Jim Peterik: Turning Out Hits For More Than 50 Years

Jim Peterik:

Turning Out Hits For More Than 50 Years

by Stella Kapetan

For more than 50 years, musician and songwriter Jim Peterik has been turning out hits, initially with The Ides of March and their 1970 classic “Vehicle” about the friendly stranger in the black sedan, as a solo artist, and formerly of Survivor. Survivor’s success includes the Grammy Awardwinning anthem to perseverance, “Eye of the Tiger;” “The Search is Over” and other staples heard on classic radio.

The west suburban Berwyn native, now 72, recently sat down with StreetWise Magazine in the music studio in his south suburban Burr Ridge home to talk about his career, which includes writing hits for The Beach Boys, REO Speedwagon, Lynyrd Skynyrd, Sammy Hagar and others. He is also still creating, recording and regularly performing live today, with The Ides of March, Cornerstones of Rock and Pride of Lions.

“It’s all about the feedback I get from people whose lives were touched or inspired by something I wrote and performed,” Peterik said about his success. “I’ve heard “Eye of The Tiger” and “The Search is Over” have been used for people in drug rehab. That means a lot to me.”

Peterik first displayed his musical talent playing the ukulele while singing with his sisters in the back of the family’s 1952 Chrysler on trips to Florida. A few years later, at age 9, he began playing the guitar, “because I was old enough to wrap my hand around the neck,” he said.

He was 14 in 1964 when friend and classmate, Larry Millas knocked on his door and asked if he wanted to start a band. “Music was my life at that point,” Peterik said. They were The Shon-Dells, then Batman and the Boy Wonders, a name that lasted about two weeks. “Then [bass player] Bob Bergland said, ‘I’m reading [Shakespeare’s] Julius Caesar, and I came across the phrase, ‘Beware the Ides of March,’” Peterik recalled. “Bergland said, ‘That sounds like

our new name.’” They played local backyard BBQs and in high school gymnasiums and split their $20 fee. Their song “You Wouldn’t Listen” reached No. 42 on the Billboard Hot 100 and No. 7 on WLS Chicago in 1966.

Then they struck it big in 1970 when Peterik was an 18-yearold freshman at Morton College and penned “Vehicle.” He was inspired by a girl, Karen, whom he met at a Turtles concert in 1968. “She would ask me to drive her places but would insist we were just friends,” Peterik said. “She said, ‘I want to date other guys. It’s not a date - you have the cool car. Can you take me to modeling school?’ I did, so I could be next to her. Week after week, she’d shake my hand. I thought, 'All I am is your vehicle baby.’ I had never heard the word used in a song.” The words in the song about the stranger offering a ride to the nearest star was based an anti-drug pamphlet Peterik’s lab partner showed him that depicted a man stopping children to sell drugs.

The song shot up to No. 2 on the Billboard Hot 100, and after hearing it on the radio, Karen called Peterik and agreed to a date. She became his wife two years later. “All my songs are written for Karen.” Peterik said. “I rarely write sad love songs because I really never experienced heartbreak.”

“Vehicle” features Peterik using a gruff voice that sounds years older than 18, accompanied by a horn riff. Peterik said as a result, people mistook the band for Blood Sweat & Tears. He was, in fact, channeling Blood Sweat & Tears’ lead singer David Clayton-Thomas, along with Ray Charles. Charles was an early, major influence on Peterik, along with Elvis Presley and Johnny Cash. “Musically, I am the mutt of so many influences,” Peterik said.

With the record’s success, the band hit the road with Jimi Hendrix, Janis Joplin and other top names. “We were sharing a deli tray with the Grateful Dead,” Peterik said, while

avoiding the drug- and liquor-infused lifestyle often associated with rock 'n’ roll. Peterik recalled arriving at a party at the invitation of Led Zeppelin’s Robert Plant and finding what Peterik described as an orgy, with plenty of drugs and semi-dressed women. “We left,” Peterik said. “We went across the street to Dunkin’ Donuts, our comfort zone.”

Peterik left The Ides of March in 1973 to “break new ground musically and be influenced by different musicians and style,” he said.

Following the 1976 release of his solo album “Jim PeterikDon’t Fight the Feeling,” he toured with Heart and opened for Boston’s first live performance. Peterik recounted how he helped Boston’s lead singer, Brad Delp, overcome stage fright. “He had never performed in front of that many people. He came over to me and said, ‘Jim, I’m afraid to go out there.’ I said, ‘You go out there, and you rock them.’ I pushed him into the spotlight. He did great.”

