Read My Lips 1978 Fearless 1979 Simplicity 1981
Support your local library and check out Tim Curry’s book, “Vagabond”
His estate doesn’t need your money.
From the Vaults Full Album: https://youtu.be/BO1DpzAEN3U?si=pNfsgn5uyoSHR8uY
Opens with “Just Fourteen” written by John Philips and Mick Jagger Just as awful as you would think it was.
Sounds like Frank-n-Furter for the first 3 songs and then goes off into songs about space ships and nail biting. Baby Love is as if Jessica Rabbit and Neil Sedaka morphed into one.
There are a lot of reasons this never saw the light of day, including the common sense of the Gods
Read My Lips Wiki: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Read_My_Lips_(Tim_Curry_album)
Read my Lips 1978, Full Album: https://youtu.be/u52yxyIS-2c?si=AR1M2ebEvkKnb_dT
Reggeaed the Beatles’ “I Will”
“All I Want” attempt at a rock ballad
An Irving Berlin song sung like Al Jolsen
“Anyone Who Had a Heart” over-produced but to the same range as Curry’s voice.
The Move’s Brontosaurus: https://youtu.be/8JwVZYa1KSk?si=ZQ48egmiWNfQcFDF
Fearless Full Album 1979: https://youtu.be/bkcyn78K_gw?si=oasMKCdXS8cInr7J
Took the Joni song (Cold Steel) and Frank-n-Furtered it
“Paradise Garage” rappy-discoish 1979 song with SNL saxophone and a Frank-n-Furter growl
“Aint No Love in the Street” John Cale covering Pink Floyd
Fearless Wiki: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fearless_(Tim_Curry_album)
Fearless breakdown: https://www.allmusic.com/album/fearless-mw0001879455
Simplicity 1981 Wiki: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simplicity_(Tim_Curry_album)
Simplicity Full Album: https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLDKA3TM9TNxDJh7G91jxbMAi6c6UCn63O&si=c3br9MqNVvxx2t4R
The dregs of what was left over recordings and some covers. Questionable covers.
Tim Curry UK site: https://www.timcurry.co.uk/fearless
Curry Wiki: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tim_Curry
List Songs Wiki: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_song
https://thelistenersclub.com/2018/05/25/the-art-of-the-list-song
Musical basis in operas: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Madamina,_il_catalogo_%C3%A8_questo
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catalogue_aria
1780: Twelve Days of Christmas
1913: Irving Berlin list song https://allpoetry.com/I’ve-a-shooting-box-in-scotland
1934: Cole Porter did it in “You’re the Top”
1939: Groucho Marx “Lydia the Tattooed Lady” https://jimlanescinedrome.com/the-annotated-lydia-the-tattooed-lady
1959: “I’ve Been Everywhere” recorded by Johnny Cash and Willie Nelson
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I%27ve_Been_Everywhere
1960: Sam Cooke “Wonderful World”
1962: Pete Seeger “Turn Turn Turn”
1965: Bob Dylan “Subterranean Homesick Blues”
1965: Tom Lehrer “Who’s Next?”
1973: Antonio Carlos Jobim “Waters of March”
1974: Reunion “Life Is a Rock”.. Dutch TV: https://youtu.be/Sqbab0LOSsM?si=a3KYgd9NjWdmn1jp
1976: Wings Let “em In
Every 4th Sparks song
1978: B52s: “Rock Lobster”
1984: The Pouges “Transmetropolitan”
1987: Faith No More “We Care A Lot”
1987: REM “End of the World as We Know It”
1990: Madonna “Vogue”
1998: Barenaked Ladies: “One Week”
2000: Afroman: “Because I Got High”
2003: Blur “Brothers & Sisters”
2016: Linkin Park “Things in my Jeep”
2018: Cardi B & Bad Bunny “I Like It”
2022: Red Hot Chilli Peppers: “Poster Child”
YouTube Link: https://youtu.be/nVijRQmoZIk
The king is dead**. Long live the king**.
But Tim Curry’s records were terrible. No other way to put it.
This is my hippie aunt and uncle’s original Rocky Horror Show London cast recording they bought in the lobby of a King’s Road theatre after seeing the play in 1974. They said they never saw anything like it, and it is only one of amazing stories they have, like seriously. When I was about 10, my aunt and uncle** gave me free access to their records, but I don’t think I ever played it. Or if I did, I didn’t care for it. Back then, I understood The Who’s Tommy** easier than I did this.
But I’m not the only one who didn’t get it right away. After crowds of people loved the play in London** and loved the play in LA, the movie version was shot in England**. Then the play went to Broadway** where it bombed and closed after a few weeks. Then the movie tanked in commercial release until 20th Century Fox put it into the midnight circuit** in 1976.
But by 1980, Rocky Horror Picture Show grossed almost $70million. Only 1million of that was from it’s initial release, everything else was midnight shows. That is how 99% of Americans first heard Tim Curry**.
