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Adventures Through The Mines Of Mellow Gold 40

Jason Hare July 18, 2007 66

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Welcome back, folks, to another week of Adventures Through The Mines Of Mellow Gold! I want you to know that I am covering today’s song under great duress. It took me a while to get up the nerve to write about it. Even my cat tried to stop me.

Todd Rundgren – Hello It’s Me (download)

It’s not that I have anything against “Hello It’s Me.” (Actually, I have a lot against “Hello It’s Me” but we’ll explore that later.) It’s just that…remember that episode of The Simpsons where Bart becomes famous for uttering the catchphrase “I didn’t do it” on Krusty’s show? And so everywhere he goes, people want him to say “I didn’t do it?” Well, for a brief period, this blog got very Rundgren-centric. People started both discussing and requesting “Hello It’s Me.” Terje sent it to me first. Robert mentioned it in the comments. So did Elaine. Finally, Mike began subtly dropping hints in online conversations.

Mike: What’s on the plate for MG this week?
Jason: Well, I don’t know. I…
Mike: (Rundgren)
Jason: I was thinking maybe I should…
Mike: (Ruuuuuuuuuuuuuuuundgrennnnnnnnnnnn)
Jason: Yeah, but I also thought that…
Mike: (RUNDGREN!)

So there’s a lot of pressure riding on this one. But I’m going to try and get it over with. There you have it, Mike. I am officially your Rundgren Monkey. (Now that’s a band name.) Hope you’re happy.

“Hello It’s Me” is really not Mellow Gold from a musical standpoint (from a musical standpoint, it’s a Carole King ripoff), but lyrically, OH MY GOD. It easily ranks up there with some of the very, very wimpiest of the wimpy.

Men have, for years, been implored to really get in touch with their soulmates. No more of this sitting-on-the-couch-and-watching-the-game bullshit. “Communication is essential. Talk about your feelings.” Todd Rundgren almost singlehandedly flipped that entire movement on its ass. “Hello, It’s Me” is so rife with emotional rambling that Todd should be sending every penny he made on this song to the people who were forced to listen to it. Think of it as a therapist fee.

Shall we take a look at these emasculating, damn near embarrassing lyrics?

Hello it’s me
I’ve thought about us for a long, long time
Maybe I think too much but something’s wrong

Ahhh, a Mellow Gold benchmark: contemplating your inadequacies, right in front of the girl woman lady to whom you’re singing. Well done, sir Rundgren!

There’s something here that doesn’t last too long

Okay, this isn’t even close to proper English, is it? When I was five years old, I wrote a song that rhymed “moon” with “baboon.” I feel like even then, I had one up on Todd.

Maybe I shouldn’t think of you as mine

Okay, just in terms of rhyming patterns, is this supposed to rhyme with “time?” That seems to be the only thing I can come up with, but for some reason, I’m thinking this pattern sucks.

Wait, he’s got more to say.

Seeing you
Or seeing anything as much as I do you

Yup, that’s right. “Seeing anything as much as I do you.” It’s like they had a contest to try and write the most awkward lyric.

I take for granted that you’re always there
I take for granted that you just don’t care

Just when I thought this song couldn’t get any dumber, it gets dumberer. So what are we talking about here, Todd? What’s up with this relationship? The first line tells me that the problem is that you’re not happy. The second line implies it’s the other way around. Unless you mean that she just doesn’t care if you treat her horribly. Are you both unhappy? Is it because you wrote this song and she had to listen to it? And did you know that there’s now a third unhappy party? Hello, it’s me!

Sometimes I can’t help seeing all the way through

Sometimes you can’t help seeing WHAT all the way through? The relationship? This goddamn song? I’m pulling my hair out listening to you ramble!

Oh shit, here comes the chorus.

It’s important to me
That you know you are free

If it’s so important to you, why can’t you sing those lines, you big sissy? Admit it! You pussed out! You figured: she hasn’t been listening to anything else I’ve said, I might as well try getting someone else to help put the point across! They’re like little gnats, buzzing around our ears. Please, Todd. Kill them.

‘Cause I never want to make you change for me

And there you have it, folks: with that one final line of the chorus, Todd Rundgren officially threw his hat into the ring for the Wussiest Line Ever. Somewhere, England Dan felt his ears getting hot, and he knew he had a challenge on his hands.

