Do you remember Player? They were, without a doubt, the sleekest vessel in the Yacht Rock marina. Unlike many of the other soft rock artists of the time they actually looked like rock stars, which is more than you can say about Christopher Cross, England Dan and John Ford Coley, and Michael McDonald.
Unfortunately, this California quartet’s rock star sheen only took it so far; Player may not have been one-hit wonders, but most folks would be hard pressed to remember them for anything but 1977’s No. 1 hit “Baby Come Back.” And while the band would record a number of LPs, none of them scored big but their eponymous 1977 debut.
On Player the band put its MOR pop craft to uninspired but more than competent use; if your idea of good music is substandard Steely Dan, you owe it to yourself to run out and buy this record. Player’s 10 cuts are pleasantly unremarkable, vapidly unobjectionable with only one or two exceptions, and hard to hate if you have a single soft rock bone in your body. I have several.
Romance, of course, is the album’s theme; boy loves-hates-wants-loses-misses girl was the wind that set sail to every boat in the Yacht Rock flotilla. Does Player have anything novel or interesting to say on the subject? Of course not. On the ersatz funky and very bass heavy “Love Is Where You Find It” they at least find a unique musical setting for their very unoriginal sentiments, but other than that they might as well be one of those Hallmark cards that plays a song when you open it up.
Where to begin? Opener “Come On Out” is a blatant Steely Dan rip, but I’ve heard far worse; they’ve got the Dan dead to rights, and only J.C. Crowley’s vocals give them away. “Baby Come Back” is a soft rock classic; let yourself sink into the mellow on this one (love those lush co-lead vocals) and you may never come up again. Think Hall and Oates, because this one shares at least 72 percent of its DNA with Yacht Rock’s most successful duo.
The unforgivably generic “Goodbye (That’s All I Ever Heard)” is pureed R&B served up tepid; “love is strange” sings J.C. Crowley, but he fails to provide the specifics that might make this dive into the shallow end interesting. “Melanie” at least has a decent groove going for it, to say nothing of one very standard L.A. sessions man saxophone and some 10CC quality backing vocals–not bad, boys, not bad.
“Every Which Way” is second-rate Doobie Brothers, and I don’t even like first-rate Doobie Brothers; that said, if you’re a fan of the Michael McDonald-era Doobs, you may eat this one up. “This Time I’m in It for Love”–which went to No. 10 on the pop charts–is another Steely Dan swipe, from keyboards to melody to vocal phrasing. But hey, I happen to like Steely Dan, and I would probably like this one more if it weren’t for the bathetic chorus.
“Movin’ Up” is a perky little ditty that falls down on the job; when it comes to urgency, these guys just don’t have it. I kinda like the chukka-chukka guitar, but when they sing the title I laugh; the Jeffersons these guys ain’t. “Cancellation” is as close as Player gets to a rocker; Peter Beckett tries to sound tough and fails, the band tries to sound hard like Foreigner and fails, and rhyming “reservation,” “imitation,” and “cancellation” wins them this year’s I’m Really Trying Hard Here Folks! Lyrics Award.
And speaking of trying, I give you “Tryin’ to Write a Hit Song,” which wasn’t a hit. Why? Because it’s one of the worst songs I’ve ever heard, that’s why. A big festering pop ballad on which bassist Ronn Moss goes mushy on lead vocals, somebody wails on harmonica, and somebody else plays a plaintive steel guitar, this one is the best argument I’ve ever heard for giving up already.
Player–or at least Beckett and Moss–were last heard playing cruise ships as part of the Yacht Rock Revue with the likes of Little River Band and Ambrosia. But no, that’s not quite accurate–just last June Player released the long player Baby Don’t Come Back, and if I were a braver man I might even give it a listen.
I wish I could say I hate this album, but I don’t; Player couldn’t pick up an original idea at a singles bar, but they had a positive knack for hooking up with the cast-off sounds of their musical betters to produce a minor but undeniably likable brand of soft rock.
I just wouldn’t listen to it too much; rock this soft can make you soft in the head.
GRADED ON A CURVE:
B-
