David Cassidy--Cherish (1971)

     For the last 20 years, David Cassidy has done a lot. Recording, some TV, but just like his dad, Jack Cassidy, stage acting is where he has made his name.....

      If your under the age of 40.

      If you are over 40  no matter how hard you may try, he will be Keith Partridge. The star-maker machinery of television did such a good job of marketing, that it's virtually impossible to separate the two. If you think it's hard for you to do that...just think how hard it was for him to escape it. In fact, he couldn't, and never seemed to make peace with it as until he embraced that character, and went in another direction artistically.

     But looking at it with more of a critical eye, it's easy to see that as good as his singles were (solo and with The Partridge Family), he had a charisma on the screen that went far beyond his singing talent. In fact, when he was hired on in 1970, no one knew he could even sing. Before they went into the recording studio, he talked music director Wes Farrell into letting him try out for lead singer spot.

     "Cherish" was a hit for The Association in 1966, and was Cassidy's first solo single. In the previous year, The Partridge Family had 4 hit singles, and three hit albums. David's first outing reached #9 and was his only top 20 hit. It's always interesting to think what would have happened if he had not been typecast. On one hand, he might have been the rock singer he thought he wanted to be, but it's pretty certain that he wouldn't have had the success, which eventually led him down the road to find his true calling.