This Was Where I First Found You Behind These Closed Doors I Will Find You Again
Released in 1973, country love songs didn't get much more suggestive than Charlie Rich'south hit "Backside Closed Doors." Merely you'd never guess what first inspired Kenny O'Dell to write the song — the Watergate scandal.
O'Dell told the "Story Behind the Song' to Bart Herbison of Nashville Songwriters Clan International.
Bart Herbison: I've been wanting to do this ('Story Backside the Song') with you since we started this series. "When we get behind airtight doors, when she lets her pilus hang down, it makes me glad that I'thou a man and no i knows,"… what?
Kenny O'Dell: "(What) goes on behind closed doors.'
BH: Wow. Hall of Fame songwriter, Kenny O'Dell. That is the Story Behind the Song this calendar week…Where'd you get that idea? Information technology'south just then obvious, just nobody ever wrote that [idea]. You wrote it.
KO: I did. I'll tell yous the thought for that vocal – at the time in the news every 24-hour interval – this was during the Watergate [scandal]. Don't ask me how I put all this together.
BH: Well, what a lot of kids from this era don't remember is they went into a clandestine session. (The Congressional Committee investigating Watergate) went into a non-public session, and they literally did it behind airtight doors.
KO: Thank you.
BH: I'm freaking out man. Only you, the genius of Kenny O'Dell, could turn that into what I believe is one of the x greatest songs e'er written in the history of music. You get the idea from Watergate. What happens next?
KO: Considering they're always talking almost no 1 know what goes on behind closed doors. Having the sessions, another session, behind airtight doors. And I'1000 thinking, I like the title, "Behind Closed Doors."
BH: A lot of writers would have written in that era about the secrecy of the government. You make information technology a pretty sexy song well-nigh a man and a adult female.
KO: Yeah. Well, I always bent towards honey songs. That'due south the only thing I knew anything about or thought I did. Cheers to my wife, I did know what it's nearly.
BH: And I want to pay homage, we lost Corki O'Dell, [who is] in the Musicians Hall of Fame. What an inspiration, what an amazing woman. And we're going to dedicate this interview to Corki, because Corki's even so effectually the states.
KO: You bet. Thank y'all.
BH: I can't believe information technology got on the radio, because you walk correct upward to the edge of the cliff, man, with – it's descriptive, but not graphic. I mean, you know, when they turn out the lights…
KO: This will change your view a little bit, only at that time I could merely find privacy in one room of our home and that was the bedchamber. Our bedroom. So, this is where I generally retreated to piece of work out a new song. Then, hither I am, I told Corki, "Sit down a infinitesimal, I want you to hear what I'm doing with this song, see what you think." So I played the vocal for her, the first part of it, and "nobody knows what goes on behind closed doors."
BH: Then, Corki hears it, what does she say? Is she merely like – 'cause I probably would've said the same thing – "Kenny, I don't know."
KO: (It's) suggestive, y'all know. Well, I said, "No, that is a love song, that's all it is." And I really, in my own naive piddling world, that's the only manner I viewed it. Information technology wasn't lost on me. That's how I got past with that.
BH: Ok. So how does Charlie Rich get this vocal?
KO: Well, Billy Sherrill was producing him and they were trying to get a huge hit, and things weren't working out very well…I took it to Billy and I had his ear at the fourth dimension...
When did y'all hear (Charlie'due south version)? Do yous remember?
KO: At the session, because I played (rhythm guitar) on the session.
BH: So, in that room that twenty-four hours, y'all hear Charlie doing information technology. You've got to exist like – yous get that this is going to be a monster.
KO: You know I didn't. I hate to let you lot downwards. But, back to being practical well-nigh the whole thing, I knew it was a good vocal. I knew I'd done as good as I could exercise. I wrote it as skilful as I could write information technology…I had a addiction of calling my friend and co-publisher, Bob Montgomery, and he wanted me to tell him how the songs went on the session, if I had one on there. (Our company) needed a hit or something so bad-- because we were on the brink of non doing very well.
BH: You needed a hit.
KO: We demand information technology, to enable information technology to keep working. So, I telephone call Bob. Nosotros didn't have cell phones, yous retrieve, and so I institute my jail cell phone – my office telephone was the petty beer joint around the corner. So, I call him. I said, "Now, Bob," I said, "The session went." He said, "How'd it get?" He'southward all excited 'cause he wants the skillful news bad. I said, "Well, the session went well." Yeah. Yeah. He says, "How did it go? What exercise you lot call up?" I said, "Well, you know, Bob, I'grand not certain just how I experience nearly that. I think it'southward pretty good. I remember it's a skilful cut and I recollect it perhaps has possibilities." You know, and Bob's about to die. But it'due south all I could say, you lot know. He knew how dry I was almost things and I don't go also excited. Well, he says, "Ok. Well, you remember it's a hit?" I said, "Hell what practice I know, it's a hit." I can't requite him what he wants to hear, anoint his middle. We talked nearly that years later.
BH: Well, it was a hit. One of the greatest songs ever.
About the series
In partnership with Nashville Songwriters Clan International, each calendar week nosotros volition interview a different songwriter most his or her work.
Source: https://www.tennessean.com/story/entertainment/music/story-behind-the-song/2017/09/08/charlie-richs-behind-closed-doors-inspired-watergate/641748001/
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