Photo via Marshall Crenshaw - marshallcrenshaw.com
Marshall Crenshaw
In the summer of 1979, Marshall Crenshaw was part of the traveling cast of Beatlemania when the popular Broadway musical came to Milwaukee in mid-July.
The show, which ran for 11 days and 16 performances, had two sets of Beatles, and Crenshaw played John Lennon in the newly formed second group. In between singing Fab Four hits, Crenshaw, who performs at Shank Hall on Wednesday, spent his time writing his own music.
One of his best-known songs, “Whenever You’re on My Mind,” which kicked off 1983’s Field Day, began life during those Milwaukee summer days and nights, says Crenshaw. It was the Detroit native’s first time in the city.
“I think about you and forget what I’ve tried to be/ Everything is foggy and hard to see,
it seems to be, but can it be, a fantasy?”
“I was writing a lot of songs at that time,” he says. “I remember specifically I worked on that one, or started writing it, when I was in Beatlemania in Milwaukee.”
In a review of one of the non-Crenshaw performances of Beatlemania, the Milwaukee Journal wrote about attendees who were “squealing and shouting, “I love you” to “the impostors” who were able to copy the Beatles’ sound in “mind-boggling” fashion.
“A I recall, the show was not a great success in Milwaukee,” Crenshaw says. “It was big in Chicago but not Milwaukee.”
Life After John
Of course, Beatlemania was not the end of the road for Crenshaw, who went onto a major label career and some chart success. He wrote many more smart, catchy pop and rock’n’roll songs like—to name a few—“Little Wild One (No. 5),” “Cynical Girl” and “Stormy River,” from his last full-length album, 2009’s Jaggedland.
He has returned to Milwaukee frequently, most often at Shank Hall (Crenshaw says the place is like a “museum of the late 1980s”).
A more recent visit to Milwaukee is a much less fond memory for Crenshaw. In March 2022, he was to perform with the Smithereens at Northen Lights Theater at Potawatomi; he has frequently served as vocalist for the band since the passing of Pat DiNizio.
But before the show started, Crenshaw had a health incident and ended up in the hospital. “It wasn’t so good, but it kind of bounced off me, like I’m Superman or something,” he says. “But, no, I was in the hospital in Milwaukee for a few days. I can’t remember the name of the of the hospital, but it was really a good place, and everybody was really nice, all the doctors and nurses. I don’t remember a lot about, you know, the time. I don’t want to say I almost died, but, you know, it was, like, pretty drastic.”
Crenshaw had recovered in time to play with the Smithereens in late June that year at Summerfest.
Songwriting Slows
One thing that has changed for Crenshaw, 71, even before his hospitalization, is songwriting. He says he hasn’t written a song by himself since 2016. He co-wrote a song in 2020 through email. “It’s very sporadic now, or it’s nearly, you know, over with, at least for now,” he says.
But Crenshaw says he is not sitting around, wishing he could write more songs.
“No, I feel like I have a lot of great songs,” he says. “You know I really love my catalog. I think it’s great. You know Thelonious Monk, right? He only wrote, like, 45 tunes or something like that in during like a four-year period and then spent the rest of his career just playing those tunes and re-recording them. And, you know, that’s one example of somebody that just wrote and then they stopped.”
Yep Roc has re-released Crenshaw’s self-titled first album and Field Day; he says two more re-releases from his catalog are expected in 2025.
Lots on Tap
Beyond his own music, Crenshaw has long had an interest in celebrating the history of rock, country and more. He compiled a fabulous double-LP compilation celebrating early country music called Hillbilly Music, Thank God, Vol. 1 for Capitol Records in 1989. Crenshaw’s Hollywood Rock: A Guide to Rock ‘n’ Roll in the Movies celebrates films and documentaries like Blonde on a Bum Trip, Smashing Time, The Gospel According to Al Green and Monterey Pop.
For several years, Crenshaw has been working with others to film a documentary about the producer Tom Wilson, who worked with Bob Dylan, Sun Ra and others in the 1960s.
“He’s a very important figure in the history of popular music of my lifetime, without a doubt, and somebody that kind of got erased from history. But, yeah, I’ve been really, super, super preoccupied with that ever since I started it. It’s good. This is a good moment for it. You know, it’s like all of a sudden, there’s really a lot of momentum. We’re going back into production during May.”
Marshall Crenshaw performs Wednesday, March 19 at 8 p.m. at Shank Hall. New York City-based singer/songwriter Rachel Sage opens.
