The Soundtrack Of Summer
Since the early days of Rock N’ Roll, summer anthems have driven record sales with songs inspired by water, the beach or simply life unburdened by the confines of school. From Eddie Cochran’s “Summertime Blues” to Frankie and Anette’s “Beach Blanket Bingo,” The Fat Boy’s version of “Wipeout” and Kid Rock’s “All Summer Long,” these variations on a theme have played on our nostalgia and woven their way into our hearts. They continue to hang around decade after decade and seem to pop up more frequently as the weather warms.
Over the years, my preferred summer jams and boat soundtracks have included everything from The Beach Boys to Jimmy Buffet, Bob Marley to Jack Johnson. And there are numerous other classic rock and country artists that have presented the right “vibe.”
Then, seemingly out of nowhere came “Yacht Rock.” Dave Grohl is reportedly a big fan, and so is Questlove. Alannis Morissette, Alice Cooper and Coolio made a TV commercial launching Sirius Radio’s first Yacht Rock station. This year saw an award-winning documentary about the genre, and Instagram has over 50 fan pages dedicated to this music.
It all begs the questions; What the hell is yacht rock and where did it come from?
On its surface, Yacht Rock is a sub-genre of late 70s, early 80s easy listening music that embraces or pairs well with the Southern California yachting lifestyle of the day. In reality, its definition is far more nuanced, and its creation is far more obscure.
I remember the first time I heard the term. My friend Tom Brandow showed up on my doorstep with an iPad laughing like a giggly 12-year-old. “You’ve got to see this,” he chuckled. He pulled up a web series called Yacht Rock. It was possibly the dumbest thing I’ve ever seen, but funny. Very funny. Stupid funny. The show was a ridiculously low-budget, over-the-top caricature of the misadventures of late 70s pop stars set on the West Coast.
With bad wigs and huge fake mustaches, the actors portrayed sketch-like storylines centered around obscure members of these once-famous bands. In one episode, Skunk Baxter was giving Michael McDonald threatening ultimatums to write Yacht Rock songs for the Doobie Brothers while Hall and Oats shouted insults and flexed their sleeveless arms.
Eventually, Baxter meets Kenny Loggins and learns the secret to unlocking the mystery of the sound. Along the way, Jim Mesinna is depicted as a washed-up bum on a street corner warning him to “Stay away from Loggins, man! He’ll break your heart, man!”
Another episode shows McDonald — sweaty, shirtless and frazzled — having been kidnapped and tortured by Steely Dan. He’s being forced to record the lyrics to Peg over and over, in different keys until he collapses.
If it sounds stupid, I promise, it’s even worse than that. Much worse.
Creators of the web series and term, Steve Huey and JD Ryznar, were huge fans of the then-fictious genre; perhaps more importantly, they did their homework.
Few people realized it in the 70s, but most Yacht Rock songs were deeply connected. The Steely Dan recordings of that era are probably the origins of the classification, although the band hates to be reductively labeled. These meticulous records featured jazz chord changes, but rock and pop grooves. It created a unique sound.
In hindsight, this was the collaboration of a large group of L.A. musicians, arrangers and producers. The same group of friends wrote, recorded, produced, sang and toured together. The Doobie Brothers, Steely Dan, Kenny Logins, Christopher Cross, ToTo and members of Ambrosia were actually cross pollinating. Well before ToTo was even a group, they worked as a unit of studio musicians and played on over 500 different albums.
Beyond the shared personnel, these artists were linked by the epidemy of recording and production standards. Huey and Rysnar say that’s actually part of the Yacht Rock pun. “Yes, it refers to the popularity of waterside culture, but perhaps more importantly the richness and high quality of this elevated pop music, which was infused with jazz, R&B and cutting-edge production.” The results were beautiful, luxurious and perfect, like a yacht.
According to Huey and Rysnar, Fleetwood Mac, The Eagles, Hall and Oates, Linda Ronstadt and Jimmy Buffett are not considered Yacht Rock, even though they were definitely all part of the late 70s soft rock scene and often occupied the same space. Many were used as villains in the original series. Buffet was portrayed as an over-the-top lunatic, while Glen Frey and Don Henley were violent street thugs. Hall and Oates were depicted as playground brats who talked tough but lacked backbone.
Like most music, this group of artists ran their course and eventually gave way to MTV and the video era. Many of the songwriters went on to find success creating music for movies until this unique sound completely fell out of fashion.
It’s unclear exactly what happened between the 2005 web series release and the 2020s explosion, but the popularity of Yacht Rock has grown exponentially. It almost certainly has something to do with the high quality of the music itself, but it continues to attract new audiences as it benefits from our desire of that simpler time.
Today, Yacht Rock cover bands and theme parties are all the rage; fake mustaches, captain hats, aviators and weed are sweeping the country. It’s an ironic tribute, celebrating both the music and the absurdity of that bygone era.
Sirius Radio now has three Yacht Rock stations available on their app to pair with its already popular YR1, Margaritaville Radio, No Shoes Radio and Bob Marley channels.
Social media is filled with consistent bickering about what is and isn’t considered Yacht Rock. It matters little. Most of the satellite provider’s YR stations do not follow Huey and Ryznar’s rules of being Yacht Rock “certified.” The creators of the name see it as a scale of Yachtyness primarily based on who was involved, also weighing how, where and when was a song was written and recorded. According to their scale, the guys rank the holy grail of YR as “What a Fool Believes,” while Google chooses “Sailing” by Christopher Cross as the quintessential offering.
Aja, the album that originally brought these artists together, is widely considered one of the greatest produced LPs of all time. After almost 50 years, the masterpiece is still the record of choice used to demo the most expensive premium stereo systems in the world.
A few years ago, I created a playlist loosely based on this genre and have really enjoyed it much more than I’d anticipated. It’s a blast outside, on the boat, on the porch or on that summer road trip. Click the QR Code below to access the Lagniappe “Not Quite Yacht Rock” Summer Playlist. And, as always, can’t wait to see y’all on the water this summer.
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