Producer Lou Adler** was the one who brought The Rocky Horror Show from London to LA and owned The Roxy Theatre** where it was a hit. He was also executive producer of the film. Quick recap; Adler is responsible for the Mamas** and the Papas, produced 4 Carol King records including “**Tapestry”, and all the good Cheech & Chong** records. He is a smart business man, and he knew how to parlay his acts to success. So around 1977, when the cult following began to swell around Rocky Horror Picture Show and the well-spoken, sexy, magnetic, purring, prowling, pouncing Frank-n-furter, Adler assumed that Tim Curry would be a shoe-in as a** rock star. Y’d think.
Sooo, Adler brought him into Ode Records and they started recording, but that didn’t last long. In Tim Curry’s 2025 autobiography, “**Vagabond,” he said that Lou was laser focused on what they were doing until it became apparent that they couldn’t agree on style. Adler also didn’t appreciate Curry’s desire to experiment with every single genre that he liked. But the final straw for the music veteran was over the cover of “**Baby Love.” Adler wanted Tower of Power horns but Curry wanted to slow the song down to a lounge ballad. The result was a sort of drunk Jessica Rabbit backed by a 1968 Paul Anka arrangement. Its not good. So Lou cut out and handed the production reins over to John Phillips** and his heroin habit. Curry didn’t care for the abrupt switch or Phillips’ way of doing things. Ultimately, the songs were shelved for almost 30yrs until 2010, when Adler released them as “From the Vaults**” which is a line from Rocky Horror.
Aside from Baby Love, there is the **Goffin-King song, “Spaceship Races,” one from London** Rocky Horror alums, Richard Hartley and Brian Thompson about nail biting, and no less than 3 John Phillips songs including a horrific one co-written with **Mick Jagger called “Just Fourteen.” Wait, I gotta get that taste out of my mouth. Tim Curry said, “it was just as well for the wider listening public [that the record didn’t see the light of day].” But because of his connection with Lou Adler, Tim Curry was able to get a contract with A&M** where he put out three spectacularly confusing records.
The first, 1978’s “Read My Lips” is made of mostly covers. It was produced by Bob Ezrin**, who worked with a bazillion people, most notably Alice Cooper, KISS, The Baby’s, Flo and Eddie, Deep Purple, Pink Floyd, Lou Reed, Peter Gabrial, NIN, Jane’s Addiction**, pick one! There’s more! But this isn’t any of those.
“Read My Lips” has a reggae version of The Beatles’ “I Will” that sounds like the closing credits for a Nickelodeon show set in Jamacia, there’s American Civil War song, “Wake Nicodemus” with Canadian drums and bagpipes, a Joni Mitchell song, a Burt Bacharach song, an Irving Berlin song which he sings like Al Jolsen, and a Tony Kos-in-ec composition called, “Alan” that would be perfect if this was Tim Curry’s residency at the Carlyle. Same with the Bob Ezrin/Michael Kamen tune, “Sloe Gin” except that you can’t sing “I’m so fucking lucky” over and over and over again and get radio time.
There is also a cover of The Move’s** “Brontosaurus.” Now I love this song, remember my influences**. I love the heaviness, I love the grit. I love the guitar. I also love being able to hear it. But on this version; Curry’s barritone, and the guitar, the bass, all the music is all right here. It is all the same register or tone, and it turns to mud. And that makes his “Brontosarus” sounds like I’m playing a 45 at 33. For the Hell of it, I started this version and The Move’s versions at the same time just to see, and they are the same tempo. But you can hear Roy Wood when he sings this, same with Robyn Zander on the** Cheap Trick version but you can’t find Tim Curry through all the Frank-n-furter sludge, so it is just 4-and-a-half minutes of disappointment. And don’t spell Brontosaurus. Don’t spell in any song, but don’t spell a word as long as Brontosaurus. cuz were all listening to see if you’re **spelling it right.
“Read My Lips” did nothing and it went nowhere. And rightly so.
The following year, Tim Curry put out “Fearless.” This time, the record was mostly original compositions by Curry and his new producers, Dick Wagner and Michael Kamen It went to #53 in America, mostly on the steam of the Curry/Kamen list song, “I Do the Rock.”
List songs or catalogue songs have origins in opera, Italian composers were especially fond of them. They are usually light, humorous arias of silly pratter and later tongue twisters** and as the list continues, it grows more ridiculous and the tempo increases until the song ends in exhaustion.
If the list-words rhymed it was a plus, but the rhythm was just as important and could fill in where phonetics couldn’t, think “The 12 Days of Christmas.” Nothing is rhyming with “4 calling birds, 3 french hens, 2 turtle doves” I mean they didn’t even try. Gilbert & Sullivan often used this technique as in the song, “I Am the Very Model** of a Modern Major-General” for “Pirates of Penzance.” Coincidentally, Tim Curry would be in the 1982 West End run of the play and receive an Oliver nomination for his** role as the Pirate King.
