Richard Kerr - Hard Lovin'/ Auntie's Insurance Policy

Suggestive "dancer" on the A-side backed with satirical popsike

Label: Decca
Year of Release: 1966

Richard Kerr's name may not immediately trip off the tongues of most readers, but he's actually a successful songwriter with numerous hits to his name. Besides writing "Mandy" for Barry Manilow (or "Brandy" for Scott English, however you want to look at it) and "Looks Like We Made It", he also penned "Somewhere In The Night" for Helen Reddy. Of more interest to me is the utterly fabulous "My World" by Cupid's Inspiration and "Nice Time" by Kenny Everett, both of which slipped out of his pen as well.

Both prior to and during his songwriting success, however, Kerr had a solo career with his first records emerging on Decca in 1966. His debut "Concrete Jungle" was an interesting piece of angsty pop poking a stick at the anonymity of office nine to five life. This effort emerged at the absolute tail end of the year  and drops the social realism for straight ahead raunch. "Hard Lovin' is what I need," sings Kerr. "I need some sordid pleasure/ to brighten up my days of leisure". It's hardly subtle, and I'd be staggered if it got any daytime airplay at the time, but the pounding, slapping rhythm (ooh, don't) behind Kerr's cheery delivery does make for a track which might have been appreciated out in the smoky, sweaty basements and dancefloors of the land. It combines the swinging oompah rhythms so popular throughout the mid-sixties with raunch, stomp and a little sprinkling of soul. 

The flipside is interesting too, being a deceptively jolly slice of satire about sucking up to monied family members. It's a borderline case for the popsike files but ultimately probably has a tiny bit too much vinegar in its grooves.  

Following the failure of this single, Kerr jumped to Decca's progressive subsidiary Deram for the next single "Happy Birthday Blues", before seemingly bouncing from label to label over the next two decades, from RCA to Warner Brothers to Epic to A&M. All were presumably acting on the assumption that he was a proven hit writer who was bound to end up writing a smash for himself at some point, but none of the records released under his own name - including five LPs - sold to significant audiences. 

While I suspect he would have preferred to have a career in the spotlight himself, these setbacks didn't dent his songwriting career, which saw him go on to write songs for Cliff Richard, Michael Ball, The Righteous Brothers, Roy Orbison and Bonnie Raitt. You can only imagine what Cliff must have made of "Hard Lovin'".

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