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We talk to the author of a new book built on interviews with some of the most important writers of popular song from the last half century.

The Guys Who Wrote 'Em: Songwriting Geniuses of Rock and Pop by Sean Egan

Leiber & Stoller. Mann&Weil. Greenwich & Barry. Bobby Hart. Chip Taylor. Holland-Dozier-Holland. Tony Macaulay. Stock, Aitken & Waterman. Few would recognise these men in the street (well, Pete Waterman aside, perhaps, due to his numerous UK TV appearances) but nonetheless, the aforementioned individuals and writing teams are responsible for some of the best-loved, highest-selling and most famous songs of all time.

From Elvis Presley’s massive hit Jailhouse Rock (to this day, something of a perennial) to the likes of You've Lost That Lovin'Feelin', Leader Of The Pack, (Theme From) The Monkeys, Reach Out I'll Be There, Wild Thing, Build Me Up Buttercup and even Kylie’s initial chart smasher I Should Be So Luckythe melodies and lyrics created by these writers are as embedded in the minds of music lovers worldwide as much their songs have seeped into the water table of global culture.

Exclusive Interviews

Now, with the aid of lengthy and exclusive interviews with some of these, arguably the biggest names - and conversely, some of the least known faces - in the whole history of rock and pop song writing, Sean Egan's book focuses exclusively on the composers working behind the scenes of popular songs.

"You may not recognise many of the names, but you’ll certainly know the songs. 'Egan has...come up with a book that is packed with fascinating insights and anecdotes...on the creative process and the history of popular music over the last 50 years." – What’s On, October 2004.

The Guys Who Wrote 'Em invites its readers to join journalist and novelist Egan - he’s the same man, by the way who wrote the excellent hard-living music novel Sick Of Being Me a couple of years back - in a whistle stop tour of the output, the highs, lows and fascinating stories behind this series of compositional geniuses. Whether working as part of a song writing team or alone Egan takes them each in turn, from the earliest (Leiber & Stoller), to the most recent (Messrs Stock, Aitken & Waterman), they are all people who for most of their careers have found themselves using their talents to help not themselves but others to achieve stardom through creating ‘hit’ songs.

From wildly different social backgrounds, some turn out to have been former players in long-forgotten bands, who fell into song writing as a way of expressing their musical urges when they (and/or their indifferent audiences) found life on the road less than compelling and less than lucrative. Some, it seems, set out to be composers and arrangers from the start. Many seem to be speaking for the first time - it seems that the composers behind the hits have long been overlooked by the authors of the seemingly endless stream of books and articles about the artists who performed their songs.

Recommended Listening

Another useful addition is a pretty good appendix of ‘recommended listening’, for those inspired by the many tales in the book to search out some of the recordings that made the songs (and singers) famous – and paid the rent for the songwriters. Though it very much depends on what your personal musical taste is – as to how interested you are in the back-stories to the songs themselves, I found that the stories of the (often struggling, sometimes ignored, almost always virtually anonymous) songwriters share a commonality that belies the many varied musical styles they are working in.

The end result is a neat recounting of some of the major milestones in the history of the post-Elvis popular song, told from an intriguing and delightfully lateral angle. A fascinating previously untold ‘hidden history’ of popular music told eleven detailed chapters, The Guys Who Wrote 'Em will be invaluable to anyone who’s ever squinted at the names in the brackets on their record sleeve or CD case and wondered ‘just who are these people?’

We spoke to Sean Egan, author of the book - out 31 October – and asked him about how he came to write it – and what other professional writing he’s been involved in.

Q: Tell us, how did you first get started as a published author?
A: “Amazingly, my first professional work was a couple of episodes of Eastenders. A script editor to whom I sent an original script felt the London vernacular was suited to that programme so I cobbled together a sample episode of Eastenders. They liked it and commissioned a couple of episodes from me - but I didn’t last because I was too touchy about my work being tampered with.”

Q: You have a journalistic background, but was it always your intention to fiction (I’m thinking of Sick Of Being Me, which is, I think, your only novel), or is non-fiction - such as this new book - where your heart is?
A: “Writing is writing but my preference is for fiction. Unfortunately, it's far harder to break into the fiction market, so I drifted into music journalism. I've still got a couple of novels planned, though. Fiction is also a lot easier as, unless you're writing an historical novel, there’s no research needed.”

