STEVE CONTE “Girl With No Name”

As fans of Steve’s solo career will be aware, one of the joys of listening to him is you never know which Steve is going to turn up next – Garage Steve (“Gypsy Cab”), Americana Steve (“Anytime At All Times”), Power Pop Steve (“Gimme, Gimme, Rockaway”), Punk Steve (covering “Somebody’s Gonna Get Their Head Kicked In Tonight”) or as part of Blues Deluxe’s flawless tribute to the Faces and early Rod Stewart. Regardless of which Steve turns up, quality is guaranteed and today folks it’s time for Seriously Smooth Steve. Playing his street style New York rock and soul, soul is never far away from his music and vocals, but takes front and centre on “Girl With No Name” (and for US readers, yes, that is how we spell “centre” in the UK – trust me, it’s not a typo). 

Described by Steve as a song which he’d written in 1984 and resurrected while working with XTC’s Andy Partridge on his new album, he felt it was influenced by the music he was listening to at the time including mid 60’s Beatles, XTC and Diana Ross & The Supremes. Starting with an upbeat sharp drum beat propelled along by punchy bass, the rhythm is Supreme(s)ly good (see what I did there?) and reminiscent in feel to “You Can’t Hurry Love”, but also capturing the feel good vibe of other 80’s songs from “Footloose” to “Walking on Sunshine”. Lyrically, the song tells the story of a tongue-tied Steve loving a girl from afar, but being too shy to speak to her – a place where many of us have been and can relate to.  

I’d only had the chance to listen to the song once before I made tea for the family. In case anyone outside Scotland is thinking we were sitting around genteely drinking cups of Earl Grey – no, that was not the case. Intent on bamboozling the rest of the world, in Scotland lunch is “dinner” and dinner is “tea”. Getting back to the point, at first listen the song had sounded bright and fresh and I’d intended to listen to it more last night. What I hadn’t expected was that after just that single listen the deceptively simple melody behind the chorus line of “I love a girl with no name” had already taken up residence in my brain and proceeded to provide the soundtrack to my cooking. And after further listening something changed for me. We’ll all know a song in which there is a moment of magic which transports a good song into a great song. Around the 2 mins 30 seconds mark when Steve may have normally been tempted to start heading for home to achieve the 3 minute target, the bridge takes this song into another league, first through the bass line and then through Steve repeatedly and slowly singing “I Cry for Loving”. As he does this the third time, the backing vocals kick in shufflingly singing “I’m So Shy, I’m So Shy, Don’t Know Why, I’m So Shy” while the lead vocal continues above them. This is undoubtedly a moment for donning sharp suits, shades, snapping fingers and cutting shapes (or rugs). And if you don’t believe me just how good this moment is, check it out for yourself. Having reached this high, the song continues with Steve singing freely and improvising over it (and hitting some seriously soulful notes) as the song fades to a close.   

As a song, the "Girl With No Name” oozes class, deserves to be heard and enjoyed by a much wider audience and has soundtrack potential written all over it. And all the while keeping just enough great guitar in the mix (raw, smooth and chopping) to satisfy those of us who like our music rockier.  

No longer content with creating the perfect 3-minute pop song, Steve Conte has delivered the perfect 4-minute pop song and probably the song of his career. I absolutely love it. And if the first two singles are anything to go by, the new album could be pretty special. I may even need to use a thesaurus to find new ways to describe it. 

The “Girl With No Name” is released on Wicked Cool Records on 13 October 2023 and will be available on all of the usual digital and streaming platforms. 

GMcA