![]() There’s crystalline keyboards from Vinny Jessel, a spectrum of synths from Ray Weiss and ripping guitar from axeman Zonder Kennedy on the post-apocalyptic “Morning Dew,” written by Bonnie Dobson in 1961. For “Float on Hope” and the stripped down, somber closing track “Sky,” he turned to Jason Stutts, an Omad artist who goes by the moniker Rust Dust.Īlthough he does the lion’s share of playing on She Said, DeNicola did call on gifted friends to chime in at all the right places. Patti Maloney, one of DeNicola’s favorite longtime cowriters, lent her special way with words to four of the record’s prettiest, poppiest tunes, while Procol Harum’s Keith Reid, responsible for the poetry of “A Whiter Shade of Pale,” provided lyrics for “Battered Cloth,” a bittersweet reminiscence simply conveyed with piano and acoustic guitar. As he puts it: “I had the opportunity to continue in the business and build relationships with people from all aspects of the music world.” Now, a host of those relationships represent on She Said, collaborating on craft and adding some serious chops. Such success meant freedom, and DeNicola used it to nurture new talent (discovering a little band called Kara’s Flowers, who later changed their name to Maroon 5), supply radio-ready tunes for contemporary chart-toppers while composing for an annual Shakespeare festival, and launch his boutique label, Omad Records. Collaborating with fellow tunesmith Franke Previte on those “TOML” and “Hungry Eyes,” the two mega-hits from the Dirty Dancing soundtrack - which held the #1 spot on the Billboard 200 albums chart for 18 weeks and ultimately sold more than 60 million copies worldwide - netted DeNicola an Oscar, a Golden Globe, a Grammy nomination, and ASCAP’s Songwriter of the Year award in 1988. Yet as time went on, he found himself drawn more to a creative life behind the scenes. Universal appeal from the guy who wrote “(I Had) The Time of My Life”? Go figure! A Long Island, New York, native, DeNicola began playing in bands as a kid in the 1970s and was a member of the jazz-fusion quintet Flight, which released the acclaimed album Excursion Beyond on Motown. Somehow, though, the more intimate, the more universal the album’s appeal, whether you’re lofted by the gravity-defying harmonies of “High,” hitting the floor with the irresistibly dance-y “Breathe Deep,” or digging into the darker, guitar-driven single “Float on Hope” (and its hand-drawn animated video, which decries the destruction of the Amazon and the earth’s endangered wellbeing at large). The phrase, “This time it’s personal” clearly applies, from the dreamy complexities-of-love story of the title track through nods to the Sixties’ and Seventies’ soul and rock DeNicola grew up on. I’m comfortable working this way, yet it was new for me and really fun to write purely about what I wanted to say.” “I holed up in my barn studio and built these tracks from scratch, playing all different instruments from guitars to synths, sitar to congas. “The groundwork laid down on The Why Because gave me the confidence to do another record right on its heels,” DeNicola explains. ![]() And while DeNIcola’s debut, The Why Because, had him interpreting tunes he’d originally penned for others, She Said was conceived and created for one voice, one touch, and one heart: his own. Fast forward-very fast-to now, for the release its follow-up, She Said. After some five decades in the recording industry, the award-winning songwriter and producer made his first album as an artist in 2019.
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