Joey Scarbury (born June 7, 1955)
Childhood and early music career
Scarbury was born in Ontario, California, United States.
Growing up in Thousand Oaks, he was continually encouraged in his ambition to sing by his mother. At the age of 14, after being spotted by songwriter
Jimmy Webb's father, he was signed to a recording contract with
Dunhill Records.
Scarbury's first single, "She Never Smiles Anymore," flopped, and he was soon without a
record label.
1970s
Citing
Dan Seals of England Dan & John Ford Coley as an influence, he stayed around the music business throughout the 1970s, first as a
backing vocalist for artists including
country music artist
Loretta Lynn, and occasionally recording his own material.
Although he had a minor
record chart single with "Mixed Up Guy" in 1971 (#52 CAN
), real chart success eluded him for the rest of the decade.
He also covered The Partridge Family song from their debut album
Point Me in the Direction of Albuquerque on the same label as them, Bell Records in 1971. Mike Post produced and arranged it.
1980s and The Greatest American Hero
In the late 1970s, he started working for record producer and composer
Mike Post.
Post was hired along with
Stephen Geyer to write the
Theme music for a new TV series titled
The Greatest American Hero,
about an average high school teacher who comes into possession of a
superhero outfit from aliens.
After recording the full-length version of the song, titled "Believe It or Not", it was edited down to a minute for broadcast as the theme song for the show. The show's success (along with its catchy theme song) prompted Elektra Records to first release it as a single, shooting up to number 2 on the Billboard Hot 100 and number 5 in Canada in 1981.
However, Scarbury could not follow the song's success, and after charting at number 49 (#24 CAN AC
1990s and songwriting
In 1990, Scarbury found success again as a songwriter. This time his co-written song, "No Matter How High", was recorded by the Oak Ridge Boys and was a number-one country music hit. His co-writer was
Even Stevens, who previously had found success with co-writing songs for country star
Eddie Rabbitt, as well as the
Kenny Rogers hit "Love Will Turn You Around" from the motion picture
Six Pack. In 1993, he teamed up with
Jennifer Warnes to record the theme from the short-lived sitcom
The Torkelsons.
Scarbury was invited to New York City by radio station WPLJ-FM in April 2005 to perform at the China Club in Times Square for a TV themes concert. He was joined on stage by other singers of popular TV themes, including Gloria Loring, Greg Evigan, Gary Portnoy, David Pomeranz and David Naughton.
Pop culture
"Believe It or Not" was parodied on the season 8 episode of
Seinfeld, titled "
The Susie", by
Jason Alexander, playing his character
George Costanza. George uses a version of the song as an outgoing answering message, with different lyrics ("Believe it or not, George isn't at home") and mistakes in the melodic line. Since Jason Alexander is a good singer in real life, he was told to sing as poorly as he could, after his first take of the song was judged too good to be funny.
Discography
Scarbury has released several singles starting in 1969 on Dunhill, followed by releases on Reena, Playboy, Bell, Columbia, RCA, Big Tree, Lionel, and Elektra labels.
- Albums
-
America's Greatest Hero (1981)
- Charting singles
|
|
|
| 1971 | "Point Me in the Direction of Albuquerque" | — | — | — |
| 1971 | "Mixed Up Guy" | 73 | — | — |
| 1981 | "Believe It or Not" | 2 | 3 | 2 |
| "When She Dances" | 49 | — | — |
External links
