Loverboy's punk roots?

July 11, 1996

Arena rockers par excellence Loverboy and alterna-gods Green Day as musical brethren?

It's true, says Loverboy bassist Scott Smith, who brings the band to the Smokin' Gun tonight.

"When we first heard Green Day, we said: `God, that sounds like a lot of the new wavy stuff we were doing. When we first got together, we had all sorts of rockabilly and new wave flavors on our first record.

"We listen to the Green Day record and say, God, that's awful close to what we were doing.

"In effect, Green Day are following a punk revival. And in the '70s, there was a big punk thing going on, and it was a big influence for us."

Whatever alternative roots Loverboy may have had were ditched in favor of the kind of stadium pop that dominated the early 1980s. By the end of the decade, as the biggest selling groups of the era watched their audiences vanish, Loverboy opted to drop out .

"All these commercial pop-rock bands like ourselves and Foreigner and Journey got flushed down the toilet, because all of us had lost touch of what was happening on the street," reckons Smith, who spent this week in Ottawa with his family.

Smith says he sold his Lambourghini and fishing boat, dismissed his domestic staff and simplified to the point where he could live off investments and royalties "trickling through the old record pipeline."

"I look back on that and I think it was frivolous, wasteful. In the '80s, we had a lot of dough.

"I don't need any of these people. They're all very nice ... but it's my little circle of hired help. So we stripped all that away."

After working for singer Stevie Nicks' L.A.-based label, Smith decided to reluctantly rejoin Loverboy for reunion shows in 1992. Much to the band's surprise, playing the oldies circuit, without the pressure of delivering hit records, gave them a new life.

"The whole weight just lifted off us. We can jam. We can do some blues songs. We're having fun with it now, rather than it being such an intense business thing in the '80s."

Separated from the industry, but now back in contact with its audience, Loverboy realized the effect they've had on their fans.

"We look back and go: `We had our 15 minutes, but we didn't have much of an impact.' But we talk to so many people who say that was the best time of their lives ... They associate it with this great era. They speak candidly, from their heart. This song is etched in their memory.

"When you are part of that many people's lives and memories, maybe you can say, `I don't need to write the book on the music industry.'

"I don't need to do anything, except write some songs that are valid in 1996."

With that in mind, expect a new Loverboy album out at Christmas.