Todd Rundgren 3: The Ballad Of Todd Rundgren

He’d gotten the recording bug, so Todd Rundgren went back to the studio first chance he got. While it starts out with a midtempo rocker of sorts, Runt: The Ballad Of Todd Rundgren has much more of an emphasis on slower, piano-based songs, as one would expect to come from the guy on the cover with the noose around his neck.

Indeed, “Long Flowing Robe” is something of a palate cleanser before “The Ballad (Denny & Jean)”, a tearjerking, absolutely heartbreaking tale of love torn apart by success. “Bleeding” is dominated by a very affected guitar sound, and while “Wailing Wall” is very pretty, it doesn’t do much with the metaphor of the found title. Speaking of which, “The Range War” is something of a clever cowboy song sung by a city slicker, but even that is bested by “Chain Letter”, which begins “Don’t take yourself so seriously” and goes on to describe the writing of the song itself in real time, building and building to an exhilarating conclusion.

It’s those pretty piano tunes on side two and inspired again by his current fave Laura Nyro that lodge themselves in your cerebral cortex and won’t get out no matter how hard you shake your head. “A Long Time, A Long Way To Go” is a trifle on par with the first McCartney album, while “Boat On The Charles” looks at how to deal with lost love from another angle altogether. “Be Nice To Me” and “Hope I’m Around” are wonderful additions to the kiss-off canon. “Parole” is another rockin’ excuse for a metaphor, and “Remember Me” is a brief grovel for posterity closing the album.

Given the Runt in the title, it’s still unclear who or what exactly it is. Only Tony Sales appears on the bulk of the album, with N.D. Smart replacing Hunt on most tracks, and Jerry Scheff and John Guerin on two others. And of course, Todd plays everything else, even the drums, an idea he’d take to a further extreme on his next album, along with journeys in other directions.

Todd Rundgren Runt: The Ballad Of Todd Rundgren (1971)—3½