As a solo artist, Todd Rundgren was a sonic innovator, as well as a pioneer of the power
pop genre.
But despite his prolific output, the "Hello It's Me" singer remains a mystery.
Here's what you may not know about Todd Rundgren.
During his senior year at Upper Darby High School, Todd Rundgren experienced his first
taste of heartbreak.
Rundgren told The Wall Street Journal,
"She probably liked me because I was the only guy in school with long hair.
We became close and hugged and kissed a lot at parties."
But it was his long hair that brought their romance to a halt — his girlfriend's parents
saw it, decided he was bad news, and ordered her to end it.
Rundgren recalled,
"Just like that, she stopped talking to me and wouldn't take my calls.
I adored her and was heartbroken."
The following year, in 1967, he wrote his first song, "Hello, It's Me," about the experience.
According to The Wall Street Journal, Rundgren first recorded the song as a slow ballad with
his band Nazz in 1968.
Then, in 1971, he recorded a more upbeat version of the song for his solo album Something/Anything?
In 1973, the song became Rundgren's biggest solo hit, charting for 20 weeks.
He later recalled how, 30 years after the heartbreak, his ex-girlfriend called him,
but he kept his tone "businesslike."
Rundgren told The Wall Street Journal,
"Our lives had gone in two different directions and we really had nothing to say to each other.
I think I also wanted to hold onto the image I had of her in high school.
I never told her she was the inspiration for the song."
Todd Rundgren recorded his album Something/Anything? in 1971, just months after Carole King released
her best-selling album Tapestry.
During his 2017 commencement address for the Berklee College of Music, Rundgren said,
"People started referring to me as the male Carole King, and I was a Carole King fan but
it bothered me, being compared to somebody else."
In a way, the comparisons turned out to be a blessing in disguise, as they pushed Rundgren
in a more original direction with his music.
Rundgren said,
"I was writing like a hypocrite and so I made this crazy record called 'A Wizard, A True
Star,' on which I threw out all the rules of record-making [...] The result was, as
I mentioned, a complete loss of about half of my audience at that time."
While the change in direction was not successful from a commercial or critical standpoint,
Rundgren saw it as a personal victory:
"I have a special pride for what essentially was my act of tyranny after having achieved
commercial success, and this became the model for my life after that."
Eric Clapton's Psychedelic guitar, also known as the "Fool," has a special place in rock
'n' roll history.
Clapton played the guitar in Cream, including on the albums Disraeli Gears and Wheels of
Fire.
What truly embedded the axe in the eyes of rock 'n' roll fans was the paint job, which
was the handiwork of Dutch design collective and onetime band the Fool.
The resulting design depicted a winged sprite on a cloud, among stars and flames and alongside
a grassy, mountainous landscape.
According to Gibson, Todd Rundgren first admired Clapton's guitar on March 25, 1967, while
Cream was playing at the RKO Theater.
Shortly thereafter, Clapton left the guitar with George Harrison, who loaned it to fellow
musician Jackie Lomax in 1968.
In 1972, after bumping into Rundgren in a Woodstock, New York recording studio, Lomax
sold the guitar to Rundgren for just $500, with the condition that Lomax had the option
to buy it back.
He never returned for the guitar.
Rundgren repaired it, and continued to play it as his primary guitar until the late '70s.
Then, in the 1980s, a Japanese fan gave Rundgren a handmade replica, which Rundgren told Vintage
Guitar was, quote, "a bit better-sounding than the original."
Rundgren sold the original guitar at a Sotheby's auction for $150,000 in 2000.
Years later, the Fool was re-sold for half a million dollars.
In a 1974 interview with Melody Maker magazine, Todd Rundgren made a stab at John Lennon.
Rundgren said in the interview,
"John Lennon ain't no revolutionary.
He's [an] [...] idiot, man.
Shouting about revolution [...]"
In response, Lennon wrote an open letter to Rundgren, titled "AN OPENED LETTUCE TO SODD
RUNTLESTUNTLE," in which he made multiple lighthearted jabs at Rundgren.
Lennon concluded the letter with,
"However much you hurt me darling; I'll always love you."
Rundgren was asked about the so-called feud during a 2013 interview for The Guardian.
Rundgren told the outlet,
"That was more of a stunt, really, cooked up by the paper so they could splatter the
acrimony across their pages like blood!
Ultimately, though, John and I realized we were being used and I got a phone call from
him one day and we just said: 'Let's drop this now.'"
The Lennon-Rundgren dispute was dug up once more after Lennon was shot by Mark David Chapman
- he was actually wearing a Rundgren t-shirt during his assassination of Lennon.
Rundgren told The Guardian,
"If you're going to get seriously down with the muck of the human experience, you're going
to have to deal with other people and all the weirdness that comes with them."
Despite bearing a striking resemblance to her biological father, Aerosmith frontman
Steven Tyler, actor Liv Tyler thought Todd Rundgren was her father until she was 11 years
old.
"Well, I have two fathers, kind of, yes.
I was raised by Todd Rundgren."
Tyler told Wonderland,
"Todd basically decided when I was born that I needed a father so he signed my birth certificate.
He knew that there was a chance that I might not be his [...] I'm so grateful to him, I
have so much love for him.
You know, when he holds me it feels like Daddy."
Rundgren had decided that assuming the role of Liv's father was the responsible thing
to do.
