When Harry Nilsson died of heart failure on January 15, 1994 at the age of 52, one of the most underrated voices of the last century passed away. Actually, she had long since fallen silent at this point. It had been 14 years since Nilsson released an album. “Flash Harry” (1980) was also only released on the European market and not in its home country, the USA. Live shows were a thing of the past for Harry Nilsson in the 90s anyway. And yet ten years between 1967 and 1977 were enough to prove what he was capable of.
Along with Randy Newman and Van Dyke Parks, Nilsson was one of a rare group of musicians who, despite their penchant for eccentricity, had a knack for mass taste in the wake of the 60s beat era – perhaps that’s precisely why. “In the case of Harry Nilsson, who was born in Brooklyn in 1941, the eccentric often goes hand in hand with the egocentric,” wrote Klaus Walter in an obituary for Bavarian Radio. “Nilsson likes to sing about Nilsson and Nilsson likes to quote Nilsson. His ability for elegant self-irony prevents these ego trips from coming across as complacent.”
1941
If you want to hear Harry Nilsson sing about himself, the best place to do so is on “1941” from the album “Pandemonium Shadow Show” (1967): “Well, in 1941, the happy father had a son, and by 1944, the father walked right out the door.” He goes on to sing about a clown who impresses the song’s protagonist so much that he joins the circus. The song is the autobiography of a musician whose father left the family in 1944 when little Harry was three years old – and whose grandparents were circus performers who thrilled audiences with their aerial ballet. Harry Nilsson’s next self-reference, the album “Aerial Ballet”, was released in 1968.
Back to Harry Nilsson’s childhood in the New York borough of Brooklyn. While the silver carriages of the New York elevated train rattled along right outside the window, a pale boy with reddish hair in the run-down apartment discovered that he could sing. To escape his family’s financial misery, he was regularly sent to California to live with relatives, where he received singing lessons from an uncle.
Eventually he relocated completely and dropped out of high school after the ninth grade. Nilsson earned a few bucks as a teenager at the Paramount Theater in Los Angeles. Then a job at a bank, where he successfully tricked him into thinking he had a school diploma. In the early 1960s, Harry Nilsson already knew something about computers, which he took over the operation of at the financial institution. In a time when devices usually took up entire floors, he proved that his intelligence was not a matter of grades on a piece of paper. That’s how the bank saw it, too, and didn’t evict him after they found out about the fictitious school leaving certificate.
At the bank at night, at the instrument during the day
Like so many of his generation, Harry Nilsson was enthusiastic about rock ‘n’ roll in the late 50s, especially Ray Charles. While he worked night shifts at the bank, he spent his days singing and composing. Even during his time at the Paramount Theater, he also performed with his friend Jerry Smith in small bars, where they emulated what was popular as a singing duo in the style of the Everly Brothers. Nilsson cleaned doors and got hired by producers, songwriters and labels. Eventually, in 1962, he met established songwriter Scott Turner, who gave him five dollars for every demo he sang. Many years later, Turner wanted to release these recordings, when Harry Nilsson was already famous. He contacted him to negotiate a fair share of the profits. Nilsson replied that he had already been paid for his work – five dollars per song.
He worked his way up, from session to session, from odd job to odd job. And success actually came quickly. As early as 1963 he was writing songs for Little Richard, who told him he was singing good ones for a white boy. Another year later, Harry Nilsson was in the studio with Phil Spector, the eccentric egomaniac who, along with George Martin and Brian Wilson, formed the triumvirate of the decade’s most influential producers. Nilsson’s debut album “Spotlight on Nilsson” was released in 1966, but he didn’t give up his job at the bank. The memory of being destitute will not have been an insignificant factor.