The Cover for the single of "Vehicle" with b-side "Lead Me Home, Gently," released in March 1970 on Warner Bros.

The Ides of March in the recording studio

Peterik holds his Grammy while in the recording studio

Stella Kapetan

Survivor and Eye of the Tiger

In 1977, Peterik was back in Chicago and had a goal. “I wanted to create the best band ever,” he said. The result was Survivor, the band Peterik would lead to the top of the music charts and earn the industry’s highest awards. Guitarist Frankie Sullivan and lead singer Dave Bickler were also from the Chicago area.

Survivor performed at Haymakers, Beginnings, The Thirsty Whale and other local bars until the day Sylvester Stallone called and asked Peterik to write a song for the 1982 movie “Rocky III.”

Stallone had told his friend Tony Scotti, head of Survivor’s

record label, Scotti Brothers Records, that he was looking for a song for the movie. Unbeknownst to Peterik, Scotti played Survivor’s “Poor Man’s Son” for Stallone. "Stallone said, ‘Give me Jim’s number,”’ Peterik recounted. “I get home, and there is a message on my answering machine. ‘Hey Jim, that’s a nice answering machine you got there. Give me a call. It’s Sylvester Stallone.”’ Peterik thought his road manager, Sal, left the message as a joke. “Karen overheard and said, ‘Who is that? You idiot, you better call him back just in case,” Peterik said. “I thought it was a good sign when he answered with ‘Yo.’ He said, ‘Hey Jim, call me Sly. I need a song for “Rocky III.” I don’t want to use “Gonna Fly Now.” I want something for the kids, something with a pulse. Can you help me out?’ I said, ‘Absolutely.’”

Peterik was sent a rough cut of the movie. Confident of his ability to write a good song, he rented a Betamax video cassette player and watched the movie with Sullivan, who cowrote the song. “When I heard Burgess Meredith say 'Rocky, you are losing the eye of the tiger,’ we looked at each other and said, ‘We have our title.’”

“Eye of the Tiger,” with Peterik on rhythm guitar and keyboards, spent more than six weeks at No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100. It won a Grammy Award for Best Rock Performance by Duo or Group with Vocal, a People’s Choice Award and was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Original Song.

“I was overwhelmed, really.” Peterik said of the Grammy Award win. “Suddenly I was in the company of some of my biggest heroes.”

People still tell Peterik how the song inspires them. “It has given a lot of people motivation to go the final mile of a 26-mile run,” Peterik said.

Hey, Jim... Give me a call. It's Sylvester Stallone'

Bickler left Survivor in 1983, and Jimi Jamison came aboard. “He had a God-given gift of singing,” Peterik said of Jamison, who died in 2014. You believe everything that he sings. It’s like he lived every lyric he sings.”

In 1984, Survivor released the platinum album “Vital Signs.” “The Search is Over,” the power ballad that reached the top 10 of the Billboard Hot 100, is Peterik’s favorite song that he has written. He said it describes people who look for something in life but are too close or too blind to see it. He noted that “High on You,” another top 10, was written for Karen.

The power-driven “I Can’t Hold Back” nearly did not make it into the album. “We were cutting the “Vital Signs” album,” Peterik said. “We thought we were done. Roadies were packing up. Frankie started an appreciated guitar figure, and I sat down at the piano and started accompanying him. And Ron Nevison, our producer, said ‘What’s that?’ I said, 'We are just goofing around.' He said, ‘You are not goofing around. You are writing a song that has to be on the record.’”

Peterik was too busy on the road at the time to realize how successful the album had become. “It was upon reflection that it really hit me,” he said.

Survivor would also score in the top 10 with “Is This Love” from the album “When Seconds Count” and “Burning Heart” from “Rocky IV: Original Motion Picture Soundtrack.”

Peterik parted ways with Survivor in 1996 and concentrated on The Ides of March.

'I am a songwriter first…'

The many hits Peterik has written for other artists span a variety of genres. “I am a songwriter first above a musician and a singer,” he said. “I tailor my songs with the people I’m writing with and for. I am trying to fit into their style of music.”

For 38 Special, he teamed with their front man, Don Branes, and guitarist Jeff Carlisi to write 1981’s “Hold on Loosely.” The song closes all the band’s live performances “like the cherry on top - everybody goes wild,” Barnes said in an interview with Decades TV Network. Peterik based it on when Karen told him while they were dating that he was too possessive.