In a 2018 interview with Variety, Rundgren had this to say:
"I could have called up Steven and said, 'Hey, you're involved in this,' But from my knowledge
of the people involved, I for some reason concluded that the only choice I had was to
get involved."
Even beyond his split from Liv's mother, Bebe Buell, and Liv's discovery of the truth, Rundgren
remained a father figure for Liv.
Liv told The Guardian in 2017,
"I'm so grateful to Todd for choosing to be a father figure to me.
It's a big thing for a man to say, 'I know this kid might not be mine, but I still want
to be her father.'
Although he and my mom weren't together, he was always a very stable, loving force in
my life."
Despite his producing talents, Todd Rundgren has a track record for being a little difficult
in the studio.
In the book, A Wizard, A True Star: Todd Rundgren in the Studio, Paul Myers wrote,
"[The word that] most frequently came to the lips of [Rundgren's] clients and associates
[...] was 'genius.'
The second most frequent, however, was 'sarcastic,' with 'aloof' running close behind."
In a 2010 episode of Rundgren Radio, Waymon Boone recalled briefly working with Rundgren
on the debut album of his alt-rock band, Splender.
Boone recalled that he and the band had a, quote, "angry, negative experience" while
making the record with Rundgren.
Boone also said that the band fired Rundgren after three weeks.
In an interview with the Star Tribune, 12 Rods member Ev Olcott described a similar
experience.
Olcott told the newspaper,
"All he would do was press the 'record' button and go back to doing crossword puzzles."
Todd Rundgren produced the 1971 debut album of pop-rock duo Sparks, and the band's members,
brothers Ron and Russell Mael, have since credited Rundgren with launching their career.
Rundgren told biographer Paul Myers,
"The record was a curiosity but had no real commercial success.
It would take them a few years, and probably a few tours, to start connecting with a broader
audience."
Talking to Myers for the Rundgren biography A Wizard, A True Star, Russell sang Rundgren's
praises:
"It may sound corny, but if it hadn't been for Todd, there might not have been a Sparks,
so we owe him the whole thing.
[...] There are a few people in our past that you would really like to say nasty things
about, but we don't have anything nasty to say about Todd."
Fifty years after their initial collaboration, Rundgren reunited with the band Sparks for
their 2021 single "Your Fandango."
Todd Rundgren was a trailblazer with his use of — and in some cases, invention of — new
technologies.
The late '70s to early '80s were a particularly innovative time for Rundgren.
According to Sound on Sound, Rundgren organized and performed the first ever interactive concert
broadcast through television, which involved audiences choosing the songs they wanted to
hear.
The following year, he opened his multi-million-dollar Utopia Video Studios.
"At this point and time I'm looking forward to exploring areas that are pretty much virgin
territory."
In 1980, Rundgren created the world's first color graphics tablet, the Utopia Graphics
Tablet, which was licensed to Apple His many notable innovations also include the world's
first interactive CD, New World Order.
Rundgren told Bohemian,
"I guess the common element in all of those projects is a certain sense of adventure [...] It's
my own need to hear and to experiment with things that are different or new to me; to
constantly absorb new influences."
Todd Rundgren married dancer and backup singer Michele Grey in 1998, on his 50th birthday.
Prior to that, he had been decidedly anti-marriage.
In a 2018 interview with Variety, Rundgren had this to say about his previous views on
marriage:
"I would go to the receptions or the parties, but I would never attend the actual weddings,
because I knew that they were standing up there promising to do something that they
kind of had their fingers crossed about."
Rundgren went on to add:
"I thought that that whole exercise of getting up in front of people and making this 'till
death do us part' declaration was an exercise in a certain kind of hypocrisy.
[...] [S]o I [was] just determined never to do that."
Rundgren's eventual marriage was born partly out of his contrarianism.
Rundgren told Variety,
"It was my 50th birthday and I had done pretty much everything in the world and I said, 'Well,
what can I do that I've never done before, that will really shock my friends?'
I decided: Get married!"
Although the union was an act of rebellion, Rundgren admits he's had a tamer existence
ever since, telling Variety,
"The reality is, my life has been a lot more boring.
My kids became more the focus of my life.
I moved to Hawaii and started living this sort of pastoral existence, and I don't run
into celebrities or anything anymore, unless they happen to be out here on the island."
"I hear Todd's song and I don't understand why he's not in the Rock and Roll Hall of
Fame.
What's the deal with that, Todd?"
In 2021, after being nominated for the third straight year, Todd Rundgren was inducted
into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame alongside the likes of Jay-Z, Foo Fighters, and Carole
King.
It's likely that Rundgren wasn't totally bowled over by the overdue honor, as he has been
vocal about his indifference to it in the past.
In a 2016 interview with the Charleston City Paper, Rundgren said this about the Rock and
Roll Hall of Fame:
"This is an institution that arose within my lifetime.
If I told you about how they actually determine who gets into the Hall of Fame, you'd think
that I was [messing with] you, because I've been told what's involved [...] It's very
weird [...] and that's why I don't care."
He echoed these sentiments to Billboard following his 2021 nomination.
Rundgren told the music outlet,
"It's no secret that I don't care about it.
It doesn't matter how many times they nominate me.
It's not gonna make me care."
Check out one of our newest videos right here!
Plus, even more Grunge videos about your favorite stuff are coming soon.
Subscribe to our YouTube channel and hit the bell so you don't miss a single one.