What Love Can Do

Album: New Music from an Old Friend (2007)
Play Video

Songfacts®:

  • This song was included on a Target album New Music from an Old Friend, where several well-known artists, including Brian Wilson, did a new recording of an old song, and then laid down one new tune.
  • Singer-songwriter Tonio K found himself collaborating with two music legends when he penned this song with Brian Wilson and Burt Bacharach. Tonio had taken on the Hal David role with Bacharach on a number of other tunes, but this was the only time either of them had written with Brian Wilson. Speaking with us in a 2013 interview, Tonio told us how this one-off collaboration came about: "He and Burt, I don't know if they even knew each other," he said. "They must have said hello over the years at one function or another, but he and Burt I think were seated at the same table at some Grammy function and someone at the table was going, 'Hey, have you two guys ever written a song?' They went, 'No, actually. We've never written a song together.' And I think Melinda, Brian's wife and kind of manager aide-de-camp put it together.

    So one day Burt called me up and he goes, 'Hey, I'm going to write a song with Brian Wilson. First time I've ever written with him before. Do you want to write the lyric?' I went, 'Oh, gee, let me think about that.' So anyway, we did.

    But Brian had a verse, melody, and background harmonies, which are really cool. Some real Beach Boy kind of background stuff that he already had. He was hoping Burt would come up with a great Burt Bacharach '60s chorus, which Burt did. I'm sitting around with my legal pad, looking at the two of them on a piano bench working it out at Burt's house, and I said, 'Burt, you know me well enough to know I don't do this, but I'm sitting here looking at Burt Bacharach and Brian Wilson sharing a piano bench as we're writing this song. I've got to have a picture of that. Are you guys okay if I bring a camera tomorrow?' [Laughing] This was pre iPhone. They went, 'Sure.'

    I don't do that, but that one just struck me as something no one was ever going to see again, and I needed to get a picture of it."

Comments

Be the first to comment...

Editor's Picks

Kerry Livgren of Kansas

Kerry Livgren of KansasSongwriter Interviews

In this talk from the '80s, the Kansas frontman talks turning to God and writing "Dust In The Wind."

Susanna Hoffs - "Eternal Flame"

Susanna Hoffs - "Eternal Flame"They're Playing My Song

The Prince-penned "Manic Monday" was the first song The Bangles heard coming from a car radio, but "Eternal Flame" is closest to Susanna's heart, perhaps because she sang it in "various states of undress."

Sugarland

SugarlandSongwriter Interviews

Meet the "sassy basket" with the biggest voice in country music.

Rupert Hine

Rupert HineSongwriter Interviews

Producer Rupert Hine talks about crafting hits for Tina Turner, Howard Jones and The Fixx.

Don Dokken

Don DokkenSongwriter Interviews

Dokken frontman Don Dokken explains what broke up the band at the height of their success in the late '80s, and talks about the botched surgery that paralyzed his right arm.

Timothy B. Schmit of the Eagles

Timothy B. Schmit of the EaglesSongwriter Interviews

Did this Eagle come up with the term "Parrothead"? And what is it like playing "Hotel California" for the gazillionth time?