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Wednesday, May 7, 2014

"I'm Your Superman" by All Sport Band

Song#:  0832
Date:  11/28/1981
Debut:  94
Peak:  93
Weeks:  2
Genre:  Soft Rock



Pop Bits:  Pop music has many examples of non-artists assembling musical acts to fulfill their ideas (and wallets). Some end up successful while others tank. Tracy Coats, a sound engineer who worked on hit recordings like "Frampton Comes Alive," had an idea. After working with the The Village People on their live album, he thought that the concept might work with a rock band. So he chose a sports theme, advertised for musicians, secured investors, got a label interested and the All Sports Band was born. Each member donned a sports persona (boxer, football player, race car driver, etc.), wore an associated costume, and then worked together to write and record songs for a debut album. The self-titled LP was issued with this song being the first single. Despite a lot of promotion, including an "American Bandstand" appearance, the song tanked. A second single would do a bit better, but by that time it was pretty much apparent that the idea failed. Investors pulled up stakes as did the label and the All Sports Band was no more.

ReduxReview:  After reading up on the band, I expected their first song would be some kind of rockin' tune, but it ended up being this power ballad and I just have to say...oh my. This single is so bad that it is almost great. The keyword though is "almost." The difference between bad-good and bad-awful is that with bad-good, you find yourself singing into a hair brush like you are on an arena stage. With bad-awful, you cringe. This one makes me cringe. The lyrics are not good and when paired with the over-baked vocals (including some unfortunate falsetto), it just crashes and burns. This was just not a good idea.

ReduxRating:  2/10

Trivia:  After the group disbanded, most members went on to have successful careers in music. Most notably, Chuck Kentis (the racer) went on to play keyboards for Rod Stewart in 1988. He's been working with Stewart ever since eventually becoming Stewart's musical director. The two have also written songs together that have appeared on Stewart's albums.

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