Innuendos, a hit single that Blue Oyster Cult turned down, and the best birthday gift a young man of 25 could give him self. Just what went in to making the multi-platinum Reckless?
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00:00 [MUSIC PLAYING]
00:05 It was the summer of '84.
00:08 Ryan Adams was in New York City working on the follow-up
00:10 to his breakthrough album, "Cuts Like a Knife," which had
00:13 sold a million copies in the US.
00:16 I mentioned the fact that you go into the studio.
00:18 Is it true you record live?
00:20 I mean, you put it right down?
00:21 Well, basically, it's the band in the studio, all the guys.
00:24 And we go in there, and we just put it down and open it up
00:26 afterwards.
00:26 But basically, it's the live band.
00:28 The new songs he recorded were good.
00:29 He was sure of that.
00:31 And he had what he considered the perfect title
00:33 for a rock and roll album, "Reckless."
00:36 But still, he had this feeling that something
00:38 wasn't quite right.
00:39 He invited his manager, Bruce Allen, to New York
00:42 and played him the album.
00:43 Allen's verdict was straight to the point.
00:45 Where's the rock?
00:46 Those three words changed everything.
00:53 Ryan called his co-songwriter Jim Valance.
00:56 When you see what happens with Jim Valance and myself,
00:58 the reason I write my songs is that we get into a groove
01:02 where we just start to really connect.
01:05 They wrote a new song from scratch,
01:07 a song designed to answer Bruce Allen's question.
01:10 Its title, "Kids Wanna Rock."
01:13 [MUSIC - KIDS WANNA ROCK, "KIDS WANNA ROCK"]
01:19 With his third album, "Reckless,"
01:20 Adams plugged into that mainstream audience,
01:23 dominated by Bruce Springsteen, John Cougar Mellencamp,
01:26 and Don Henley.
01:27 But Adams was of a different generation
01:28 to those established big hitters.
01:30 He turned 25 on the day "Reckless" was released,
01:33 November 5, 1984.
01:36 His hard rock sensibility, explicit in "Kids Wanna Rock,"
01:40 was something that spoke to fans of Van Halen and ZZ Top.
01:44 And the way he sang, belting it out like a young Rod Stewart,
01:48 gave him that extra edge.
01:49 [MUSIC - ROD STEWART, "KIDS WANNA ROCK"]
01:56 With "Reckless," Bryan Adams created an album of hits
02:00 that still resonates to this day.
02:02 But it was no overnight success.
02:04 Born in 1959, Bryan Adams was performing on the Vancouver
02:08 music scene by the age of 15.
02:10 He joined Canadian glam rockers Sweeney Todd,
02:13 and in 1979, released an album, "If Wishes Were Horses."
02:16 In 1978, he met Jim Valance, formerly
02:19 of Canadian rock band Prism.
02:21 And the two began writing songs together.
02:22 And he said, what are you doing tomorrow?
02:24 And that was it.
02:26 We've got to get together the next day
02:27 and started writing tunes.
02:29 Later that same year, Adams signed to A&M Records
02:32 for $1.
02:33 His first minor hit was a remix of a demo of his.
02:35 Turned into a disco track called "Let Me Take You Dancing,"
02:38 with sped up vocals.
02:40 Adams hated it so much, you can't hear it online to this day.
02:44 Stung by the experience, he threw himself
02:47 into making it on his own terms.
02:49 He wrote songs and toured relentlessly.
02:52 Spent almost three years solidly touring in Europe
02:56 and the States and Canada, over and over and over
02:59 and over and over.
03:00 Developed a bass, put out a record, and it clicked.
03:03 "Run to You" had originally been written for Blue Oyster Cult,
03:06 with an opening guitar riff that echoed their classic 1976
03:09 hit, "Don't Fear the Reaper."
03:11 When that band turned it down, Adams decided to use it.
03:15 It was the lead single off the album,
03:17 and topped the Billboard rock charts.
03:20 "Summer of '69" was originally inspired
03:22 by Bob Seger's "Nightmoons," a nostalgic song
03:25 about adolescent rites of passage,
03:27 with images of cars, girls, and long, hot summers.
03:31 To begin with, Brian was a little bit coy as to what
03:33 the "Summer of '69" was about.
03:35 The thing about the "Summer of '69" is it's a metaphor.
03:38 It's not actually about the summer of '69.
03:42 I mean, it could be about the summer of '85.
03:43 Later, he came clean.
03:46 I never said 1969.
03:48 Oh, it's a metaphor for that.
03:51 It's a metaphor for a great summer.
03:54 Of love?
03:55 Summer of love, exactly.
03:56 Thank you very much.
03:57 I'm going to just move on to a different topic here, Brian.
04:01 Another song that came together quickly
04:02 was one that Jim Valance had brought to the table.
04:05 "It's Only Love" wasn't written with a vocal duet in mind,
04:08 but Adams felt it needed another voice to make it special.
04:11 And he had only one person in mind, Tina Turner.
04:14 I met Tina Turner probably about six years ago
04:18 when she came to town to play a little club here in town.
04:21 (SINGING)
04:23 "Power Ballad Heaven" was written for cheesy '80s movie
04:27 "One Night in Heaven."
04:29 The movie stiffed, but the single
04:30 became the biggest hit from "Reckless,"
04:32 going to number one in Billboard's Hot 100.
04:36 There were more singles.
04:37 "One Night Love Affair" went top 20 in the US and Canada.
04:40 (SINGING)
04:44 And "Somebody" was an instant sing-along classic.
04:47 "Reckless" had more hits on it than most artists have
04:50 on their actual greatest hits albums.
04:52 It sold more than 12 million copies worldwide
04:55 and transported Brian Adams into rock's A-lists.
04:59 And the secret of its success?
05:01 Great songs performed with heart.
05:04 Because even at the height of synth pop in the new wave '80s,
05:07 the kids wanted something less pretentious.
05:10 And Brian knew it.
05:11 They didn't just want to rock.
05:13 They wanted songs they could sing along
05:14 with for the rest of their lives.
05:16 [CHEERING]
05:19 (audience cheering)