Kim Fowley

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Kim Fowley (born July 21, 1939) is an American record producer, impresario, songwriter and occasional recording artist. The son of Hollywood character actor Douglas Fowley (Singin' in the Rain), Kim's scattergun career in the music industry has been as varied and eccentric as it has been long. He has generally remained on the fringes of the mainstream industry, free to immerse himself in obscure and offbeat projects while occasionally stumbling on (and then happily milking) commercial success. Of all his ventures, he is perhaps best known for being behind a string of novelty and/or cult rock 45s during the 1960s, for co-founding the all-girl punk group The Runaways in the 1970s with Joan Jett and Sandy West— whence also came Cherie Currie and Lita Ford — and, perhaps surprisingly, for working as a producer and songwriter with Helen Reddy in the late 1970s, including her album Ear Candy.

During the 1960s in Los Angeles, Fowley produced and/or wrote hundreds of recordings with a wide range of acts and in a remarkably broad spectrum of styles - from bubblegum novelty rockers to girl group ditties, from folk and country to acid rock. While many attained a cult status over time, only a few achieved mainstream commercial success. His three biggest hits - all as producer - were "Alley Oop" by The Hollywood Argyles (a US #1 in 1960); a cover of "Nut Rocker" by B. Bumble and the Stingers (a UK #1 in 1962); and "Popsicles and Icicles" by The Murmaids, a US #3 in 1963. The latter was written by a pre-Bread David Gates, then a jobbing musician and songwriter who had met Fowley while hitch-hiking in LA.

During the mid-1960s Fowley relocated for a time to London where he worked and recorded with a surprising number of then-unknown acts who went on to become famous: Cat Stevens (Fowley co-wrote "Portobello Road", the B-side of Stevens' first single "I Love My Dog"); an early incarnation of Slade known as the N'Betweens; Soft Machine (he produced their first single); and the Lancasters, an instrumental rock group featuring a young Ritchie Blackmore. He also helped Napoleon XIV record the 1966 novelty record "They're Coming to Take Me Away Ha-Haaa!", which was a hit in the UK and number 1 in the US. The B-side consisted of the A-side played backwards.

Fowley also worked as an occasional recording artist in the 1960s, issuing opportunistic flower-power albums such as Love Is Alive and Well. In 1965, he wrote and produced a song about the psychedelic experience, called "The Trip". Released as a single in June of that year, it was probably the first recorded rock song about LSD.^{[citation needed]} Though largely ignored in the USA, it scored in Europe and oddly, was one of the first releases on Island Records. Other 45s by Fowley as a recording artist included the notorious, darkly comic "Animal Man" (1968). He is a guest musician (on megaphone) on Frank Zappa's first album Freak Out!.

In 1969 Fowley produced a critically acclaimed comeback album for Gene Vincent entitled I'm Back and I'm Proud. Also in 1969 he produced Warren Zevon's first solo album. Fowley perhaps came closest to mainstream recognition (and chart success) during a period from 1969 to 1971, when he collaborated with his friend Skip Battin, then bass player for the Byrds, on a number of songs. Several appeared on the group's hit 1970 album, Untitled; one, from the 1971 LP Farther Along, was even released as a single: "America's Great National Pastime". The novelty-Americana slant of much of this material was not well-received, however.

In 1972 and again in 1973 he produced early recordings by Jonathan Richman and The Modern Lovers, many of which were released several years later.

Later he met a teenaged Joan Jett and drummer Sandy West with whom he founded the legendary all-female punk combo The Runaways. Stories about the rise and fall of The Runaways, and of Fowley's bizarre expectations of the act's members vary depending on the source.

However, by printing the girls' ages (as young as fourteen or fifteen) on the back cover of their first album, Fowley helped cement his Svengali image. Further, according to 1980s interviews with Sandy West and Cherie Currie in publications including The Guardian and The Cutting Edge, members were required to go along with the "special needs" of Fowley and his associates "if they wanted to stay in the band". According to Sandy West, "Kim Fowley told us" that Michelle Steele (later of The Bangles) and Ann Boleyn (of Hellion) "were both kicked out because they wouldn't put out in the way he expected if you know what I mean".

He also co-wrote songs for acts as diverse as KISS, Helen Reddy, Slade, Alice Cooper, Leon Russell and Kris Kristofferson. He also co-produced, with John Cale, the debut album by cult new-wavers the Modern Lovers.

His efforts as a solo artist since 1970 have sold poorly, but his albums of the 1970s such as I'm Bad and International Heroes have been cited as an influence on punk rock. Some of his New Wave styled recordings of the late 1970s have been cited as prefiguring the electroclash genre; electroclash band Add N to (X) covered his song "Invasion of the Polaroid People" on their "Loud Like Nature" album, using extensive samples of his original version. He tended to keep a lower profile in the 1990s and first half of the 2000s.

In 1984, still owning rights to the name "The Runaways", Fowley re-built the image around Gayle Welch, an unknown young teenager from New Zealand. Adding Denise Prior, Missy Bonilla (then a typist for Denny Diante at what was CBS Records) and Cathy DiAmber (Catherine Dombrowski) with David Carr on keyboards and a Chicago guitarist Bill Millay, Fowley, assisted by New Zealander Glenn Holland, recreated the spirit of the Runaways with a mildly-successful CD. Millay later went on to marry Welch.

He is featured in Mayor of the Sunset Strip, a 2003 documentary about influential LA DJ Rodney Bingenheimer, in which Cherie Currie of The Runaways claims that he was abusive to her and the group while he was their manager and producer. Fowley was sued by the members of the band in the 1990's for ownership of the name and back monies owed. The group won the suit. Fowley currently lives in California and still works as a record producer for hire and occasional recording artist. (Classic quote:

"You must be very cynical, very detached, and nothing bothers you, like me, and you'll be fine. I recommend it for all selfish bastards who have shit in their own little place. Get on a plane, immediately, and show up."

-- Kim Fowley, in Mayor of Sunset Strip, commenting on what type of people should go to Hollywood.)

In 2005 Fowley was recruited by Steven Van Zandt to host his own radio show on Van Zandt's Underground Garage radio channel heard throughout America on Sirius Satellite Radio. Fowley is presently heard every weekend on the channel - with a 4-hour show on Saturdays and Sundays.

On June 24, 2007, Fowley appeared on stage before some 17,000 fans at the Hollywood Bowl at the conclusion of the DJ Shadow and Cut Chemist performance of "Hard Sell" (aka Brain Placement: 7 Inches of Fury.) Fowley announced in a very slow and deliberate monotone, "I'm Kim Fowley and that was the Hard Sell."