‘Immortals’ Of Rock

Q: You’ve done a number of works on various musicians and bands prior to your look at composers in The Guys Who Wrote 'Em, is there anyone you’ve never been asked to do a book on that you would personally love to do?
A: “I’d enjoy doing a book on any of the ‘immortals’ of rock: the Beatles, the Stones, Dylan, the Clash, etc. There’s also a couple of acts I’d like to do books on but don't want to mention them in case it spurs other people to get there before me.”

Q: There are so many music books – particularly on acts since the early days of rock and roll to the present – new ones every day. Do you think there’s anything left to say about some of the artists that are repeatedly covered, or are we reaching saturation point?

A: “Occasionally one wonders whether there's anything new to say about any of the really big bands (which is partly why I so enjoyed writing the biography of The Creation, a cult band who never had any hits and so never had any books written about them). However, I think there is actually plenty of stuff to say, because serious analysis of rock only started in the early Seventies, a long time after the peak of most Sixties bands. Unfortunately, although there’s plenty to say, one does notice in my line of work that the information to write books, etc is drying up because memories of Sixties musicians are really beginning to fade and, more seriously, people of that generation are sadly beginning to die.”

Q: Where did the idea first come from – to do a book looking at the history of popular song from the point of view of the songwriters, rather than the performers?
A: “When I was writing for Record Collector magazine I noticed – in those days at least – that if they had ‘done’ an artist, that was it. You'd pitch a story about a band and they'd say, ‘Well, we did a feature on them in 1987’. So I started thinking about people they hadn't done and it occurred to me that songwriters rather than performers were an area not really covered much either by them or anybody else. That was really the genesis of this book, although ironically none of the pieces ended up in Record Collector”.

Q: Of all the many different stories in the book, which is your own personal favourite composer story/anecdote?
A: “Tony Macaulay was approached by the legendary Berry Gordy Jnr. who wanted to poach him to work at Motown. Macaulay wasn't aware that there was not a Berry Gordy Snr. and assumed that Berry Gordy Jnr. was the son of the Motown head and was completely offhand with him, virtually telling him, ‘Listen sonny, next time your dad’s in town, tell him to give me a call’.”

Q: How did you go about deciding on the subjects of the eleven different chapters of the book – did the choice of songwriters to cover just leap out at you, or was there a whittling down process to be done first?
A: “To some extent, the choices were inevitable. I’d have been very disappointed, for instance, if I hadn't got Leiber & Stoller. I think I have covered most of the great and significant songwriter’s post-Elvis. A couple of ‘biggies’ turned me down: Bacharach & David and Jimmy Webb. You could also argue that the omission of Goffin & King (who I never formally asked) is a weakness because they were so great and so successful. However, there is also an aesthetic balance that one needs to achieve and I felt that a third Brill Building songwriting couple (Mann & Weil and Greenwich & Barry are the two included in the book) would be a bit too much in terms of both circumstance and eras covered.”

Q: Can you tell us who you might have had to leave out – or say who else you would have featured, if space restrictions did not exist, or if you were doing a volume 2?
A: “I didn't leave anyone out other than Goffin & King but if there were a market for it, I’d love to do a volume two. I’d include: Paul Williams, Bacharach & David, Jimmy Webb, Guy Chambers, Goffin And King, Cook & Greenaway, Martin & Coulter (and) Paul Anka.”

Q: Most of the writers covered are widely regarded (if not too well known) as being in the first rank, due to who they’ve written for – and/or the massive sales and recognition artists doing their songs have gained. Do you think there’d be any mileage in doing a similar work about lesser known songwriters? I’m thinking of songwriters whose songs were perhaps picked up after they had been pretty unsuccessful as performers – but ended up paying the bills as default professional composers?
A: “I don't think there’d be mileage in it commercially but I do think they would make interesting stories. Certainly somebody who fits that description to some extent is Eddie Phillips, who couldn't get any hits with the classic songs he wrote for The Creation but achieved intermittent success in the following decades (including for Hillbilly Rock, Hillbilly Roll – featured in Emmerdale!)”

Q: What’s the next project? Another novel – or another non-fiction music book?
A: "I’m currently working on a project about the album Let It Bleed by the Rolling Stones – so I am getting to do one on one of the immortals, after all."

Sean Egan is the author of books on The Verve, The Animals, Jimi Hendrix, The Creation and of the acclaimed novel Sick Of Being Me. The Guys Who Wrote 'Em is out now as a paperback, from Askill Publishing, priced £15.99.

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