Rick Derringer, whose six-decade career spans teen stardom as lead singer of the “60s smash “Hang on Sloopy, a “70s solo hit with “Rock and Roll Hootchie Koo, session work with artists from Steely Dan to Barbra Streisand, and extensive work as a writer and producer of wrestling themes like Hulk Hogan’s apparently ageless “Real American,” has died, according to an announcement from his carer, Tony Wilson, and Guitar Player magazine. Wilson’s post notes that Derringer passed Monday night in Ormond Beach, Florida. Derringer, 77, had been in ill health recently; no cause of death was stated.
A fiery and remarkably versatile guitarist, a strong singer and a high-profile presence on New York’s rock scene of the ‘70s and ‘80s, Derringer also produced the Edgar Winter Group’s 1972 smash single “Frankenstein” and served as the band’s guitarist for several years; worked closely with Winter’s brother Johnny as a guitarist and producer; produced “Weird” Al Yankovic’s first album; and even gave Patti Smith her first major credit, on the song “Jump” from Derringer’s 1973 debut solo album, “All-American Boy.”
His original band recorded several albums and toured extensively in the mid- and late-1970s; their last major incarnation included Neil Giraldo, who immediately afterward had great success as Pat Benatar’s guitarist and cowriter (and husband today). Members of Andy Warhol’s extended circle, Derringer and his first wife, Liz, regularly featured in rock magazines of the day. Later on, he collaborated closely with singer Cyndi Lauper and penned and produced several hit theme songs for wrestlers, including Hulk Hogan’s “Real American,” which has the odd legacy of being used as a theme song by Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, and Donald Trump.
Born Richard Dean Zehringer in Ohio in 1947, the young Derringer started performing local shows with his uncle, a country musician, before he started high school after getting a guitar for his ninth birthday. Teenagerically, he started a band called the McCoys with brother Randy.
Originally released by the Vibrations the previous year, the songwriting-production team the Strangeloves—Richard Gottehrer, Jerry Goldstein, and Bob Feldman—hired the group as a backing band in the summer of 1965 and soon after hired them to record a cover of the song “My Girl Sloopy.” Changing the title to “Hang on Sloopy,” the song topped the Billboard Hot 100 that summer, replacing Barry McGuire’s sombre “Eve of Destruction,” about the time Derringer (still using his born name) turned eighteen. For Derringer’s home state as well as in a foretelling of his later years producing music for professional sports, the hit has evolved into a sort of theme song for Ohio State football game for decades.
Beginning working with blues guitarist Johnny Winter in the late 1960s and later, his brother Edgar, touring with both and playing on and producing their albums, the McCoys, who opened for the Rolling Stones on their first major North American tour, had modest follow-up hits but did not repeat that success. The title came from the look of the master tape, which had so many segments spliced together that the musicians said it resembled the horror-movie character’s stitches. The band had been playing around with an instrumental piece for years. Derringer wrote the song, which peaked on the Billboard Hot 100 in May 1973; he subsequently replaced Ronnie Montrose in the band and stayed the guitarist and producer for the next three years.
Derringer left Winter and started his self-titled solo band, which toured extensively throughout the decade and released several albums; their concerts were heavy on guitar duelling and showmanship, and climaxed with Derringer and his second guitarist dramatically throwing their guitars to each other from opposite sides of the stage. Derringer enjoyed his first solo hit with “Rock and Roll Hootchie Koo” (which has had such a long life and was used in the fourth season of “Stranger Things”).
Derringer also performed extensively as a session musician for albums by Steely Dan (including “Countdown to Ecstasy, “Katy Lied,” and “Gaucho”), Todd Rundgren, Kiss, and even Barbra Streisand throughout the 1970s and “80s. Early in the 1980s he soloed on two huge singles penned by Meatloaf master Jim Steinman, “Total Eclipse of the Heart” by Bonnie Tyler and “Making Love Out of Nothing at All.”
He started working with singer Cyndi Lauper in the middle of the 1980s, touring in her band and performing on three of her albums (including the hit “True Colours”), but maybe more importantly was that it brought him into the realm of professional wrestling. He created the World Wrestling Federation’s “The Wrestling Album in 1985,” mostly featuring theme songs from pro wrestlers, many of which he co-wrote. Most famously among these was “Real American,” a theme song by Hulk Hogan used by President Barack Obama at the 2011 White House Correspondents’ Dinner when presenting his birth certificate; as a campaign song by Hillary Clinton; and, naturally, often by President Donald Trump.
Along with Peter Frampton, Carmine Appice, Ringo Starr’s All Starr Band, and others matched with conservative causes, he recorded several Christian-themed albums with his wife, Jenda in later years.
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