You Can Do Magic - America

I know my husband will wince when he sees this song up here today. I'm not exactly sure, myself, why I'm going with this one other than the fact that the lyrics, "You can do magic. You can have anything that you desire" (and "doo-doo-doo-doo-doo-dit, doo-doo-doo-doo-doo-dit") are firmly planted in my head this afternoon.

The three founding members of America - Dewey Bunnell, Gerry Beckley, and Dan Peek - met while attending London Central High School, at High Wycombe in the mid-1960s. They are all sons of American fathers and English mothers whose families were stationed at the Air Force base in West Ruislip, London.

America released their debut album, "America", in 1971 and while it was a huge success in Holland, it didn't fair too well elsewhere. While in Holland, they worked on recording some other songs, including one written by Dewey Bunnell that he called, "Desert Song." The song had its formal debut at The Harrogate Festival where it received a very enthusiastic response from the audience. After several more performances, both live and televised, the song was re-titled "A Horse with No Name" and was added to the debut album which was re-released in 1972 and quickly went platinum. That was the album (actually it was an 8-track tape) that I used to make my mother play over and over again whenever she drove us anywhere. I loved that song!

In 1977 Dan Peek left the band. Beckley and Bunnell continued on as a duo, supplemented on the road by other musicians as needed. They struggled for several years before finally reaching commercial success once again in 1982 with the release of their 12th album, "View from the Ground", and the single You Can Do Magic which reached #8 on the Billboard pop singles charts.


You Can Do Magic by America from the 1982 album "View from the Ground"



America website