Every Monday, valued friend Pete Vogel visits my home to give my son Zachary drum lessons.  Pete and I pick the songs for him to learn.  I play electric guitar and vocalize while Zach figures out the necessary beats and fills. The teen is actually getting good at laying down a groove, so I will throw him curveballs in the form of new songs.  This time, I picked a fast Rockabilly version of The Rolling Stones’ “Play with Fire.”  Zach picked up on the cut-time beat and laid down a sloppy groove that drove the song beautifully.  The three of us were elated by the progress.

Pete sat down at the drumkit to analyze what the song needed.  As he laid down a 2/4 shuffle, Vogel exclaimed, “It’s just like Ballroom Blitz!”

Noting the similarities, I noted, “Or I Want You to Want Me!”

Since Pete and I are “men of a certain age,” we have remarkably similar recollections about the music of our youth. I decided to share with him the very first time I ever heard this Cheap Trick classic.

During the spring of 1979, I was an eighth grader at Mohawk Junior High in the South End of Columbus.  Every weekend, I would stay at the apartment of my older brother, John. It was located downtown near the Columbus College of Art and Design.  It put us within a short bus ride of the Ohio State University campus where we would frequent the record stores and art-house movies at The University Flick.

Thanks to my brother’s record collection, I was gaining a passion for mid-sixties British Invasion bands like The Beatles, Rolling Stones, Kinks, and The Who. I also started loving distinguished African-American artists like Chuck Berry, Little Richard, Otis Redding, and The Supremes. Conversely, this made me increasingly discontent with the mainstream contemporary music geared towards my age group. While I loved the exuberant high-energy of ‘sixties Brit-Pop or Motown, I found much of the then-current hard-rock sloppy, arrogant, and overly serious. The pop charts, at that time, were dominated by disco. To my 14-year-old ears, disco sounded slickly overproduced, lyrically repetitive, and coldly narcissistic. I confess that I found both hard-rock and disco equally unappealing.

When I arrived at the apartment on Friday evening, I gave my brother his mail that was delivered to our parents’ house.  Among it was the latest issue of Rolling Stone. It featured this odd new band called Cheap Trick on the cover. I had never heard of them before.  Two of the guys looked like run-of-the-mill rock stars with long hair that resembled Cocker Spaniel ears.  The other two seemed like something out of a 1930’s comedy movie.  One was a skinny guy with bugged eyes, a baseball cap, and a bow tie.  The other was a pudgy man in a baggy white shirt, short hair, John Lennon glasses, and a moustache. I could not remotely imagine what these guys sounded like.

As the weekend passed, we stayed up late enough to watch all of Saturday Night Live and then a portion of Jerry Beck’s “Almost All-Night Theater.” Plenty of cans were cracked open. We would usually crash out by 2am with my brother retiring to his bedroom and me sleeping on a surplus army cot.

Waking up late Sunday morning, we would flip on the radio to Casey Kasem’s “American Top 40” as we had coffee & donuts and then took care of household chores. Because disco had become so ubiquitous, I actually dreaded “AT-40.” I listened in hope that I would catch something new by The Rolling Stones, The Who, Kinks, or former Beatles. This one particular morning, that type of music seemed in short supply.

By the middle of the show, I started loudly complaining about “all that damned disco.” My brother accused me of sounding like an old person who hated Rock ‘n’ Roll. He then insisted that “disco is the sound of today. It is also the sound of the future, so you’d better get used to it.”

By this time, I was nearly frustrated to tears. To drown out the cacophony, I started vacuuming the living room carpet. When I switched off the machine, I was pleasantly surprised by something coming over the radio. I heard a very Beatlesque singer who sounded like the perfect mix of John Lennon and Paul McCartney. He sang a lilting melody that bent words over several notes. The punchy drumming played a shuffle somewhere between the early Rolling Stones and Rockabilly. A rhythm guitar riff chugged a fast Blues progression, ala Chuck Berry.  Something sounded beautifully familiar yet utterly new.

I asked my brother, “Is this an old song from the ‘sixties? It sounds like something from the British Invasion.”

My brother had no answer, but I could tell that he too was enjoying the song. When it ended, Casey Kasem hit us with the final surprise.

“And that is the latest from some newcomers from Rockford, Illinois” he announced, “You have just heard I Want You to Want Me by Epic recording artists Cheap Trick!"

Our jaws dropped. We couldn’t believe that such a goofy-looking band could sound so satisfying.

About this time, I started becoming aware of a musical phenomenon called “New Wave.” I understood it to be a movement about taking Rock back to the basics of the 1950’s and 1960’s. I had already discovered The Jam and Blondie. I wondered if Cheap Trick was also part of this movement?  The bouncy British Invasion vibe of I Want You to Want Me certainly suggested this. 

I started to wonder if Cheap Trick would prove to be a “new sensation” like Elvis Presley or The Beatles, or would they be "a flash in the pan.” Over forty years later, Cheap Trick is still here, so we all know the answer

Jim Hutter is a rock n roll musician and author of the book Just The Normal Abuse.

editor’s note: Re-broadcasts of Casey Kasem’s American Top 40 can be heard Sunday mornings from 9 am to 11:15 on Sirius/XM Radio’s 70’s Channel (channel 7, natch). It’s must-listen radio for this editor, as that clueless bastard Kasem recounts Overhyped Record Company Press Releases as Gospel Truth pretty much each & every week. Plus there’s songs on those charts that Ricki C. doesn’t even remember, and the 70’s were his Favorite Decade of rock & roll.