Moving into the early 20th century, Irving Berlin’s 1913 song**, “I Have A Shooting Box in Scotland” lists a series of properties a pompous man owns while it mocks the bubble of the wealthy. Rogers & Hart laid out a map of the Big Apple in their 1925 song, “Manhattan**.” And Cole Porter listed all the wonderful things his love was better than in his 1934 song, “You’re the Top**.” But for my money, the Harold Arlen and Yip Harburg 1939 classic, “**Lydia the Tattooed Lady” is the best list song from the early 20th century.
In 1960, Sam Cooke sung a list of school subjects** he didn’t know anything about in, “Wonderful World,” Two years later, Pete Seeger recorded** “Turn, Turn, Turn” a song he wrote from adapting Old Testament verses which listed the time and place for all things in one’s life. The Byrd’s recorded their **version in 1965, the same year Bob Dylan put out “Subterranean Homesick Blues” which had the rhythm** and the lists playing off of each other. 32 years later, INXS would pay homage to Dylan with their song and **video, “Meditate.”
In the early 70s, while Rocky Horror was still in London you had “Life is a Rock**” but the radio rolled me, Come on finish it with me! “at the end of my rainbow-o-w lies a golden oldie.” You have to finish it. Whoa-whoa-whoa-whoa. Anyway. In ‘76 Paul McCartney and Wings** sang “Let ‘em In”, In ‘78 The B52s gave us** “Rock Lobster.” And like every 4th Sparks** song is a list.
From the 80s to now everyone from REM** to Faith No **More, Barenaked** Ladies to **Blur, **Madonna, **Linkin Park, CardiB** & Bad Bunny they’ve all done list songs, usually evoking people and topics of their era. Tim Curry’s “I Do the Rock” rattled off a bunch of chic celebrity** names in made up chic celebrity situations all while David Sandborn is threatening to turn it into the **Saturday Night Live intro. Its very 80s. It was clever then, I still sing to it when it is on. But listening to it now is just a time capsule or a reminder that we all get old. So, go cleanse your palette with some **Afroman. I’ll wait.
Tim Curry and his band toured in support of “Fearless” and he said he enjoyed it, for a bit. He got to open for** Peter Frampton, which was cool, but he felt touring was hard and it fostered bad habits. He already had a friendly relationship with cocaine, **Studio 54 never turned him away, you know what I mean? But he felt if he continued on this musical journey there would be wreckage. And it would be him.
And he’s an actor, he’s an actor first. He is an actor who can sing**. And that’s how he put it in his book. He sang in the choir when he was a kid, his dad was a Navy minister but being a rock star was never the goal. He also couldn’t find his “character” on the stage, which meant he never felt comfortable leading a band.
When he was done touring for “Fearless” he went back to New York to star in Amadeus** on Broadway. The role earned him 3 Tony nominations. He also started rehearsals for the movie version of “Annie.” This is a lot. Especially Amedeus. Curry played Mozart to **Ian McKellon’s Salieri, and they had a very competitive stage relationship. So if you’re doing what, 8? 10? Shows a week with someone who is capable of upstaging you every night? You’re an actor and a cage fighter now.
Which is probably why his last record, 1981’s “Simplicity**” consists of some originals and a lot of really bad covers. Like, the Zombies**’ “She’s Not There” which he just talks through it, and they sort of New Wave it, like Dad-band it. Its weird. There is a version of “Dancing in the Street”, this is 4 years before **Mick and Bowie would do it, and while they’re totally different, you can’t help but listen for the **Tim Curry-Mick Jagger impression. Which isn’t fair to Tim Curry but the song sucks anyway. And there is a cover of Squeeze’s “Take Me I’m Yours**” which on it’s own is a great song, and his voice should be made for this but they add an echo to it on the verses and it mucks it up, so you get that 45 at 33 sound again. This record just isn’t for the faint of heart. Even if you love Tim Curry.
“Simplicity” came out the day they started shooting “Annie**” and A&M made no move to renew his contract. So Tim Curry’s music career was just over. Even though Tim was aware of his talents and his strengths, he said it still stung and it took a few years to really be able to enjoy music again. He also said that he did not listen to any of his albums though he did like some songs he recorded. He knew music would always be part of his life, it just wasn’t going to be front and center.
Obviously, Tim Curry had a fabulous career and the world is a dimmer place without his talents. No one will ever come close to his Frank-n-Furter**, or the Pirate King**, or Darkness**, or Long John Silver**, or Wadsworth**. Or any role he played. For real. Steven King’s nightmare creation, **Pennywise was a highly sought after role, and Curry traumatized an entire generation in the 90’s miniseries. One of the people who wanted to play the murderous clown was Alice Cooper**, so professionally I guess the universe has a way of evening things out.
You should be able to find all of Tim Curry’s records in the cheaps. Even if people are buying them now, they’ll be back. I have links to all 4 records on BandsoftheLost.com along with tons of supporting material and some really interesting stuff about list songs. But I’m a bit of a nerd.
If you want to hear about other records you may or may not have heard of back in the day, feel free to subscribe to Bands of the Lost YouTube channel or check us out at BandsoftheLost.com.
Happy Digging
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