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Brandy You're a Fine Girl


Who is Stephen Homner?
There is a bit of a controversy, has been for decades, over the true authorship of "Brandy," the syrupy woman-waits-for-her-sailor ballad from Looking Glass in the early '1970s.

There is a commonly expressed view that Looking Glass'  Elliott Lurie didn't write the song -- he bought it from Stephen Homner. The specific figure sometimes used is $10,000. 

Lurie denies this. 

Is there even a real Homner? So far as I know he has no existence outside of this claim. 

The more heated accusation is made, too, that Lurie "stole" the song. Obviously both claims can't be true. If Homner (whoever he is exactly) willingly sold it and cashed the check then it wasn't stolen from him. 

A seller of those rights for $10,000 would plausibly have had buyer's remorse when the song seemed to be coming out of every radio in the world but ... that's the way it goes. 

And yes, he should have been given song credit IF this Homner person is real AND the story is true AND if there was nothing in the agreement that specified that he was not to get named credit.  

All of which just slightly piques my interest in the question: which one of those ugly farts on the album cover is Lurie?


Comments

  1. LWFebruary 16, 2025 at 5:20 PM

    Wow, I can’t believe I came across this upon searching for some information. If anyone is still interested 4 years later, Steve Homner was in fact a real person, and told the story his whole life of the song him and his band created, “Brandy”. It was sold, to my recollection, for FAR LESS than $10,000 at the time. I was able to head the original version, which sounded a bit different than Looking Glass’s production, but the story is true. Looking Glass DID NOT write the song, they DID buy it, or they’d producer did, for a STEAL.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. ChristopherFebruary 17, 2025 at 9:25 AM

      As I said, either it was stolen or it was bought. If it was "bought for a steal," I.e. the buyers made a good decision and a huge profit -- the fact is nothing for which they can or should be blamed. Lying about it, of course, is another matter.

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