Billy Squier Takes 'The Stroke' To Bookstores For The Kids

10/30/1998 2:00 PM, Yahoo! Music
Craig Rosen

(10/30/98, 12 p.m. PST) - After avoiding the music business for years, Billy Squier is back with a new album, Happy Blue (myLAUNCH, 7/13), and a more optimistic outlook than he's had since he reached the upper region of the charts 15 years ago.

To promote Happy Blue, he's playing Borders Books & Music stores across the country. At the recent Atlanta stop, word of Squier's affection for children attracted a large elementary school chorus, who sang three songs to him before his performance. He was so touched by the gesture, he seemed all choked up as he thanked them.

For four years, Squier didn't write or play any music whatsoever, though he had racked up several hit albums in the '80s. Don't Say No, Squier's 1981 breakthrough album, contained the smash singles "The Stroke" and "In The Dark." Emotions In Motion, released in 1982, featured the hit "Everybody Wants You." The 1984 album Signs Of Life featured yet another hit, "Rock Me Tonite." But by 1985, Squier felt the pressure to maintain his hit-machine status was increasingly compromising his credibility and creativity, and his next four albums were all but ignored. In 1993, he simply walked away from music.

During his hiatus, Squier became an expert mountain climber, traveling worldwide. He also wrote two screenplays--becoming a finalist in the prestigious Sundance Screenwriting Competition--and took art history courses. And he began volunteering at a New York City pediatric AIDS shelter. Of all his newfound interests, he's most fond of his time with these children.

In fact, it was a child who inspired Squier to return to music. He wrote a song for his ex-girlfriend's son on the boy's second birthday, and it turned out so well that it renewed Squier's creative instincts.

"Writing a song is a magical feeling. I'd forgotten how good it felt to do that," Squier says. That birthday song, "Two," appears on Happy Blue along with a new blues version of "The Stroke," retitled "Stroke Me Blues."

Happy Blue is a bare-bones affair--Squier sings over his acoustic guitar accompaniment, with no other embellishments--so it may not appeal to longtime fans hoping for another full-throttle hard rock anthem collection. But Squier says he deliberately made Happy Blue without regard for the commercial concerns, or whether anyone else would like it. "I made this record outside of any [music] industry advice," he says.

However, Squier knows most people want to hear his hits, not his new material, and he obliges fans with a mixture of both new and old songs. At his Atlanta Borders instore, his new blues version of "The Stroke" was the finale, a move audience members greeted with frenzied applause and shouts.

After the show, Squier met with kids who turned up with samples of their artwork to show him. Not only did Squier chat with the children, but also he bought several pieces of art and showered the young artists with praise.

-- Katherine Yeske, Atlanta