick, Keith, and Brian, or that it had been the Rolling Stones. At 16 or so, I was intrigued by the notion of a female singing about wanting to be someone's man, though it really just meant that Quatro didn't care enough about gender politics to be bothered; she just wanted to sing the song, you stupid boys. It wasn't a statement; it was benign indifference.
My Suzi Quatro fandom meandered after that. In the summer of 1978, I purchased an import Suzi Quatro album called Aggro-Phobia; the LP was two years old by then, but I'd never seen it before, and rightly figured What the hell--why not?
I'd never quite stopped searching for that elusive, unidentified Quatro song I'd heard on Supersonic. It wasn't on her second album Quatro, nor Your Mama Won't Like Me, and it didn't seem tio be anywhere. Now was it on Aggro-Phobia. However, Aggro-Phobia did include a track which seemed to be a companion piece, since its mention of "Louisiana Sue" was a direct reference to Little Suzi from Baton Rouge. The Aggro-Phobia track was called "Tear Me Apart."
I loved "Tear Me Apart," a brash and confident rock 'n' roller that moved more fluidly and winningly than any other Quatro track I owned up to that point. Most of Aggro-Phobia was forgettable for me; "Tear Me Apart" was classic.
Although Quatro was originally from Detroit (where she and her sisters started a band called the Pleasure Seekers when she was 14), she found stardom in England, stardom that did not translate back in the colonies. In 1977, Quatro had begun appearing in a few episodes of TV's Happy Days, playing anachronistic chick rocker Leather Tuscadero.
One Saturday afternoon in the mid 1970s, the date long faded away, but the image still vivid in my mind. Suzi Quatro. She was beautiful. And hey, whaddaya know? She rocked!
I was transfixed. Hey, ya heard about Suzi from Baton Rouge? She wasn't asking me, but I shook my head, jaw agape, as she continued, Well, lemme tell you 'bout it! Guitars and drums, a churning Me Decade bop, grinding forward, Suzi Quatro's bass booming as she not-quite-sneered, not-quite-smiled her way through.
This deal was sealed as far as I could see. Marry me, Suzi!
It was the only time I saw Suzi on Supersonic, or anywhere else for a while thereafter. And I didn't catch the damned title of the song! I spent years looking for something called "Little Suzi From Baton Rouge," or "I'm Just Waitin' For You," or, I dunno, "Suzi Quatro's Love Theme From Supersonic," all to no avail. I bought a copy of Quatro's eponymous debut album, and that song was not on the album. And the album...aw, the album didn't do all that much for me, dammit.
Suzi Quatro ain't exactly a bad record. mind you. It contains not one, but two of her all-time signature tunes, "Can The Can" and "48 Crash," plus "Glycerine Queen" and covers of Elvis' "All Shook Up" and the Beatles' "I Wanna Be Your Man." At the time, I only knew the latter as a track on Meet The Beatles, not realizing that John and Paul had originally written it for Mick, Keith, and Brian, or that it had been the Rolling Stones. At 16 or so, I was intrigued by the notion of a female singing about wanting to be someone's man, though it really just meant that Quatro didn't care enough about gender politics to be bothered; she just wanted to sing the song, you stupid boys. It wasn't a statement; it was benign indifference.
My Suzi Quatro fandom meandered after that. In the summer of 1978, I purchased an import Suzi Quatro album called Aggro-Phobia; the LP was two years old by then, but I'd never seen it before, and rightly figured What the hell--why not?
I'd never quite stopped searching for that elusive, unidentified Quatro song I'd heard on Supersonic. It wasn't on her second album Quatro, nor Your Mama Won't Like Me, and it didn't seem tio be anywhere. Now was it on Aggro-Phobia. However, Aggro-Phobia did include a track which seemed to be a companion piece, since its mention of "Louisiana Sue" was a direct reference to Little Suzi from Baton Rouge. The Aggro-Phobia track was called "Tear Me Apart."
I loved "Tear Me Apart," a brash and confident rock 'n' roller that moved more fluidly and winningly than any other Quatro track I owned up to that point. Most of Aggro-Phobia was forgettable for me; "Tear Me Apart" was classic.
Although Quatro was originally from Detroit (where she and her sisters started a band called the Pleasure Seekers when she was 14), she found stardom in England, stardom that did not translate back in the colonies. In 1977, Quatro had begun appearing in a few episodes of TV's Happy Days, playing anachronistic chick rocker Leather Tuscadero.
1979 brought Suzi's belated American success: "Stumblin' In," a duet with Chris Norman, broke through the American Top 40 in early '79, peaking at # 4. I was happy for her success, while remaining resolutely uninterested in any of it.
I did eventually identify that track I'd seen Suzi Quatro mime on Supersonic years before. In the early '90s, rummaging through 45s at a great North Syracuse record store called Knuckleheads (Motto: We ain't in no mall!), when I found a Quatro single called "I May Be Too Young." Cash made it mine, and a spin on the ol' home turntable verified that my search had finally reached its end.
I did eventually identify that track I'd seen Suzi Quatro mime on Supersonic years before. In the early '90s, rummaging through 45s at a great North Syracuse record store called Knuckleheads (Motto: We ain't in no mall!), when I found a Quatro single called "I May Be Too Young." Cash made it mine, and a spin on the ol' home turntable verified that my search had finally reached its end.
"I may be too young to fall in love." Man, you're never too young to fall in love. I wasn't too young to fall in love with my preschool girlfriend Mary Rose when I was five, nor with kindergarten flame Suzette Mauro when I was six, and they weren't too young to fall in love with me. Temporarily. They got over me quickly--a little too quickly in Suzette's case, if you ask me. I'm not bitter.
But we weren't too young to fall in the first place. You're not too young to fall in love with people, whether as friends or potentially something more. You fall in love with all sorts of sparkly things. You fall in love with stars. At 15, I fell in love in Suzi Quatro.
But being a mere poster girl wasn't Suzi Quatro's thing. She never pandered, never tried to be provocative in that way. She wanted to rock like the boys rocked. She wanted to be your man. It wasn't a statement of sexuality; her gender was incidental to her, another label like black or white, Mod or rocker, DC or Marvel. She didn't care. Have ya heard about Suzi from the Motor City? She was punk before we knew what punk was. She was Suzi Quatro. She's still Suzi Quatro. Go, go, go, little Suzi.
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