Steven Grossman (musician)

Something in the Moonlight (2011)
Studio album by Steven Grossman

Steven D Grossman (September 1, 1951 in Brooklyn, New York – June 23, 1991 in San Francisco, California) was a singer-songwriter from the early 1970s whose debut (and until 2011 only) album Caravan Tonight (1974) is distinguished as being the first album dealing with openly gay themes and subject matter to be released on a major label (Mercury Records).[1] Stephen Holden of Rolling Stone hailed it as "one of the most auspicious singer-songwriter debuts of the '70s."[2]

Grossman was heavily influenced by Joni Mitchell[3] and the album is very much in the style of singer-songwriter Cat Stevens, as opposed to the then-current glam Bowiesque fashion of openly gay artists such as Jobriath. Performers on the album included Eric Weissberg, best known for his recording Dueling Banjos for the 1972 movie Deliverance.

Grossman died in 1991, aged 39, of an AIDS-related illness.[4][5] Caravan Tonight has yet to be released on CD although a cover version of the title track by model and occasional singer Twiggy has. Singer songwriter Mark Weigle created a duet of Out with Steven Grossman on his Out of the Loop CD in 2002.

Grossman recorded a second album shortly before his death and this was finally released on CD in 2011 entitled "Something in the Moonlight".[6]

References

  1. ↑ Wayne Struder "Rock on the Wild Side" Leyland Publications 1994 p99-100 ISBN 0-943595-46-0
  2. ↑ http://culturecatch.com/music/steven-grossman-caravan-tonight Robert Cochrane, A Queer Hippy Christ, January 28, 2009
  3. ↑ Interview in "In Touch" magazine vol 2 no 1 reproduced at http://queermusicheritage.com/jun2005mc.html accessed 10th August 2016
  4. ↑ http://jamesgavin.com/page42/page187/page187.html
  5. ↑ http://www.rollingstone.com/music/lists/10-singer-songwriter-albums-rolling-stone-loved-in-the-1970s-youve-never-heard-20150716/steven-grossman-caravan-tonight-20150715 accessed 10th August 2016
  6. ↑ http://www.queermusicheritage.com/jun2011.html accessed 10 August 2016


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