Think of me
You know that I’d be with you if I could
I’ll come around to see you once in a while
Or if I ever need a reason to smile

I’ll freely admit that I can be a tad dense sometimes, so please, help me out here. Am I missing the meaning behind this song? I still don’t understand who’s breaking up with who here. Is he breaking up with her because he’s a jerk? Am I just a maroon for trying to figure this all out? Is this why nobody will talk to me anymore? Maybe I think too much but something’s wrong.

Anyway, if the song ended here, we’d know that Todd had was a first class Fogelberg, through and through. But then, suddenly, Todd’s penis interrupts.

And spend the night if you think I should

You gotta love it. You just gotta love it. The man can’t help but just throw that little hint in there. But he’s smart: he makes it look like it’s not his idea. No, no, no! It’s important to him that she knows she’s free! But, you know, if she thinks he should, well, then. “Okayyyy…I guess if I have to…” And you know what? Todd’s pretty smart. After hearing this song, I imagine the girl woman lady would have done just about anything to get him to shut up. Well, done, sir! Well done! Your cunning little plan worked!

And yet…there is something 100% irresistible about this song, isn’t there? Once it’s in my head, it’s in my head for hours, and I honestly don’t mind it. I find myself singing it aloud. I think it must have to do with the music: those beautiful, minor 7 and 9 chords, and that key-change near the end, which I have to admit is pretty kick-ass. Those keyboards. The trumpet. It’s not Mellow Gold in the slightest, but man, is it catchy. Still, though, I’m overpowered by the lyrics. It makes me feel like maybe Todd Rundgren shouldn’t have sung this song. It should have been sung by Woody Allen, or some other nebbish-y, accountant-type guy.

Download:



It’s official: I’ve lost any trace of dignity I had left. By the way, this is the voice of the guy who does my taxes.

So what could be worse than listening to this incessant rambling (either me or Todd)? How about listening to a version so unbearably slow that Rundgren’s version is referred to as “the uptempo version?” I’m dead serious.

Nazz – Hello It’s Me (download)

Yes, this is the version Rundgren recorded with Nazz, his psychedelic garage band from the late ’60s. When it started, I was wondering if maybe I was playing it at the wrong speed. Enjoy…or don’t. Either way, it’s time for us to move on to some video!

Behold! RUNDGREN, IN ALL HIS NIPPLED GLORY! This video could also be subtitled Todd Makes It A Point To Touch Every Fucking Hand In The Audience. I imagine this entire crowd came down with the flu shortly after the show.

By the way, if you listen carefully to the studio version of “Hello It’s Me,” you may notice that Todd attempts to riff/scat on the vocal. It’s kind of a mess, but it’s back in the mix and relatively subtle. Around the 2:17 mark of this video (or 1:45 if the counter’s going backwards), Todd goes for some falsetto riffing and fails so miserably that he makes LeBon’s Live Aid fuckup look like a Pavarotti performance.

Well, there you have it. That’s as much as I can glean out of this one for the day. I’m sure you have many thoughts about this Mellow classic, and I can’t wait to hear them. In the meantime, I’m going to go back and listen to this song again. I kinda love it. See you next week for yet another Adventure!

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About the author: Jason Hare View all posts by
Jason Hare used to love Christmas. He feels differently now.
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  • http://captivewildwoman.blogspot.com Anonymous

    I remember when he got all tough and political in Utopia’s Hiroshima, which ended with the chorus: Hiroshima, Nagasaki, Don’t you ever forget–don’t you ever fucking forget–HIROSHIMA!!! (Boom! fizzzz [sound fx]). It was a lushly orchestrated toughness. Tough lush Rundgren. And probably on my death bed some semblance of Hello It’s Me will be running through my thoughts at some point–so damn catchy and annoying, yet truthful in its sensitive cad construct.

  • http://captivewildwoman.blogspot.com/ Miss Lisa

    I remember when he got all tough and political in Utopia’s "Hiroshima," which ended with the chorus: Hiroshima, Nagasaki, Don’t you ever forget–don’t you ever fucking forget–HIROSHIMA!!! (Boom! fizzzz [sound fx]). It was a lushly orchestrated toughness. Tough lush Rundgren. And probably on my death bed some semblance of "Hello It’s Me" will be running through my thoughts at some point–so damn catchy and annoying, yet truthful in its "sensitive cad" construct.