The trio also wrote “Caught Up in You” that 38 Special took to the top 10 on the Billboard Hot 100. Peterik said 38 Special ushered in a new sound in music. “They were the first band to really bridge southern rock and pop, and I was a big part of that.”

Peterik also displayed his versatility when he collaborated with Sammy Hagar to write “Heavy Metal” that Hagar sang for the animated movie of the same title.

The genesis for The Beach Boys song “That’s Why God Made the Radio” is a conversation with Brian Wilson over a meal at a Chinese restaurant. “We were discussing how great music sounded on AM radio through the dashboard of your car,” Peterik said. “Between gulps of shrimp Brian said, ‘That’s why God made the radio.’ I wrote that title down, and the rest is history.” The tune Peterik and Wilson wrote with Larry Millas and Joe Thomas captures the California sun and surf sound and is featured in the album with the same name released to coincide with The Beach Boys’ 50th anniversary.

The Ides of March: Top row: Steve Eisen, Tim Bales, Henry Salgado Bottom: Mike Borch, Bob Bergland, Jim Peterik, Larry Millas, Scott May

Peterik and Dennis DeYoung, Styx co-founder and Chicago South Side native, share a 35-year friendship and live two blocks from each other. They wrote and recorded “Proof of Heaven” four years ago. “It reflects Dennis’ and my feeling that there is more to this life beyond what we see.” Peterik has high praise for his friend. “He has the most iconic voice in rock 'n’ roll,” Peterik said. “It is a signature sound that nobody has. You know immediately it’s Dennis DeYoung.” And Peterik has seen a side of him most fans have not. “He can be serious,” Peterik said. “But get him in front of a microphone, and he becomes a stand-up comic.”

Still Going Strong

Peterik said “All That’s Mine to Give,” released last year with singer Toby Hitchcock, has already become a standard at weddings, bar mitzvahs, “every time people get together,” he said. “It’s about Karen. It’s a good example of two people who gave each other everything.” As the Pride of Lions, Peterik and Hitchcock released “Dream Higher” this month.

Peterik also uses his talent to fight cancer through the organization In Concert for Cancer that raises funds for patient support services, treatment and research. He has performed in their annual live show. They will release in August “The Fight of Our Life,” the song Peterik calls “our cancer anthem.” It features vocal performance by Peterik, DeYoung, Ray Parker Jr. and saxophonist Mindi Abair. Peterik has a personal reason for his involvement. “I always think of my mother, who was cured of breast cancer,” he said.

And Peterik is still with The Ides of March, the band that started it all more than 50 years ago. “It’s a family and a band of brothers,” Peterik said. In 1990, they were invited to a reunion in Berwyn’s Cermak Plaza Shopping Center’s parking lot, where Peterik said they played to a crowd of 20,000. They still perform about 30 concerts a year, mainly in the Midwest,

where the fans cheer at the start of “Vehicle.” “They usually greet us on their feet when we hit our signature brass call to arms,” Peterik said. The band is writing and recording material for an album to be released later this year.

The Ides of March has also joined with other classic groups that originated in the Chicago area - The Buckinghams, The Cryan’ Shames, The Shadows of Knight and The New Colony Six - to tour as Cornerstones of Rock.

The Ides of March also give back to the community. They formed a college scholarship program for fine arts students at Morton West High School after the City of Berwyn dedicated the portion of Home Avenue in front of the school as The Ides of March Way in 2010. The school is where all the original members formed the band.

In 2006, the band, together with Chicago’s Holy Name Cathedral, released “Sharing Christmas,” a 4-song EP featuring disc jockey Dick Biondi. The proceeds benefited the cathedral’s Thursday Suppers for people who are low-income or homeless.

With his full schedule, Peterik has no plans to retire. “I can’t say the R word,” he said. “You can’t retire from what you love doing.” And he is always trying to top what he has already accomplished. “I stay creative. People ask me what’s the biggest hit you have ever had, and I say 'I haven’t written it yet.’”

And despite his success, he said he is “still a kid from Berwyn at heart. People tell me I haven’t changed. I keep both feet on the ground.”

See Cornerstones of Rock live, at 3 p.m. Sunday, July 16, at the Des Plaines Theatre, 1476 Miner St. For full schedules, visit theidesofmarch.com