Dreams don’t fade away so easily. While Bruce Springsteen and Jon Bon Jovi were determined to achieve world domination, fellow New Jersey native Pat DiNizio was simply happy to join the family business, picking up trash for N.A. DiNizio & Sons Disposal. But like so many others, he got swept up in the musical tsunami that was 1977. Talking Heads: 77 and Elvis Costello’s My Aim Is True, both debuts, were just two examples of what inspired him to follow through on what he was always meant to do. Or as he memorably put it in a 2010 interview with PopEntertainment.com, “I lost interest in garbage and rekindled my lifelong interest in rock’n’roll and the guitar.”
When the Smithereens released their first EP, Girls About Town in 1980, DiNizio had a job at an advertising agency in Times Square. Around the same time in nearby Hell’s Kitchen, Bon Jovi worked for his cousin Tony Bongiovi as a janitor/gofer at the legendary Power Station recording studio. Back in the year that changed the course of DiNizio’s life, Bongiovi co-produced Talking Heads: 77 and Rocket to Russia by the Ramones. The latter featured “Here Today, Gone Tomorrow,” a mid-tempo danceable dirge dealing with a breakup. In other words, proto-Smithereens. DiNizio even sounded like Joey Ramone, and the perpetually bouncing and kicking bassist Mike Mesaros resembled Dee Dee Ramone.
It wouldn’t be until 1986 when the Smithereens released their full-length debut, Especially for You. The first single “Blood and Roses” was all over the radio and MTV that year. It became as an indelible a part of ’86 as Peter Gabriel’s So, The Dark Knight Returns, Miami Vice, Pretty in Pink, R.E.M.’s Lifes Rich Pageant, The Color of Money, Late Night with David Letterman, Van Halen’s 5150, the World Champion New York Mets, and of course, Bon Jovi’s Slippery When Wet, their mainstream commercial breakthrough, where they went from Uncle Floyd to Pink Floyd.
In the synth-dominated ‘80s, “Blood and Roses” stood out, bridging the gap between the ‘70s folk/punk/psychedelic nocturnal delirium of “Gimme Danger” by the Stooges, and the ‘90s power pop melancholia of The Lemonheads and Nirvana. Not surprisingly, Kurt Cobain once mentioned that Nirvana frequently listened to the Smithereens when they recorded Nevermind. In Journals, he listed Especially for You as one of his favorite records, alongside other classics like Aerosmith’s Rocks and Master of Reality by Black Sabbath.
Much like Nirvana, the Smithereens were a mighty combination of grief and guitar, with DiNizio writing breakup songs as well as anyone. He completely understood the mournful desolation of a relationship’s immediate aftermath. In “Strangers When We Meet,” just the vocal harmonies alone convey a powerful sense of loss. And their second album, 1988’s Green Thoughts, had gems like “Only a Memory” and “House We Used To Live In.” The latter contains the lyrics “Our house was not a home/And we both felt alone it seems/It is empty now/Worn and broken like our dreams.” They weren’t called the Smithereens for nothing.
Ironically, their most well-known song wasn’t about endings, but the earnest optimism of a new beginning. Cameron Crowe commissioned the Smithereens to write the theme song/boom box moment for Say Anything… However, the decision was made not to use the song, because it was felt the lyrics to “A Girl Like You” revealed too much of the plot. So close to cinema immortality, yet Peter Gabriel’s “In Your Eyes” was undeniably the right choice. A few years later, Crowe gave DiNizio a cameo as Sid in Singles. Fittingly, he can be seen briefly in the background during the disintegration of a relationship, as Bridget Fonda dumps Matt Dillon, justifiably damning him with the faint praise, “I think you’re very… entertaining.” Another scene has Campbell Scott and Kyra Sedgwick going through Scott’s vinyl collection, with Especially for You prominently displayed near them. It’s a perfect homage to a band whose songs were often about the complexities of relationships.
The only time I saw the Smithereens live was with my ex-girlfriend, appropriately enough, as part of a 2010 tribute to the Who at Carnegie Hall. They did “The Seeker” (originally covered by them as the B-side to “Strangers When We Meet” back in ’86), which then segued into the majestic instrumental “Sparks” from Tommy. (Cameron Crowe used it for the pivotal “Listen to Tommy with a candle burning and you will see your entire future” scene in Almost Famous.) It was a savvy decision to combine the two, since “Sparks” actually feels like the act of seeking, and both are songs of introspection executed with brute force.
The Smithereens clearly realized this, so while deservedly renowned as an elite power pop band, there was an emphasis on “power” that evening. Like the band they were honoring, their performance fused the primitiveness of garage rock with the grandiosity of classical music, resulting in intense psychedelic hard rock euphoria.
On the morning of December 13th, the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame revealed that Bon Jovi, after almost a decade of eligibility, would finally be inducted. Just a few hours later, it was announced that DiNizio had passed away. He never attained the level of success Jon Bon Jovi has managed to sustain for the last three decades. Instead, DiNizio did something even more substantial. He became one of music’s keenest observers of the world, while still creating the kind of loud, riff-based rock’n’roll that makes it a better, more dynamic place to live.
Not all dreams are the same. We should consider ourselves fortunate that DiNizio accomplished his.
Matt Leinwohl