Jim Croce

(10 January, 1943 - 20 September 1973)

Time In A Bottle

If I could save time in a bottle

the first thing that I'd like to do

is to save everyday till eternity passes away

just to spend them with you.

If I could make days last forever

if words could make wishes come true

I'd save everyday like a treasure and then

again I would spend them with you.

But there never seems to be enough time

to do the things you wanna do once you find them

I looked around enough to know

That you're the one I wanna go through time with.

If I had a box just for wishes

and dreams that had never come true

the box would be empty except for the memory of how

they were answered by you.

But there never seems to be enough time

to do the things you wanna do once you find them

I looked around enough to know

that your the one I wanna go thru time with.

James Joseph Croce, pronounced (CROW-chee) (January 10, 1943 – September 20, 1973), popularly known as Jim Croce, was an American singer-songwriter.

Croce scored a handful of hit songs in the early '70s, but died in an airplane crash just as he was beginning to capitalize on his success. He is probably best remembered for the songs "Time In A Bottle" and "Bad, Bad Leroy Brown," both #1 hits in 1973.

Early life

Croce was born in South Philadelphia. He graduated from Upper Darby High School in Drexel Hill, Pennsylvania in 1960. In 1976, he was the first former student to be added to the Upper Darby High School Wall of Fame. While attending Villanova University, from which he graduated in 1965, Croce was a member of the Villanova Singers and Villanova Spires and was a student disc jockey at WXVU. He also met his future wife, Ingrid Jacobson, at a hootenanny at Convention Hall in Philadelphia, where he was a judge for a contest. When they married, he converted to Judaism. Their son Adrian James is a singer-songwriter in his own right, performing under the name A. J. Croce.

Early career

During the early 1960s, Croce formed a number of college bands, performed at coffee houses and universities, and later performed with his wife as a duo in the mid-1960s to early 1970s. At first, their performances included songs by Ian and Sylvia, Gordon Lightfoot, Joan Baez, and Woody Guthrie, but in time they began writing their own music, such as "Age," "Hey Tomorrow," and "Spin Spin Spin," which later led to Croce's hit songs in the early 1970s.

At the same time, Croce got his first long-term gig at a rural bar and steak house in Lima, Pennsylvania, called the Riddle Paddock. There, over the next few years, Croce developed a very engaging rapport with tough audiences and built his musical repertoire to more than 3,000 songs. His set list included every genre from blues to country to rock 'n roll to folk, with tender love songs and traditional bawdy ballads, always introduced with a story and an impish grin.

In 1968, Jim and Ingrid Croce were encouraged to move to New York City to record their first album with Capitol Records. For the next two years, they drove more than 300,000 miles playing small clubs and concerts on the college concert circuit promoting their album Jim & Ingrid Croce.

Then, disillusioned by the music business and New York City, Croce sold all but one guitar to pay the rent, and they returned to the Pennsylvania countryside where Croce got a job driving trucks and doing construction to pay the bills. He called this his "character development period" and spent a lot of his time sitting in the cab of a truck, composing songs about his buddies and the folks he enjoyed meeting at the local bars and truck stops.

Success

In 1970, Croce met classically trained pianist/guitarist, singer-songwriter Maury Muehleisen from Trenton, New Jersey through Joe Salviuolo (aka Sal Joseph). Salviuolo was best friends with Jim when they attended Villanova University together, and Salviuolo later discovered Maury when he was teaching at Glassboro State College in New Jersey. Sal, along with Tommy West and Terry Cashman, brought this duo together in the Cashman and West production office in New York City. Initially, Croce backed Muehleisen on guitar at his gigs. But in time, their musical strengths led them each to new heights. Muehleisen's ethereal and inspired guitar leads became the perfect accompaniment to Croce's down-to-earth music.

In 1972, Croce signed to a three-record deal with ABC Records releasing You Don't Mess Around with Jim and Life & Times in the same year. The singles "You Don't Mess Around with Jim," "Operator (That's Not The Way It Feels)," and "Time in a Bottle" (written for his newborn son, A. J. Croce) helped the former album reach #1 on the charts in 1974. Croce's biggest single, "Bad, Bad Leroy Brown," hit #1 on the U.S. charts in the summer of 1973, selling two million copies.

Sudden death

Croce, 30, and Muehleisen, 24, died in a small commercial plane crash on September 20, 1973, one day before his third ABC album, I Got a Name was to be released. The posthumous release included three hits, "I Got A Name," "Workin' At The Car Wash Blues," and "I'll Have to Say I Love You in a Song". Three months after his death, the song "Time in a Bottle," originally released on Croce's first album the year before, became a #1 hit single (the third posthumous chart-topping song of the Rock Era following Otis Redding's "Sittin' On (The Dock of the Bay)" and "Me and Bobby McGee" by Janis Joplin).

Croce had just completed a concert in Natchitoches, Louisiana, and was flying to Sherman, Texas. The pilot and all passengers (Croce, Muehleisen, and George Stevens, the comic who was the show's warm up act) were killed instantly at 10:45 PM EDT on September 20, 1973, less than an hour after the end of their last concert. Upon takeoff, the plane did not gain enough altitude to clear an area of large pecan trees at the end of the runway. The official report from the NTSB hints that the charter pilot, Robert Newton Elliott, who had severe coronary artery disease and had run a portion of the 3 miles to the airport from a motel, may have suffered a heart attack, causing him to crash into the trees on a clear runway with excellent visibility. A later investigation placed sole blame for the accident on pilot error.

Croce was laid to rest in the Philadelphia area, even though he had recently relocated to San Diego. Family, friends, and fans were stunned to learn of the premature death of the two musicians.

News of the premature deaths of the duo sparked a massive interest in Jim’s first two albums – You Don’t Mess Around With Jim and Life and Times - as well as the “I Got A Name” single, which was released later that same week. This was followed closely by the release of the album of the same title. Sales soared and resulted in three gold records. A “Greatest Hits” package released in 1974 also proved to be extraordinarily popular. The catalogue became a staple of radio play, turntables, cassettes, and CDs for years, and is still receiving significant airplay in the first decade of the 21st century.

Albums

Facets (1966) (re-released with additional tracks, 2003)
Jim & Ingrid Croce (with Ingrid Croce) (1969)
You Don't Mess Around with Jim (1972)
Life and Times (1973)

I Got a Name (1973)
Photographs & Memories: His Greatest Hits (1974)
Down the Highway (1975)
The Faces I've Been (1975)
Time in a Bottle: Jim Croce's Greatest Love Songs (1976)
Bad, Bad Leroy Brown: Jim Croce's Greatest Character Songs (1978)
Jim Croce Live: The Final Tour (1989)
The 50th Anniversary Collection (1992) - 2 CDs
24 Karat Gold in a Bottle (1994)
The Definitive Collection: "Time in a Bottle" (1999) - 2 CDs
Words and Music (1999)
Home Recordings: Americana (2003)
Classic Hits (2004)
Have You Heard (2006)

Singles(Number is Billboard peak)

1 - Bad, Bad Leroy Brown (1973)
1 - Time in a Bottle (1973)
8 - You Don't Mess Around With Jim (1972)
9 - I'll Have to Say I Love You in a Song (1974)
10 - I Got a Name (1973)
17 - Operator (That's Not the Way It Feels) (1972)
32 - Workin' At The Car Wash Blues (1974)
37 - One Less Set Of Footsteps (1973)
63 - Chain Gang Medley (1973)
64 - It Doesn't Have To Be That Way (1976)
110 - Mississippi Lady (1976)