Tony Harnell
A moment arrives when we hear a singer’s truest voice. For John Lennon it might have happened with “Julia”; for Rod Stewart maybe “Maggie May.” When Tony Harnell really grew into himself, not everyone was listening.
It was a few years into the 1990s. Harnell was recently divorced — from his first wife and from TNT, the multimillion-selling hard rock band whose ’80s music had left a big imprint on fans’ minds. He felt he had changed.
“I finally figured out WHY I was singing,” Harnell says now. “I needed to touch people, wrench something out of their hearts.”
That’s what he’s doing with his as yet untitled new solo album, which represents his first full attempt to maximize the emotion and subtlety of his multi-octave voice in a context cleared of limits and preconceptions. Without abandoning the heavy music he loves, Harnell has freed himself to add touches of the Beatles, Queen, and his other early and recent influences.
“I wanted to make music that was timeless,” he says, “stuff people can appreciate for more than a week and a half.” Holding it together are the immediately identifiable qualities that have always characterized Harnell’s work: his soaring vocals and equally aerodynamic songwriting. And more than ever, his lyrics speak of killing the fear that keeps us from our destiny.
Circumstances haven’t encouraged his evolution: Harnell’s a committed New Yorker who made his name singing an ephemeral style with a Norwegian band. But after music’s years of rap, grunge and nu-metal, audiences are turning back to the verities. It’s called classic rock for a reason, and Harnell is finding ways to give it freshness and energy.
He has been for years. Harnell has often gleaned surprising results from his regular reunions with guitarist Ronni LeTekro in TNT: the Kinks/Beach Boys euphoria of 1997′s “Daisy Jane,” the churning modern optimism of 1999′s “Wide Awake,” the Zep-to-Zombies harmonic leaps of 2004′s “Everything U R.” In 1994 he and guitarist Al Pitrelli unfurled the classic flag when they covered tunes such as the Eagles’ “Desperado” in the one-off project Morning Wood.
Even more in tune with Harnell’s current aesthetic have been the three highly praised but little-distributed albums he made with guitarist Mark Reale and Westworld; the dark side of beauty crunched through in songs such as “Ivory Towers” (1999) and the emotionally twisting “Skin” (2000).
On the heavy-weather front, 2008 saw the second incursion of dense, moody melody from Starbreaker, Harnell’s metal storm with Swedish guitarist Magnus Karlsson.
Also that year, though, when Harnell first posted and then released the songs that ended up as the “Cinematic” EP — well-polished demos he made in Sweden with various talented producers and co-writers — the picture came into clear focus. He was going to craft the most ambitious rock/pop of his career, and dare the world to ignore it. The overwhelming fan response convinced him his path was righteous, while the death in April 2009 of his beloved mother, a former opera singer, has deepened his passion for lasting beauty.
Born in San Diego, a pro skateboarder at age 15, Harnell moved to New York in 1979 and chose the life of music (though he didn’t stop surfing). “You don’t know his name, not in it for fame,” he sang of those early years on Starbreaker’s “Unknown Superstar.” Be advised, however, that Harnell’s in it for the personal impact. Listen and see if you don’t get new ears.
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