[in 2001, on longtime songwriting partner
Kal Mann] He was a very talented
writer. He had his finger on the pulse of what was going on in those
days. Very simple lyrics, about romancing and dancing . . . And the
teenagers dug it at the time . . . a very prolific, imaginative guy . . . He
was very, very commercial in his treatment of music. Though he was much
older than the audience he was writing for, he was very contemporary.