Grand Funk Railroad hadn’t had a lot success heading into 1973. Nicely, that’s not a wholly honest remark, as a result of 1970’s Nearer To Residence album offered properly sufficient for the band to be taking part in – and packing out – venues like New York’s Madison Sq. Backyard and Shea Stadium.
So actually, Grand Funk had skilled success, however it wasn’t the kind of world-straddling success the Flint, Michigan, trio sought. Proof of that was that they had been in debt, primarily due to their supervisor/ producer Terry Knight. Singer/drummer Don Brewer shakes his head, telling Traditional Rock: “We had been being sued by Terry, and we knew that radio had modified.”
Grand Funk had logged a minor hit with Rock & Roll Soul, which peaked at No.29 on the Billboard Sizzling 100 – however it wasn’t sufficient. “We would have liked successful,” Brewer says. “You couldn’t are available in and make seven-minute songs, so we knew we would have liked to put in writing a three-minute music that might get radio play.”
The preliminary ruminations on what would turn into 1973’s We’re An American Band, which stormed radio airwaves and turntables alike, had been roadblocked by Terry Knight’s vendetta in opposition to Grand Funk. “He’d taken all our cash, and we had been broke,” Brewer says.
Grand Funk’s solely possibility was to tour. And it was throughout these exhibits that Brewer got here up with We’re An American Band’s iconic line: ‘We’re coming to your city, we’ll assist you social gathering it down.’ Trying again on it, Brewer says: “That was the thought I had in my thoughts. I put all these snippets of issues happening from the highway, all these tales, grabbed my guitar, and added the chord adjustments, which was the beginning.”
However he didn’t have a title. “I didn’t have a tagline. However someday, I used to be practising the music, and thought:‘We’re an American band…’ I sang it, and it sounded nice. It sounded adequate to me that it caught.”
Brewer’s shot at the hours of darkness at successful music proved to be on the cash. However on the time, Grand Funk’s major author, frontman Mark Farner, didn’t agree. It’s been stated that Farner didn’t admire Brewer’s treading on his turf, however Brewer remembers it in another way. “We had been all brothers in arms,” he insists. “We had a typical objective: to come back by means of this, to sink or swim.”
Brewer says that the method between him and Farner went one thing like: “Anyone bought any nice concepts?” And that they’d every “convey issues in”, and this was “mainly the way in which we had been doing issues at that time”.
As a lot as Brewer – and Farner – appreciated We’re An American Band, the drummer admits that when Grand Funk went into the studio to file it they’d no inclination that they’d hit paydirt.
Brewer and Farner won’t have, however producer Todd Rundgren did.
“With Todd engaged on that album, the individuals on the file label, Capitol, had been chomping on the bit,” Brewer says. “They wished us to supply product instantly. Todd performed them what we had been engaged on, and the fellows from Capitol had been leaping up and down [laughs]. We performed them We’re An American Band, and so they had been screaming and yelling, like: ‘Oh my god, that’s nice. It’s nice!’ I stated: ‘Actually? You guys actually prefer it?’”
On the time, Brewer thought We’re An American Band was “simply one other music”, however says that Rundgren and the executives at Capitol Information knew higher. “They had been yelling: ‘That’s successful! and so they wished it launched instantly.”
So it was. Grand Funk’s album We’re An American Band was launched in July 1973. With its gold foil cowl and anthemic title observe (which might hit No.2), it took off like a rocket, going gold within the US inside a month.
“It marched proper as much as Quantity One,” Brewer says, smiling. “It was simply that form of music. I didn’t realise it at first, however after driving residence from my home one evening it got here on the radio, and I simply couldn’t consider how good it sounded. Not simply good, it was the sound of successful file.”
Grand Funk might need had successful, however all wasn’t properly. Farner wasn’t proud of Rundgren’s slick manufacturing, nor was he liking that Brewer had stolen his thunder. He additionally hated that the band’s power-trio dynamic had been damaged up by newcomer Hammond organist Craig Frost – who by the way in which was throughout We’re An American Band. “It didn’t matter,” Brewer stated. “We would have liked to make a transition. We made six data, and it hadn’t labored.”
In accordance with Brewer, although, Farner’s ego wasn’t as bruised as some say. “Everyone was gung-ho,” he says. “We had been on the identical web page. At the moment, there was no: ‘Oh, Don’s singing too many songs’, or ‘He’s writing too many songs.’”
Regardless of Brewer’s recollection, Farner didn’t stick round for for much longer. He didn’t agree with deviating from the power-trio format, and didn’t take to being regarded as something lower than the motor that drove the proverbial engine.
We’re An American Band took Grand Funk to the following stage, however it was the start of the top, resulting in their disbandment in 1976, simply three years after the album took the world by storm. However on the time, it meant the world. “It was our peak,” Brewer says. “It was precisely what we would have liked.”
Past We’re An American Band’s standing as a basic rock radio staple, and the celebrity and fortune it offered, when Brewer appears again, the private which means stands proud most. “Once I wrote that music, I wasn’t making an attempt to wave a flag. The music simply has power. I’m happy with that.”
A sheepish smile creeps throughout Brewer’s face earlier than he admits: “Everyone has nice reminiscences in the case of that music, you realize? I look again, and if we’d stayed the place we had been as a trio, or not performed what we’d performed, we wouldn’t have made it. With out We’re An American Band we wouldn’t have continued and wouldn’t nonetheless be promoting out audiences at present. So I’m very happy with that.”
