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Andy Paley, composer and producer who worked with Brian Wilson, has died

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Andy Paley, composer and producer who worked with Brian Wilson, has died

by the staff of Best Classic Bands

Andy Paley (r.) and Brian Wilson

Andy Paley, a composer, producer and musician described by Brian Wilson as “the most terrifyingly talented person I have met and the greatest musical genius I have encountered in many years… perhaps my entire life”, is today dead. (November 20, 2024), after a short battle with cancer. His death at the age of 72 at a hospice in Colchester, Virginia, was announced by veteran music industry publicist Bob Merlis. Just hours earlier, his wife, Heather Crist Paley, had posted on Facebook: “All of you reporting news of (Andy’s) death are causing us, his family, trouble and lying. Unless it comes from me or Bob Merlis, it’s fake news.”

Paley played a major role in behind-the-scenes studio work for more than forty years, collaborating with a remarkably diverse range of recording talent. He worked mainly as a music producer, but also as a session player and composer. Among the many artist projects in which Paley participated were recordings by the Ramones, Madonna, Jonathan Richman, Hank Ballard, Deborah Harry, NRBQ, Julia Sweeney, John Wesley Harding, Elton John, Brenda Lee, Ofra Haza, Little Richard, the Mighty Lemon Drops, Mandy Barnett, Jerry Lee Lewis, KD Lang and Brian Wilson.

Paley also provided original music for the long-running Nickelodeon animated series SpongeBob SquarePantsin collaboration with Tom Kenny, who voices the title character. He was an Emmy winner and produced Wilson’s song on the Grammy-winning album Folkways: A Shared Vision – A Tribute to Woody Guthrie and Leadbelly. Paley was musical director of Tom Kenny & the Hi-Seas, the 16-piece rock and soul band he and Kenny put together, which has become a live performance attraction.

Andy Paley with Tom Kenny, the voice of SpongeBob Square Pants

As a child growing up in the borough of Albany, New York, Paley became fascinated with rock ‘n’ roll, listened to disc jockey Boom Boom Brannigan on WPTR, and wrote and performed music before his teenage years. At the age of seven, he wrote “The Porcupine Song,” which was recorded by children’s music artist Tom (“On Top of Spaghetti”) Glazer. He was a drummer for local bands before moving to Boston in the early ’70s, where he formed Catfish Black. Soon renamed the Sidewinders, the band included future members of the Modern Lovers, including Jerry Harrison, who would later become a member of Talking Heads. They were joined by Billy Squier and moved to New York, where they played Max’s Kansas City and signed to RCA Records with Lenny Kaye producing. After the Sidewinders broke up, Paley played on sessions and gigs with Elliott Murphy, Patti Smith and Jonathan Richman, for whose later recordings Paley would serve as producer.

With his younger brother Jonathan, he formed the Paley Brothers, who epitomized the mid-1970s power pop movement, appealing to punk rock and bubblegum fans alike. They appeared on live dates with artists as diverse as Patti Smith and Shaun Cassidy, and recorded a Sire single produced by Jimmy Iovine before the label released the brothers’ full-length album in 1978.

Marc Nathan, a veteran music industry executive, was in charge of pop radio promotion for the label at the time. He recalled, “I had to figure out a way to get (the radio) to receive it. The first single was chosen, ‘You’re The Best’, and I commissioned the boys to create personalized liners for a number of radio stations that I thought were only just entering the market. Within a few days I received dozens of five-inch reel-to-reel tapes with all the necessary liners, with A & J singing the call letters, or the jock, or the program director, or the music director… You are the best, better than the rest.

“We sent out the rollers and the 45 and the race was on,” he added. “Unfortunately we never got out of the starting gate and the single received little to no airplay. We released a second single and got pretty much the same response. That was a shame because it was a damn good album and years later it became one of those cult classics that was finally re-released on compact disc with bonus tracks.

“I’ve had a lot of failed records in my promotional career, but I was extremely disappointed that I couldn’t get them off the ground, because Andy and Jonathan were great people, and although I’ve lost track of Jonathan over the years , is Andy and I remained close for over forty years.”

The brothers joined forces with Ramones for a cover version of Ritchie Valen’s ‘Come On Let’s Go’, which was featured in the film. Rock ‘n’ roll high school and recorded with Phil Spector at the legendary Gold Star Studios. “Baby, Let’s Stick Together”, their final studio recording, was reportedly the last session ever held at Gold Star before it closed.

At the behest of Seymour Stein, Paley became a permanent producer at Sire Records, where he produced Brian Wilson’s critically acclaimed comeback album in 1988. He co-wrote several of the album’s songs with Wilson, as well as a handful of previously unreleased songs. officially released. He produced the Dick Tracy soundtrack album and wrote most of the album’s songs with vocal performances from k.d. lang, Take 6, Jerry Lee Lewis, Brenda Lee, Tommy Page, August Darnell, Patti Austin, Erasure, Ice-T, LaVern Baker, Al Jarreau and Darlene Love. He continued to work in the field of film music and produced soundtracks for A walk on the moonWild Orchid, A Rage In Harlem and Drop Dead Beautiful.

In one Los Angeles Times In an interview published in 1990, Paley marveled: “Never in my wildest dreams did I think I would work with Brian Wilson and Darlene Love, or that Jerry Lee Lewis would ever record a song I had in mind with him written. These are people I listened to when I was a little kid, who meant more to me than anything. I dropped out of high school when I was 15 years old, after 11th grade. I never got a degree and maybe I didn’t pay attention in some classes, but I certainly paid attention to Darlene Love, and I paid attention to Brian Wilson. That’s what I really cared about. I’m excited to work with these people later in life.”