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Bread virtually invented soft rock in the early Seventies, and the group\u2019s biggest hits \u2014 \u201cMake It With You,\u201d \u201cIf,\u201d \u201cBaby I\u2019m-a Want You\u201d and \u201cEverything I Own\u201d \u2014 remain staples on lite-rock radio. For all the mellowness of Bread\u2019s music, however, the band dissolved acrimoniously, and the bad feelings last to this day.<\/p>\n
Tensions date back to the group\u2019s first hit. In 1968, veteran singer-songwriter James Griffin hired David Gates as an arranger on the recommendation of a mutual friend, Robb Royer. Along with Royer, they formed a band, signed with Elektra and named themselves Bread after getting stuck in traffic behind a Wonder Bread truck.<\/p>\n
When their first album bombed, Gates and Griffin added bassist Larry Knechtel and drummer Mike Botts. (Royer dropped out, though he continued to write songs for them.) The group recorded \u201cMake It With You,\u201d a gentle, dreamy pop song that went to Number One in 1970. At the time, Gates and Griffin \u2014 the group\u2019s principal songwriters \u2014 had informally agreed to alternate singles. Because Gates\u2019s songs consistently charted high, the agreement fell through, and Griffin began playing Salieri to Gates\u2019s pop Mozart.<\/p>\n
The band broke up in 1973, briefly re-forming three years later to record\u00a0Lost Without Your Love<\/em>. A protracted legal battle between Gates and Griffin, co-owners of the Bread name, was waged over its use on a Griffin-less tour. \u201cWe all got slapped with suits claiming we were conspiring to stifle [Griffin\u2019s] career,\u201d says Mike Botts. A judge ordered that the group could not record, perform or collect royalties until the case was resolved. The litigation stretched out until 1984.<\/p>\n After Bread broke up, Gates wrote the title song for the film version of Neil Simon\u2019s\u00a0Goodbye Girl<\/em>, which became a Top Twenty hit in 1978. Soon after, he fulfilled a lifelong dream of running a ranch, disappearing with his wife and four kids to an 800-acre spread in northern California. \u201cI\u2019m taking care of cows, riding horses and running farm equipment,\u201d says Gates, 48, who still writes songs and is completing a twenty-four-track studio. A satellite dish allows him to keep up with music via MTV and VH-1. His hobby is predicting what will hit the Top Five. \u201cMan, I nail it every time,\u201d he says. \u201cPlay me a record, and I\u2019ll tell you how far it\u2019s going to go.\u201d<\/p>\n For fourteen years, Larry Knechtel worked on his own cattle ranch, but he recently quit the farm and moved to a suburb of Nashville to pursue music again. He\u2019s just released\u00a0Mountain Moods<\/em>, a New Age record, and is in Elvis Costello\u2019s current road band. A longtime sessionman with an impressive rock & roll resume prior to Bread, Knechtel admits he was somewhat uncomfortable playing Bread\u2019s mellow music. \u201cWhenever somebody in the back of the hall would yell, \u2018Boogie<\/em>,\u2019 I\u2019d feel damn miserable,\u201d he says, \u201cbecause I knew there was no way that this band was gonna get up and boogie.\u201d<\/p>\n Botts, 42, writes jingles and music for children\u2019s albums and does background vocals and session work. Encouraged by such friends as Linda Ronstadt and J.D. Souther, he\u2019s taken up songwriting and is shopping around demos in hopes of landing a record deal.<\/p>\n Recently, Griffin moved to Nashville from Memphis, where he\u2019d been living since Bread\u2019s breakup. He has a new group called Dreamer and is cutting an album that will include some Bread remakes. Griffin unsuccessfully tried to coax Gates into a reunion tour last year. \u201cHe\u2019s comfortable up there playing cowboy,\u201d says Griffin. \u201cHe doesn\u2019t want to go out and be, as he puts it, a museum piece.\u201d Griffin would be willing to work with the other members but says, \u201cI don\u2019t think the feeling is mutual.\u201d He\u2019s right \u2014 Knechtel won\u2019t even speak to him, and Botts says, \u201cWe couldn\u2019t forgive and forget that easily.\u201d<\/p>\n Even if relations were friendlier, a Bread reunion would be unlikely. Says Gates, \u201cSometimes it\u2019s better to be grateful and stay the heck out of the limelight when your best work is behind you.