Ever since I first time I watched The Wraith as a kid, I’ve enjoyed the song playing during the credits. “Where’s The Fire” is such a powerful Rock track with an uplifting chorus that stays with you long after first listening to it; in fact you can hear that shit on repeat for ages and not get annoyed at all. For some reason or another I never bothered finding who the singer was until recently, and now that I have (thanks partly to the Covid lockdown) I may as well write about him. Tim Feehan, a Canadian musician who’s put out an LP with his band Footloose as well as a few solo albums, has a somewhat sizeable back catalogue. Unfortunately, Spotify doesn’t have Tim’s self-titled album which contains his classic song from this 1986 movie but there’s lots of other music to listen to if you’re into that kind of thing.

Hearing Feehan’s music in the present day gives one a strange sense of nostalgia. I’ve never heard any of these songs before but they evoke the 1980’s perfectly, bringing back memories of a time completely unconnected to these tracks (for me at least). If I was a movie producer, I’d make a film set in those days with a soundtrack consisting entirely of Feehan’s music.

Despite liking the music however, seeing the album artwork in 2020 I have to admit is quite amusing; the buttoned-to-the-top red leather jacket and tash combo on Carmalita is a hilarious marvel (if only his black moustache was in line with those black bars behind him), the Sneak Preview cover is so oddly posed and composited that it looks like a parody of the early 80’s, and it looks like Tim is on the shitter in desperate need of Lactulose on his cover for Full Contact. Not that album covers have much to do with the music contained within them, otherwise Large Professor’s Re:Living would sound like his facial expression: boring (which it isn’t).

Speaking of albums, Tim Feehan seems to be in the A.O.R. (Album Oriented Rock) genre (which I’d also never heard of until today) but I’d argue that some of his songs are obvious singles that never were; “The Painter” and “If Ever You Need Someone” for instance, are tracks that I’m surprised never got into the charts. I guess it was…

Somebody Else’s Moment.

An unpublished and unfinished article from 2020 with a few added sentences, plus a new Spotify playlist (which I’ll add to if Tim Feehan’s 1987 and 1996 albums ever get added to their platform)