  • http://mulberrypanda96.blogspot.com/ Robert

    Rocky and Elaine, you two are cruel for linking to Bebe Buell pictures we can’t access! Were either of you trying to link to the shot of her wearing nothing but a T-shirt with Rundgren’s face on it?

    I read the parts about Rundgren in her book — yes, she makes him look like a tool, but when she says Prince wrote “Little Red Corvette” about her even though they’d never met, she looks like a tool herself. I think I commented on this before on this site: Buell thought Prince was saying “Bebe, you’re much too fast” instead of “Baby, you’re much too fast,” and even in 1983, about six years past her celebrity prime, she still considered herself popular enough in the rock community that Prince, who was relatively new to the scene, would want to reference her in a song. Good grief …

    Dw, I like your theory about the song quite a bit. Rundgren is manipulative but trying to appear sensitive. I think we all knew a guy like this in college. He got all the women while I fumed about being oversensitive and not smart enough to be manipulative. Poor fucking me. I haven’t heard Joe Jackson’s cover of “Couldn’t I Just Tell You”; I’ll have to look that up. Smudge, an Australian band, did a down-tempo cover of it in the ’90s that’s nice. I feel like I’ve heard another cover of the song somewhere before.

    Jason, your Woody Allen impression is frighteningly close to the actual voice of Poison’s C.C. DeVille. What do you think of bandmate Bret Michaels’s new reality show, C.C.? And is Bret bald underneath all those cowboy hats and bandannas? Is that what he’s trying to cover up?

    Miss Lisa, when Todd gets serious it’s not pretty — have you heard “Sometimes I Don’t Know What to Feel,” where he talks about a car crushing “a little dog under its wheels”? Or “Bag Lady”? Not in your wheelhouse, Todd! Back away!

    I remember seeing that “Hello It’s Me” performance on VH1 Classic five years ago. Not the best performance, but still fun to see Rundgren doing it without irony, because these days he half smirks his way through it.

  • http://mulberrypanda96.blogspot.com/ Robert

    Rocky and Elaine, you two are cruel for linking to Bebe Buell pictures we can’t access! Were either of you trying to link to the shot of her wearing nothing but a T-shirt with Rundgren’s face on it?

    I read the parts about Rundgren in her book — yes, she makes him look like a tool, but when she says Prince wrote “Little Red Corvette” about her even though they’d never met, she looks like a tool herself. I think I commented on this before on this site: Buell thought Prince was saying “Bebe, you’re much too fast” instead of “Baby, you’re much too fast,” and even in 1983, about six years past her celebrity prime, she still considered herself popular enough in the rock community that Prince, who was relatively new to the scene, would want to reference her in a song. Good grief …

    Dw, I like your theory about the song quite a bit. Rundgren is manipulative but trying to appear sensitive. I think we all knew a guy like this in college. He got all the women while I fumed about being oversensitive and not smart enough to be manipulative. Poor fucking me. I haven’t heard Joe Jackson’s cover of “Couldn’t I Just Tell You”; I’ll have to look that up. Smudge, an Australian band, did a down-tempo cover of it in the ’90s that’s nice. I feel like I’ve heard another cover of the song somewhere before.

    Jason, your Woody Allen impression is frighteningly close to the actual voice of Poison’s C.C. DeVille. What do you think of bandmate Bret Michaels’s new reality show, C.C.? And is Bret bald underneath all those cowboy hats and bandannas? Is that what he’s trying to cover up?

    Miss Lisa, when Todd gets serious it’s not pretty — have you heard “Sometimes I Don’t Know What to Feel,” where he talks about a car crushing “a little dog under its wheels”? Or “Bag Lady”? Not in your wheelhouse, Todd! Back away!

    I remember seeing that “Hello It’s Me” performance on VH1 Classic five years ago. Not the best performance, but still fun to see Rundgren doing it without irony, because these days he half smirks his way through it.

  • http://stylusmagazine.com/stypod/ Stephen

    Of course the one week I don’t have internet, the song I’ve been begging for all along goes up! Kudos on the lyric analysis, it does contain some of the most awkward lyrics ever put to tape, but I suppose I always figured Todd knew just how cheesy and wussy the lyrics were, but either didn’t care or just thought it was funny. Considering so much of the album is kind of a joke, I guess I assumed this one could’ve been too — but I think I’m giving him way too much credit, especially when you consider some of the cheesiness of his older songs.