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Bread virtually invented soft rock in the early Seventies, and the group\u2019s biggest hits \u2014 \u201cMake It With You,\u201d \u201cIf,\u201d \u201cBaby I\u2019m-a Want You\u201d and \u201cEverything I Own\u201d \u2014 remain staples on lite-rock radio. For all the mellowness of Bread\u2019s music, however, the band dissolved acrimoniously, and the bad feelings last to this day. Tensions […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":4370,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4369","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-blog"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"featured_image_urls":{"full":["https:\/\/newssoccer.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/12\/rs-182983-85231110.webp",1581,1054,false],"thumbnail":["https:\/\/newssoccer.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/12\/rs-182983-85231110-150x150.webp",150,150,true],"medium":["https:\/\/newssoccer.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/12\/rs-182983-85231110-300x200.webp",300,200,true],"medium_large":["https:\/\/newssoccer.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/12\/rs-182983-85231110-768x512.webp",768,512,true],"large":["https:\/\/newssoccer.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/12\/rs-182983-85231110-1024x683.webp",1024,683,true],"1536x1536":["https:\/\/newssoccer.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/12\/rs-182983-85231110-1536x1024.webp",1536,1024,true],"2048x2048":["https:\/\/newssoccer.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/12\/rs-182983-85231110.webp",1581,1054,false],"jnews-360x180":["https:\/\/newssoccer.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/12\/rs-182983-85231110-360x180.webp",360,180,true],"jnews-750x375":["https:\/\/newssoccer.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/12\/rs-182983-85231110-750x375.webp",750,375,true],"jnews-1140x570":["https:\/\/newssoccer.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/12\/rs-182983-85231110-1140x570.webp",1140,570,true],"jnews-120x86":["https:\/\/newssoccer.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/12\/rs-182983-85231110-120x86.webp",120,86,true],"jnews-350x250":["https:\/\/newssoccer.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/12\/rs-182983-85231110-350x250.webp",350,250,true],"jnews-750x536":["https:\/\/newssoccer.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/12\/rs-182983-85231110-750x536.webp",750,536,true],"jnews-1140x815":["https:\/\/newssoccer.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/12\/rs-182983-85231110-1140x815.webp",1140,815,true],"jnews-360x504":["https:\/\/newssoccer.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/12\/rs-182983-85231110-360x504.webp",360,504,true],"jnews-75x75":["https:\/\/newssoccer.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/12\/rs-182983-85231110-75x75.webp",75,75,true],"jnews-350x350":["https:\/\/newssoccer.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/12\/rs-182983-85231110-350x350.webp",350,350,true],"jnews-featured-750":["https:\/\/newssoccer.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/12\/rs-182983-85231110-750x500.webp",750,500,true],"jnews-featured-1140":["https:\/\/newssoccer.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/12\/rs-182983-85231110-1140x760.webp",1140,760,true]},"author_info":{"display_name":"Newssoccer","author_link":"https:\/\/newssoccer.uk\/?author=1"},"category_info":"Blog<\/a>","tag_info":"Blog","comment_count":"0","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/newssoccer.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/12\/rs-182983-85231110.webp","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/newssoccer.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4369","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/newssoccer.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/newssoccer.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newssoccer.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newssoccer.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4369"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/newssoccer.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4369\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4371,"href":"https:\/\/newssoccer.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4369\/revisions\/4371"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newssoccer.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/4370"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/newssoccer.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4369"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newssoccer.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4369"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newssoccer.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4369"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}