Love Is All That I Ever Needed. Chapter 23. 1976. The Worst Year

 

1976 started horrible. On February 12, 1976 Sal Mineo was killed. Just outside his apartment in LA, he was stabbed in the heart by a mugger. He was only 37. For David it was a shock and a great personal loss.

Sal was a friend since 1965, and they were always supportive of one another. When David was in London, he always found time to meet with Sal who worked there in the early 70s. David, deeply moved, paid for Sal Mineo's casket. 

In 1976 he spiraled down. He couldn’t sleep, instead often was playing music at night with some friends. David was still working on new material, even though deep inside he knew that nothing would come out of this, and there would be no new fans. 

He mourned the loss of his career and the loss of his money. He felt like a failure, a joke, a former teen idol no one was interested in any more. Instead his younger step-brother, Shaun, was on the way to stardom. Just getting up in the morning became difficult. He tried everything to numb himself. To numb the pain. Drugs and alcohol. 

His mum tried to help him. She even moved in for a while but of course, it didn’t help. 

Ruth Aarons wanted him to appear in a new TV series, The Hardy Boys, but he didn’t want it. 

He refused his father a loan, and they stopped seeing each other. He started losing his friends, the people who wished him the best. Even Sam Hyman left him. He couldn’t stand watching David killing himself. When he told him he couldn’t be around because of it, David’s only comment was: ’I understand’, and Sam moved to Colorado.

In March 1976, David Cassidy’s second RCA album was released in the USA, UK, Australia, Germany. Japan, Turkey and France. ‘Home Is Where The Heart Is’  produced by David Cassidy and Bruce Johnston. This is entirely a David record. More than any other album recorded by him in the 70s. He was much more in control. He wrote or co-wrote 7 of 10 songs, and 3 covers from that album were outstanding. Maybe even better than the originals. 4 songs were written with Bill House in Hawaii.

There were some great reviews in the musical press, mostly in the UK. About the single from that album, ‘Tomorrow/Bedtime’ ;’This is by far the best of the ‘new’ Cassidy we heard yet, His vocal is very assured throughout and he does wonders with the high notes. The whole effect is very Beatles-ish. Very catchy, very clever.(..) I love it and it should make the top five’.

Ray Fox-Cumming, also for Record Mirror, wrote - ‘The whole album abounds with confidence and David’s singing in particular has improved immeasurably since his last album. The highlights, ‘On Fire’, ‘January’ which I prefer to ‘Pilot’ version, ‘Tomorrow’ on which HE BEATS McCARTNEY, ‘I’m Breaking Down Again’ which has a great hook, and ‘Half Past Your Bedtime’ which is a dream of the song (..) Ever since David resigned from being king of the teenies, he’s been looking for respect for his music. With this album, in my book, he’s got it.’. 

If David Cassidy had read that review, he must have been very satisfied, because in 1973 Ray Fox-Cumming wrote a very critical article about one of David’s Wembley concerts. In after listening to ‘Home Is Where The Heart Is’ he changed his mind and appreciated David’s artistic development, his hard work and his talent.

In March 1976 David was in Europe again, promoting his new album, giving press and radio interviews. He appeared on TV. In France he sang ‘On Fire’, and ‘Run and Hide’, and each time Steve Ross was with him. 

The best performance he gave was for a UK Saturday morning show called Tiswas, when he sang ‘Tomorrow’. We don’t have the exact dates of the programs David appeared on in 1976, and it’s difficult to establish the right chronology. Probably it was also in March. Everybody praised David’s ‘Tomorrow’. Paul McCartney himself said that David took that song to its ultimate potential. David’s version was very powerful, full of emotion, it was an outstanding rock number, and on Tiswas he not only sang ‘Tomorrow’ like a true rock singer. He also looked like an epitome of a rock star. Much slimmer, with long hair again, sexy, and very sure of every move he made. 

But although critically well received, the album didn’t chart in any country. The tiredness, burnout, and disappointment due to the poor reception of his music, and hard partying started to show on him. 

He became a chain smoker again. Giovanni Dadomo, who met him at the beginning of April, wrote about David: ‘his skin is stretched taut across the cheekbones. Still boyishly good looks, but much thinner, eyes raw and red as if they belonged to some alien.’ Dadomo was surprised that David was much smaller than he expected and admired his courage. ‘he could play Boy Wonder for another 20 years’. He also wondered: ‘if it’s not his ability to make people feel pleasant in his presence that’s the real secret of Cassidy’s success.’  David wrote something very similar about his own father.

In 1976 the last, third RCA album, ‘Gettin’ It In The Street’, was recorded. Again it was different from the previous ones. After the title song managed only number 105 in the USA, the album was shelved at the very last moment. It was released on schedule only in Germany and Japan. Many fans regard this outstanding, amazing album as David's best from the 70s. He co-produced it with Gerry Beckley (America), wrote or co-wrote 7 songs, and the other two were great covers.

It was a very adult oriented album, full of passion, sadness, loneliness, anger and sarcastic humor. Music was darker and more rock. David’s voice was more mature and huskier, also because the album was recorded at the famous studios at the Caribou Ranch, in the Rocky Mountains in Colorado. Between 1972 and 1985 the greatest artists worked there, including David Cassidy. 

A famous English guitarist, Mick Ronson provided a guitar solo on the title track. In October David appeared on ‘The Wolfman Jack Show’, where he presented two songs from the album, the title one, and his own composition, ‘Junked Heart Blues’. He played piano too. 

That was the second time he played the piano that year while guest starring on tv. In April on the Russell Harty Show, he accompanied himself while singing a song written by Tandyn Almer, ‘Then I’ll Be Someone’. David wanted to record it for the ‘Gettin’ It In The Street’ album, but according to Gerry Beckley he changed his mind because Mick Ronson didn’t like the song. It shows how David Cassidy was still unsure of himself and how he wanted to be regarded ‘cool’ by known rock artists. 

David again made amazing progress, as a producer, songwriter and primarily as a singer. His voice was so deep and moving on the poignant ballad ‘I’ll Have To Go Away/Saying Goodbye. Renee Armand, who co-wrote that beautiful song, after David died said in an interview: ‘I cried for him because I could hear his age, his time, he wasn’t a kid anymore. He was a man, and I could hear his live un-fixed vocal. He was singing from his heart. Like any really good singer, he was telling the truth. His truth. It hurts to hear it..’

David had great hopes regarding that album. It had quite a lot of publicity because Mick Ronson played with ‘a former teen idol’, so it was a huge disappointment when the album wasn’t released. 

Since May 1974 David Cassidy did everything he could do to write and produce good, high quality music. He learned so much, worked so hard and didn’t get new fans. The interest in his music wasn’t there. He was always nervous and unsure of himself. By the end of 1976, David lost the rest of his confidence. He stayed at home. There were non-stop parties, or he was playing music all night long with his friends. There were some women, but David said later they were opportunists who were with him only because of his money and fame. But he preferred that way. 

He didn’t sleep that December night either. In the early morning on December 12, there were still some friends at his Encino house. They were talking, and the radio was playing in the background. And that’s how David learned that his father, whom he hadn’t seen for the last nine months, his dad Jack Cassidy, died in a fire.