Derek Taylor and the Beatles
After “Spotlight on Nilsson,” Harry Nilsson signed with RCA Victor and recorded “Pandemonium Shadow Show.” His songs had previously appeared on albums by Fred Astairre, Glen Campbell and the Yardbirds. While his second album was of little interest to the general public and was a financial flop, it made even bigger waves in music industry circles. The songwriting and Nilsson’s three-octave voice impressed producers, agents and managers, including Derek Taylor, who worked as a press agent for the Beatles. Taylor immediately bought a whole stack of pressings of “Pandemonium Shadow Show”. He distributed the records to friends and acquaintances. Two of these albums ended up in the hands of Paul McCartney and John Lennon, who quickly came out as Nilsson fans.
Both “1941” and “You Can’t Do That” left a lasting impression, although the latter song was actually written by Lennon himself. First appearing as the B-side of “Can’t Buy Me Love” and later on “A Hard Days Night” (1964), Harry Nilsson took over the music and quoted over twenty other Beatles songs in the lyrics. When McCartney and Lennon were asked at the Apple announcement press conference in 1968 which American artists they thought were particularly noteworthy at the moment, both answered: “Nilsson”. After that, Harry Nilsson no longer entered the computer room at the bank in Los Angeles.
“Everybody’s Talkin'”
Nilsson rejected offers to tour with stringent regularity (which he later described as a big mistake) and continued to devote himself to work in the studio. A little later, the Fred Neil song “Everybody’s Talkin’” appeared on “Aerial Ballett”, which only became a hit when it was heard in the film “Midnight Cowboy” (1969) and earned Nilsson his first Grammy. “One” shows how capable the artist was of writing great songs himself. “A classic separation pain song in the guise of a mathematical reflection,” is what Jens Balzer calls the piece with its famous opening line: “One is the loneliest number.”
The loneliest number, always with itself. Another self-reference? In any case, Harry Nilsson rarely listened to what music industry officials whispered in his ears behind their desks. With lines like “I sang my balls off for you, baby,” he outraged the delicate minds of conservative suburban kids, whom he actually counted as his core target group through his romantic songs. Harry Nilsson didn’t care. On “Son of Schmilsson” (1972) and “A Little Touch of Schmilsson in the Night” (1973), he prioritized stubbornness over profit, artistic expression over conformity.
Lost Weekends
When John Lennon and Yoko Ono went their separate ways in 1974, the Beatle and his old friend met in Los Angeles. The time they were supposed to spend on the next Nilsson album (Lennon as producer) was instead invested in drinking sessions that are remembered as Lost Weekends. With Alice Cooper and Keith Moon, they ruined their vocal cords and were kicked out of clubs like the Troubadour while drunk, to media attention. The result was Pussy Cats, an album that was considered an unpleasant misstep during Nilsson’s lifetime and was only rehabilitated many years later. “Most critics see this album as nothing more than a collection of nonsense from not-so-little boys who refuse to grow up. That may be so, but as a monument to this friendship it is a touchingly beautiful record,” writes Klaus Walter.
However, Harry Nilsson was never really able to recover from the Lost Weekends. Three more albums failed to make it into the charts until “Knnillssonn” (1977) was supposed to be the hoped-for comeback. Nilsson himself saw it as his best work to date and was even more disappointed when, after the death of Elvis Presley, RCA Victor focused all marketing activities on the financial promise of the tragic event. The king is dead, long live the king.
Harry Nilsson dies
But Harry Nilsson hit them even more Assassination of John Lennon on December 8, 1980. He became a member of an anti-gun organization and made public appearances to raise funds. Not only did he lose a good friend in the attack, but he also lost a partner. Beyond the superficial world fame as a Beatle, Lennon was more closely linked to Nilsson on a musical level than anyone else. From then on, Nilsson likes to describe himself as a “retired musician”.
An early retirement that he couldn’t enjoy. Financial hardships (a financial advisor embezzled all of his royalties) and persistent alcohol consumption ultimately led to his first heart attack in 1993. He hastily asked the bosses at RCA Victor to rehash his old hits. Harry Nilsson will have known that his remaining time was limited. On January 15, 1994, he finished recording vocals on what was only released in 2019 as “Losst and Found.” Nilsson died that same night.