LAMONT’S MUSIC NOTES-FEB 19, 2020…FORTY YEARS AGO BOB SEGER RELEASED THE SINGLE ‘FIRE LAKE.’ IT WAS THE FIRST SINGLE ISSUED FROM THE ‘AGAINST THE WIND’ AND IT CONTINUED SEGER’S STREAK OF HIT SINGLES GOING TO # 6 ON THE CHARTS AND IS ONE OF 7 TOP TEN SINGLES FOR SEGER IN THE 1970’S-1980’S. ACCORDING TO SEGER HE DECIDED TO MAKE ‘FIRE LAKE’ THE FIRST SINGLE BECAUSE IT WAS “totally and unequivocally unlike anything I’d ever done before.The lyric is very different and very kind of unique. It’s about taking risks. About risking love, chucking it all and just heading off with a bunch of wild people, whatever. It is one of my favorite lyrics down through the years, and the track is very unusual. It’s sort of an R&B meets country kind of thing.I really wanted it to be the first single but I never thought Capitol would agree to it, and I believe it was Punch (Andrews, Seger’s manager and often co-producer) who talked them into it. What I liked about it was that it broke new ground for us. It really showed that we were unafraid to push the envelope of what we were doing before, which was basically pretty hot rock and roll, you know, with a few ballads thrown in.”
IT’S KIND OF INTERESTING TO NOTE THAT HIS GOOD BUDDIES DON HENLEY, GLENN FREY AND TIMOTHY B. SCHMIDT OF THE EAGLES ADDED BACKUP VOCALS ON THIS SONG. SEGER LATER REPAID THE FAVOR BY COMING UP WITH THE CHORUS FOR THE EAGLES HIT ‘HEARTACHE TONIGHT.’ HERE’S SEGER WITH ‘FIRE LAKE’
