Jim Keller, of Tommy Tutone and '867-5309/Jenny' fame, Breaks New Ground As He Finds 'Daylight'
The Brooklyn musician remains proud of his 1980s legacy, but looks forward always.
Jim Keller
Photo by Jimmy Fontaine
It was 1982 and Jim Keller had just finished doing an interview in support of a song he co-wrote with Alex Call. Jim thought the interview had gone well. The head of public relations at Columbia Records thought otherwise.
You may have heard of this tune—“867-5309/Jenny” by Tommy Tutone, the name of Jim and Alex’s band. It actually didn’t gain traction on the charts until 1983. But it gained iconic status for Gen X and those, including myself, who lived and died by the rotation of videos on what was then a groundbreaking new medium for music—MTV.
“The interviewer said, ‘I have to ask, what’s the story with the song?’” Jim recalled. “I said, ‘Alex and I made it up. There’s no Jenny.’”
Jim continued, “The PR person came up to me and looked me in the eye and pointed in my face and said, ‘Don’t ever do that again. You have to come up with something better than that.’ Basically, we started making up stories. The stories were more interesting than reality.”
Ahhh, Jenny.
I’m glad I didn’t hear Jim share that story when I was a teenager. I would have been crushed.
Hit songs of the 1980s offered up plenty when it came to female antagonists. There was “My Sharona” from The Knack; “Gloria” from Laura Branigan; “Rosanna” from Toto; “Veronica” from Elvis Costello (co-written with Paul McCartney); and Eileen, as in “Come on Eileen,” from Dexy’s Midnight Runners.
But Jenny was the one who put her hooks in this teenager’s back (me). Jenny had an edge. Jenny was mysterious. Jenny stepped into the spotlight, but it was obvious that, before too long, she’d retreat back into the dark.
“Jenny Jenny, who can I turn to?/You give me something/ I can hold on to/I know you'll think I'm like the others before/Who saw your name and number on the wall.”
This song has texture. There is a mood. There is a dark alley with sketchy characters. I see myself in a dingy men’s room in a dump of a nightclub, watching for just a second as some creep copies Jenny’s number off the wall.
“Jenny, Jenny you're the girl for me/Oh, you don't know me but you make me so happy/I tried to call you before/But I lost my nerve/I tried my imagination but I was disturbed”
I love this song’s sense of identity. Jenny and the creep—a peeping tom, as it were. A solid foundation for a strong tune. A story. From the dawn of MTV, musicians harnessed the new medium of video to tell their song’s story in a parallel universe, one of sights, rather than just sounds.
As someone whose Apple Music library is cuppa-joe-filled-to-the-brim with 1980s songs, “Jenny” remains as current, relevant, hip and unsettling as it did more than 40 years ago.
But I was recently turned on to a whole other side of Jim Keller, a Brooklyn resident who once managed composer Phillip Glass’ song catalog. Jim also founded St. Rose Music, which oversees publishing for a wide range of musicians, including Ravi Shankar, Tom Waits and Rufus Wainwright.
Jim Keller
Photo by Rob Aft
Jim’s reach is wide. The songwriting prowess he revealed on “Jenny” fires up the pistons on his new album, “Daylight.” And I was in no way surprised to learn that he’s still got it when it comes to taking melodies and lyrics and rhythms and generating moods and texture.
You can also learn a lot about Jim from the company he keeps. He works extensively with his fellow Brooklyn resident Byron Isaacs, the longtime bass player for Levon Helm who is currently holding down the low end for The Lumineers and soaring through the sonic sphere with his band, Lost Leaders. Jim and Byron co-wrote a majority of the songs on “Daylight.” And David Hidalgo from Los Lobos plays on “Daylight,” the second album in a Jim Keller trilogy.
The “Daylight” crew. From left, David Boucher, Mitchell Froom, Michael Urbano, Jim Keller, Bob Glaub, David Hidalgo.
Photo by Brandise Danesewich
“Daylight” has got the goods, as they say.
Take, for example, the song, “Trouble High, Trouble Low.”
This tune is S-W-A-M-P-Y. Humidity. Heat. A blazing sun in need of a dimmer. Some people dig a blinding snowstorm. For others it's torrential rain. Heat and humidity, for some reason, trigger a surge of adrenaline for me. And who doesn’t enjoy stirring up just a little bit of trouble, high and low?
“Walkin,” on the other hand, is an upbeat testimonial to resiliency and determination. The rhythm of this song evokes a steady gait and makes you feel as if you’re hitting your own stride, walking right alongside Jim as he urges you to keep up the pace.
“Bungalow Road” is a haunting, cautionary tale of infatuation gone wrong, regret and “what was I thinking?” Like “Trouble High, Trouble Low,” this song is hot and humid. The “Bungalow Road” groove left me playing the song over-and-over-and-over while dancing in my kitchen. The lyrics are cinematic, in a disturbing way that calls to mind a dark, troubling movie that keeps us mesmerized.
“I met her at a gig and followed her home/Her taillights turned down Bungalow Road/ In the morning I could barely crawl/When I saw these words scratched on her wall/ Nothing but trouble down on Bungalow Road.”
As for the closing tune on the album, “If You Love Me,” someone, in my opinion, should get this song to Mavis Staples as soon as possible. Jim does a fine job on the vocals. But, regardless of whether or not he knows it, he seems to have written it for Mavis.
“Daylight.” “Jenny." Jim Keller. Brooklyn. Mavis. It all fits together nicely. It all makes sense. I find it all inspiring. Now back to getting down to “Bungalow Road” in my kitchen. Over and over.
Visit jimkellermusic.com for information.