Rediscover: Daryl Hall: Sacred Songs

Daryl Hall’s career was on an upward trajectory in 1977. Hall and John Oates had a hot streak of three top 10 singles with “Sara Smile,” “Rich Girl” and a rerelease of “She’s Gone.” So their label RCA was more than willing to let Hall do a solo album…that is until they actually heard Sacred Songs. By then end even Nipper was holding his ears. The reason was simple: the album had been produced by Robert Fripp, who was already getting a reputation as a troublemaker. Which was obvious from this Frippian quote: “Daryl is a remarkable singer. It is too bad RCA is limiting the scope of his career. As for Hall and Oates, they are a very profitable group. They limit their format and possibilities on purpose as part of a commercial compromise they accept.”

Recorded in 1977, Sacred Songs was to be the initial offering in a trio of Fripp-produced releases including Peter Gabriel II and Fripp’s own Exposure. It took three years to finally get it released, and even this long after the fact, it’s a pretty incredible album. With no promotion the disc managed to reach 58 on the Billboard chart. Just think what might have happened if there had been some record company muscle behind it.

Fripp had arrived on American shores in 1974 after having dissolved King Crimson, and began residing in NYC’s Hell’s Kitchen. Immersed in the new wave and punk scene, Fripp had a vision of merging the drone of his Frippertronics tape loop system (developed with Brian Eno) with the frantic punk energy he was experiencing. When Fripp and Hall reconnected in ’77, Fripp was immediately drafted to fill the producer’s chair for Hall’s solo effort and lend a hand with the guitar as well.

The surprising opener “Sacred Songs” is an out and out rocker with all the marks of a tune that could have been on a Hall and Oates disk. It sounds like something created just to please the record company, except that lyrically it’s just a bit edgier. His girlfriend is asking him to give her the role of the song’s heroine, and he’s not comfortable with that. He ends up managing to be both sacred and profane in the same song, while Fripp’s production is straight forward.

The A&R guys were probably beginning to smile, as “Something in 4/4 Time” begins right where the opener left off. Lyrically though, Hall seems to be biting the hand that feeds him. The company discomfort probably began when they realized the opening stanza is a bit bruising: “Sooner or later it’s a matter of money/ And then it’s just a matter of time/ You can say you don’t care and you think it’s funny/ But baby it’s your life on the line/ You’re selling yourself and it’s a matter of fact/ Your love is your life and your life is your act.” Suddenly the staccato piano and biting guitar, bass and drums are layered over by Frippertronics and one imagines that everyone in the room immediately turned as white as a ghost. The jig is up, the fix is in. Hall, the pipsqueak needs to learn a lesson.

Yet Hall’s vocals are soulful as all get out, he’s singing like there is no tomorrow. Plus, he’s got a great band backing him, with Caleb Quaye and Roger Pope (veterans of Elton John and Hookfoot) on guitar and drums and Kenny Passarelli’s bass, a staple of records by Joe Walsh, Stephen Stills, Dan Fogelberg and Elton John.

While the suits didn’t hear anything but the Frippertronics, what they missed were a series of songs managing to combine mainstream rock with something requiring a level of thought rarely seen in Top 40. “Babs and Babs” not only straddles musical worlds, its lyrics feature lovers who happen to both be women. Hall was challenging expectations in ways that simply weren’t comfortable to mainstream audiences at the time. He and Fripp had created a framework for music that lived out on the edges while still seeming to be as mainstream as possible. So, for every edgy new fan Hall would gain, he would lose at least one of those who lived for another “Sara Smile.”

A lot of music biz folks probably never even made it to side two, where Hall featured “The Farther Away I Am” running into “Why Was It So Easy.” Hall’s vocals and Fripp’s guitar create an exquisite interplay on a romantic couple of numbers where Hall shows how his improvisations take things into uncharted territory of the heart.

Hall mines the Philadelphia soul of “Don’t Leave Me Alone With Her” without ever really leaving the grooves of a fairly straightforward rock. The guitar churns while Hall’s voice expresses the displeasure of having to deal with a woman that brings out the worst in him. The grooves mesh perfectly and when Hall starts improvising on the title you can feel desperation in every syllable. Just when you think the end is near and you can relax, Fripp fades the song back up to give you another touch of insecurity.

Closer “Without Tears” is another one of those moments of absolute heartbreak. With Hall on piano and Fripp on guitar, there is an absolute pouring out of emotion. Tellingly, Hall explains, “But if there’s one thing I’ve learned through the years/ It’s how to pour my heart out without tears.” While that’s the way the album ends, the CD includes two bonus tracks with Hall and Fripp joined by none other than Tony Levin, Jerry Marotta and Sid McGiniss. Yes, this was from the period when Fripp’s new band Discipline became a reborn King Crimson, albeit with Adrian Belew replacing McGiniss and Hall and Bill Bruford taking over for Marotta.

RCA made an egregious mistake in not releasing Sacred Songs. It’s one thing to stand out from the crowd, and another to stand the test of time. That this album does both is a testament to the shared vison of both Hall and Fripp.