One person’s view: “This might just be the most over-baked soft rock song of the entire 1970s: a pretentious, gooey mess of saccharine slop.” – dagwood525 @ Rate Your Music
The public’s view: 2.26 / 5.00, the third-worst #1 hit of 1976
Barry Manilow is not as popular today as he once was, but that doesn’t mean he’s been consigned to history’s dustbin along with Lawrence Welk. His Wikipedia article notes that his songs are still sometimes employed to deter loitering and to drive protesters away from government buildings. Researchers are probably working on using highly targeted doses of “Mandy” to kill cancer cells. And “I Write the Songs” is the type of record that you never forget after a few listens. It’s so majestic and spiritual that it seems sacrilegious to force it through an AM radio in a Chevy Impala, yet that’s exactly the kind of crazy shit that people did back in the ‘70s.
“I Write the Songs” has one of the most unusual lyrical concepts of any #1 hit. It is sung from the viewpoint of Music itself, which is operating as sort of a subsidiary of God. God (d/b/a Music) informs us that He has been alive forever and that He wrote the very first song. He goes on to explain that He, in fact, writes all the songs, and that He threw some rock ‘n’ roll our way so that we “can move.” What a helpful deity.
So why would God write another song to tell us all this? Because this is apparently the insecure God who we remember from the Old Testament, and He’s tired of us humans taking credit for all of His songwriting work. When BMI lists Ray Stevens as the composer of “The Streak” without acknowledging God’s contribution, it’s like erecting an idol to Baal. Yet God seems to have mellowed out since the days of the Golden Calf, Sodom and Gomorrah, and the Great Flood. There’s no vengeance this time. He makes His point with a bunch of grandiose trumpet flourishes, some hard-hitting background singers, and a triumphant key change, and then goes away without even demanding the publishing royalties that are rightfully His.
If we accept that God writes every song, then this leads to a lot of other questions that I’d like to ask Him. Do you also write all the books, God? Paint all the paintings? Sculpt all the sculptures? Including that Golden Calf? Ha, got you on that one, God!
With lyrics this weird and narcissistic, it’s impossible for anyone to sing “I Write the Songs” without inviting some amount of derision. Manilow understood this and was reluctant to record it. After caving under pressure from his label boss Clive Davis, he decided to lean in to the song’s premise all the way. He starts out slowly, but builds up to a bombastic finish that has listeners wondering if the “Ron Dante” guy who is listed as co-producer on the record is actually just a pseudonym for God. Manilow may not have wanted to do this song, but he definitely got into it once he did. Compare this version to the one by the Captain & Tennille, and it’s easy to hear why one was a hit and one wasn’t.
I see Barry Manilow as something of a musical magician here. A magician saws a woman in half and leaves everyone in awe at the talent and rehearsal that went into his act. Manilow turned a thoroughly ridiculous composition into a #1 record, and I am in awe at the talent and genius that this required of him as a singer, arranger, and co-producer. However, just like you really shouldn’t go around sawing people in half, you also shouldn’t be subjecting them to “I Write the Songs”. It’s perhaps the most memorable hit that I’ve covered so far on this blog, but I’m fine with leaving it in the past.
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