RIP Dwight Twilley
I first heard Twilley Don’t Mind, his 1977 sophomore album, when I was 17, staying in Santa Cruz with my older brother, a hardcore kid who had managed to fall in with a bunch of pop nuts. He played me “Looking for the Magic”, which is perhaps the most enduring hit of Twilley’s decades-long career (in no small part for its prominence in the soundtrack of the 2011 horror hit You’re Next). The track wedged itself into my brain while Twilley’s breathy staccato vocals gave way to the booming chorus. So did the rest of the album when I returned home. When I was able to get my hands on Sincerely, Twilley’s first, I found much of the same; perfectly-crafted pop songs, a clear of American rock n’ roll swagger and unabashed Beatles worship. Those records have stuck with me, as I’m sure they have for so many others.
Very few power pop albums are perfect all the way through. The music, especially that from Twilley’s heyday, is admittedly formulaic: power chords and harmonies and songs about young love. Few artists could rehash that same formula again and again come out with an entirely great record. The Ramones did it on Pleasant Dreams, Cheap Trick with In Color, Shoes with Black Vinyl Shoes, etc. But to my mind, only Twilley really did it back to back, with Sincerely and Twilley Don’t Mind (his third, self-titled, record is also quite good). Never leaving the genre’s constraints and never reusing a single sound, there’s about as much variety in those records as possible. With the exception of a few Presley-style rollickers, they are also unflinchingly sweet. Much of Sincerely is as syrupy as any early Beatles, approaching the love song not as a retrospective ballad but as a pure expression of feeling and desire. Twilley is at his crooning best on “You Were So Warm” and “Baby Let’s Cruise”.
It’s always been a bit confounding to me that Dwight Twilley never made it. Most of the obituaries ascribe the lack of mainstream success to the collapse of Shelter Records. I think that’s probably true, that once the label collapsed, so did the band. Twilley’s post-Shelter music reflects somewhat reflects that insecurity, geared towards producing an AM hit rather than a whole project. But I also believe that the American rock zeitgeist moved away from Twilley’s brand of earnest pop. It’s those outmoded qualities that made Dwight Twilley so special, allowing the listener to hold his music close.