MOG

We have been having a blast playing the lastest music from Richard X. Heyman on the radio the past few days. "Stockpile" is just one of the many toe tapping head shaking songs found on "Actual Sighs" from Turn-Up Records. Richard had been a guest on our radio show a few times over the years and one of our shows was just a couple of years ago where Richard played DJ with us for SIX HOURS! He's really a genuine nice guy who also happens to be extremely talented as a musician. Only Richard X. Heyman could wait 20 years before recording his first LP.

Allow his wife Nancy to explain:

Richard began working on that debut record in 1983 in an 8-track studio. After 6 songs were completed, we realized we couldn't afford to record the remaining tunes in contention for inclusion. We decided to put those 6 finished songs out as a 12” vinyl EP called Actual Size. The release garnered critical acclaim and Richard went on to write, perform and produce some of the finest pop albums of all time.

Like Walter Matthau (playing Oscar Madison in the movie “The Odd Couple”), who, when his wife asks “when would you like to eat dinner?” responded with “I’ll let you know” and then suddenly, at 3 A.M., proclaimed “now!”, Richard surprised me in 2006 with his “now!” – now I want to record my first record. 35 early songs, which had never been put on tape (minus, of course, the 6 songs from the Actual Size EP) were dug out of an old folder containing the lyrics and the massive project began.

This is the ultimate full circle experience – because it involved the participation of the first person to ever record Richard’s music -- producer/engineer Ed Stasium, who hailed from Greenbrook, the neighboring town to Plainfield, New Jersey where Richard grew up. Ed was a renowned guitarist and the first guy in the area to acquire quality recording equipment and the know-how to engineer and produce great sounds. He, along with the very talented Tony Lewis who’s been at Richard’s side at the board for the last several albums, mixed the tracks for this release.

And what a release it is! All Music Guide said of Richard and ACTUAL SIGHS: “…perhaps America’s greatest unsung hero of power pop, a songwriter of uncommon talent and intelligence, and a one-man rock band without peer”, “a splendid album which belongs in the collection of anyone who cares about great pop music” and “a superb new album from a major talent.” Noted music writer Parke Puterbaugh, in his liner notes which accompany the disc, said “I could've written a breathless track-by-track commentary on these fourteen plus six songs, but their beauty and brilliance speak eloquently for themselves...the belated issuing of these 20 sterling tunes makes ACTUAL SIGHS no less remarkable - and maybe even more so - given the superlative musicality and commitment it took for Heyman to bring this mammoth project to fruition in 2007...get ready to be treated to a king's ransom of newly minted buried treasure from America's pre-eminent popmeister.”