2 languages
The Knack
From HitStory, the pop encyclopedia of School of Rock · Artist
The Knack was an American power pop band, formed in Los Angeles in 1978 by singer and rhythm guitarist Doug Fieger, lead guitarist Berton Averre, bassist Prescott Niles and drummer Bruce Gary. Fieger came from Oak Park near Detroit and had moved to Los Angeles after his previous band Sky, which was produced by Jimmy Miller, had no hits. With Averre he formed a songwriting duo. Within a few months of their first gig in June 1978 they were playing popular club shows on the Sunset Strip and a bidding war between record labels broke out. They signed with Capitol Records, for the largest sum in that label's history.
Music and breakthrough
The debut album Get the Knack (1979) became one of the best-selling records of the year and spent five weeks at number one on the Billboard album chart. The single My Sharona, written by Fieger about Sharona Alperin, became the number one of 1979 in the United States. Good Girls Don't reached number one in Canada. The success provoked criticism: the 1960s retro look and the sleeve, which resembled Meet the Beatles!, led to the accusation that the band was copying The Beatles. Fieger did not entirely deny it and said that he wanted to let people who had not lived through the 1960s hear the sound of the British Invasion.
Influence
The following records, ...But the Little Girls Understand (1980) and Round Trip (1981), did less well, and in 1982 the group disbanded. Reunions and albums such as Serious Fun (1991), Zoom (1998) and Normal as the Next Guy (2001) followed later. After Fieger's death in 2010 it was definitively over.
Listening
Discography
Studio albums
- 1979Get the Knack
- 1980…But the Little Girls Understand
- 1981Round Trip
- 1991Serious Fun
- 1998Zoom
- 2001Normal as the Next Guy
Mentioned in other articles
- Powerpop Genre
In the early 1970s it was played by Badfinger, Raspberries and Big Star, followed later by Cheap Trick and The Knack.