  • http://stylusmagazine.com/stypod/ Stephen

    Of course the one week I don’t have internet, the song I’ve been begging for all along goes up! Kudos on the lyric analysis, it does contain some of the most awkward lyrics ever put to tape, but I suppose I always figured Todd knew just how cheesy and wussy the lyrics were, but either didn’t care or just thought it was funny. Considering so much of the album is kind of a joke, I guess I assumed this one could’ve been too — but I think I’m giving him way too much credit, especially when you consider some of the cheesiness of his older songs.

  • http://stylusmagazine.com/stypod/ Stephen

    Oh, and does anyone by chance want to upload that Joe Jackson cover?

  • http://stylusmagazine.com/stypod/ Stephen

    Oh, and does anyone by chance want to upload that Joe Jackson cover?

  • http://mulberrypanda96.blogspot.com/ Robert

    Probably one reason he smirks through the song now is because, as Blow It Out Your Ass pointed out, he wrote it nearly 40 years ago. I think he wasn’t even 20 yet when Nazz started. Are any of us still thrilled with stuff we wrote in our late teens?

    By the way, is it just Nazz or is it THE Nazz? I don’t think “The Nazz” ever appeared on their album covers. And what’s up with Rhino’s edition of “Nazz III”? Everything I’ve read about this album says that Rundgren’s vocals were erased on the final product, but his voice is clearly the one singing “Loosen Up” and “You Are My Window.” Anyone know what the deal is?

  • http://mulberrypanda96.blogspot.com/ Robert

    Probably one reason he smirks through the song now is because, as Blow It Out Your Ass pointed out, he wrote it nearly 40 years ago. I think he wasn’t even 20 yet when Nazz started. Are any of us still thrilled with stuff we wrote in our late teens?

    By the way, is it just Nazz or is it THE Nazz? I don’t think “The Nazz” ever appeared on their album covers. And what’s up with Rhino’s edition of “Nazz III”? Everything I’ve read about this album says that Rundgren’s vocals were erased on the final product, but his voice is clearly the one singing “Loosen Up” and “You Are My Window.” Anyone know what the deal is?

  • http://underneathica.blogspot.com jon

    Jason, you made my wife’s day. She was looking for Hello It’s Me and discovered that it’s not available on itunes or emusic, except the recent Todd and friends version. Apparently Todd has a friend who thinks that everything goes better with Velveeta-cheesy sax solos. She enjoyed the humor in your posts, esp. the one about Paul Davis’ speed metal phase. I told her that bloggers appreciate comments, and she told me to do it. Yes, dear! That’s the way I roll, Paul Davis style.

  • http://underneathica.blogspot.com jon

    Jason, you made my wife’s day.  She was looking for "Hello It’s Me" and discovered that it’s not available on itunes or emusic, except the recent "Todd and friends" version.  Apparently Todd has a friend who thinks that everything goes better with Velveeta-cheesy sax solos.   She enjoyed the humor in your posts, esp. the one about Paul Davis’ speed metal phase.  I told her that bloggers appreciate comments, and she told me to do it.  Yes, dear!  That’s the way I roll, Paul Davis style.

  • http://jasonhare.com Jason

    Hello It’s Me is very much available on iTunes – I think I count at least 16 instances of the song by Todd on there, let alone all the other weenies who have covered it – but I’m glad that the search for the tune led you and your wife here. Anybody who has a better day as a result of Mellow Gold in #1 in my book. Hope you guys will stick around!

  • http://jasonhare.com Jason

    Jon,

    "Hello It’s Me" is very much available on iTunes – I think I count at least 16 instances of the song by Todd on there, let alone all the other weenies who have covered it – but I’m glad that the search for the tune led you and your wife here.  Anybody who has a better day as a result of Mellow Gold in #1 in my book.  Hope you guys will stick around!

  • http://stylusmagazine.com/stypod/ Stephen

    I did a search for "Couldn’t I Just Tell You" on iTunes and discovered a bizarre country version…the sample I listened to featured the exact same solo — played on a pedal steel. Actually sounded kind of good.

  • http://stylusmagazine.com/stypod/ Stephen

    I did a search for Couldn’t I Just Tell You on iTunes and discovered a bizarre country version…the sample I listened to featured the exact same solo — played on a pedal steel. Actually sounded kind of good.

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