Remembering Clive Davis, Who Elevated Hitmaking To An Art Form

Barry Manilow has told nan communicative down his first large deed truthful galore times that I had nary volition of bringing up nan half-century-old “Mandy” erstwhile I sat down pinch nan vocalist connected a caller day astatine his location successful Palm Springs. Among nan questions I did inquire was really he ended up signaling nan opus that opens his caller album, and nan reply — arsenic it’s truthful often been passim Manilow’s career, opening pinch that 1975 chart-topper — was Clive Davis.

“It was each Clive,” Manilow said of “Once Before I Go,” nan Peter Allen/Dean Pitchford number that leads disconnected his just-released “What a Time” LP. Davis, nan star-making grounds executive pinch nan alleged aureate ears, had been urging him to grounds nan opus for years, Manilow told me, which inevitably brought him backmost to nan well-rehearsed communicative of “Mandy” — to Davis’ determination that Manilow’s debut for his Arista explanation lacked a breakout smash and to his proposal that nan vocalist trim a type of a humble deed called “Brandy” by Scott English.

“So I went successful nan workplace and did it trying to sound for illustration that guy,” Manilow recalled, stomping his ft to approximate a lumbering stone beat. “Clive came successful and said, ‘That’s terrible.’ I said, ‘I cognize it’s terrible.’ But successful bid to study nan song, I’d slowed it down and changed nan cardinal — I recovered nan emotion opus hiding successful ‘Brandy,’” Manilow continued. (He besides changed nan title to debar immoderate disorder pinch Looking Glass’ “Brandy,” which had precocious reached No. 1.) Manilow played nan tune successful his much romanticist style for nan exec. “I’ll ne'er hide it — Clive said, ‘Just do that.’ And that was nan record.” He laughed.

“He’s a benignant of a genius.”

Davis, who died Monday astatine property 94, didn’t singing aliases play an instrument. “I knew thing astir music,” he erstwhile said, looking backmost astatine his introduction into nan grounds business. Yet his instincts made him 1 of nan surest spotters and nurturers of talent successful popular history, pinch a agelong — and varied — statement of occurrence stories that included Manilow, Janis Joplin, Neil Diamond, Lou Reed, Patti Smith, Whitney Houston, Aretha Franklin, Dionne Warwick, Alicia Keys, Jennifer Hudson and Maroon 5, among galore others. He moreover helped nan Grateful Dead people a Top 10 azygous pinch “Touch of Grey” successful 1987.

Davis, who sewage his commencement successful Columbia Records’ ineligible department, could place original voices and seemed to intuit which songs were apt to go hits. Sometimes nan hits came from nan voices themselves, arsenic successful nan lawsuit of Bruce Springsteen, whom Davis cajoled into penning “Blinded by nan Light” for his Columbia debut; sometimes nan exec match-made performers and composers, arsenic successful nan lawsuit of “Mandy” aliases “Freeway of Love,” a zippy Narada Michael Walden jam that launched Franklin’s comeback successful nan mid-1980s.

A natty dresser pinch a cosmopolitan air, Davis founded Arista successful 1974 aft he was fired from Columbia (where he’d ascended to nan presidency) amid an embezzlement ungraded of which he was later cleared. In 2000, he was ousted from Arista successful a firm shakeup — conscionable months aft nan explanation won 8 Grammy Awards pinch Carlos Santana’s 15-times-platinum “Supernatural” LP — past launched a caller label, J Records, which scored an contiguous blockbuster pinch Keys’ “Songs successful A Minor.”

Clive Davis astatine nan Beverly Hills Hotel successful 2020.

(Christina House / Los Angeles Times)

Wherever he worked, Davis’ extremity was shepherding hits that spanned formats and generations; he delighted successful projects for illustration “Smooth,” nan inescapable Santana azygous pairing nan stone guitarist and Rob Thomas of Matchbox Twenty, and a bid of Great American Songbook albums by nan once-scruffy Rod Stewart. He mightiness besides person been nan euphony industry’s biggest believer successful ballads, astatine slightest among suits: Between 1985 and 1992, Houston unsocial released almost a twelve of music’s all-timers, including “Saving All My Love for You,” “Didn’t We Almost Have It All” and — possibly nan top popular ballad ever recorded — her return connected Dolly Parton’s “I Will Always Love You.” (It wasn’t a immense hit, but perceive to Houston and Jermaine Jackson’s pedal-steel-drenched “Nobody Loves Me Like You Do,” from Houston’s debut, for an early lawsuit of that crossover ambition.)

One of comparatively fewer nonperformers inducted into nan Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, Davis brought his flair for assortment to nan statement he threw astatine nan Beverly Hilton each twelvemonth connected nan nighttime earlier nan Grammys — a famously basking summons that drew A-list celebs from nan worlds of euphony and Hollywood arsenic good arsenic business and politics. You could ever count connected nan exec to person persuaded immoderate number of nan year’s splashiest caller acts to perform; this year’s bash, successful January, had Sombr, Olivia Dean and nan women of “KPop Demon Hunters.” But my favourite portion of nan show was ever seeing which seasoned Davis had tapped to operation it up pinch nan youngsters — Diamond aliases Manilow, for instance, aliases Johnny Mathis, who perfectly killed successful 2015.

Davis horrified galore successful 2012 erstwhile he opted to proceed pinch his statement conscionable hours aft Houston was recovered dormant successful a edifice room astatine nan Beverly Hilton. In nan years aft nan singer’s death, Davis drew disapproval for taking excessively overmuch in installments for Houston’s creator achievements; to some, he became a awesome of nan euphony industry’s efforts to reside down Houston’s Blackness successful bid to scope achromatic audiences. Five years ago, I asked Warwick, who was Houston’s cousin, whether she’d taken connected immoderate benignant of consulting domiciled connected “I Wanna Dance With Somebody,” nan 2022 Whitney biopic that Davis produced.

Bobby Brown, from left, Whitney Houston and Clive Davis successful New York successful 1998.

(Stuart Ramson / AP)

“Not 1 thing,” she told me. “I want them to fto Whitney remainder successful peace. Leave her alone. Ten years [since she died] — it’s clip to fto her sleep.” (In a connection Monday, Warwick called Davis her “dear friend” and said she “can deliberation of nary different grounds man that seemed to person that magical expertise to cognize a deed erstwhile he heard a song.”)

I said pinch Davis galore times complete nan years and was ever struck by his enthusiasm astir euphony and astir his callback of events from decades ago. In 2017, I interviewed nan exec alongside Mathis and Kenneth “Babyface” Edmonds astir a grounds nan 3 made together that had Mathis singing newish popular songs for illustration Adele’s “Hello” and Pharrell Williams’ “Happy” — a conception Manilow told maine successful March he and Davis had been talking astir replicating. After my communicative ran, Davis emailed maine and said he’d enjoyed nan piece, which had a mates of lines astir Davis’ inclination to spell overboard hyping his projects.

“Yes, a fewer of your bites required a individual Band-Aid,” he wrote, “but I did admit your position of nan Mathis album’s quality.”

He knew nan euphony was good; Clive Davis ever knew erstwhile nan euphony was good.