A Bittersweet Farewell to Youth: The Unsentimental End of a Relationship
Oh, those golden years of pop music! Do you remember how quickly the landscape shifted? One minute, it was all bubblegum and heartthrob posters, and the next, a certain maturity, a certain edge, began to creep into the sound. Few artists embodied that turbulent transition as acutely as Shaun Cassidy. By the time he released “So Sad About Us” on his 1980 album, Wasp, the former teen idol was desperately trying to shed his carefully crafted image. While Shaun Cassidy had enjoyed considerable chart success with hits like “That’s Rock ‘n’ Roll” and “Da Doo Ron Ron” in the late 70s—including a US #3 peak for his debut single and his first two albums going platinum—that momentum had stalled dramatically. By 1978, his third album, Under Wraps, marked the beginning of his fading teen-star appeal, and his fourth, Room Service, failed to chart on the US Billboard 200 entirely. This cover of “So Sad About Us” was part of Cassidy’s ambitious, albeit ultimately commercially unsuccessful, final attempt to reinvent himself. The album Wasp, produced by the legendary Todd Rundgren and featuring members of his band Utopia, embraced a decidedly New Wave sound, a stark departure from the polished pop that had made Cassidy a household name. Unfortunately, this brave venture failed to save his pop career, and consequently, “So Sad About Us” did not register on the major charts, fading quickly from public view.
The song itself, however, carries a much deeper, more distinguished history. “So Sad About Us” is not an original Shaun Cassidy tune; it was penned by Pete Townshend and originally recorded by the British rock legends The Who for their 1966 album, A Quick One. It stands as a profound piece of early power pop and garage rock, capturing the bittersweet pangs of a relationship that must end, not due to malice or anger, but simply because it must. Lyrically, Townshend delivers an unusually mature, almost stoic, farewell: “Apologies mean nothing, When the damage is done, But you can’t switch off my lovin’, Like you can’t switch off the sun.” It’s a candid admission that while the romantic relationship is over, the singer’s deep affection remains unextinguished. There is no blame, just a mature, melancholy acceptance: “Sad that the news is out now, Sad, suppose we can’t turn back now, Sad about us.” The original version, with its ringing guitars and raw energy, became one of The Who’s most covered songs, cited as an early archetype for the power pop genre.
Shaun Cassidy’s decision to cover this particular track for his New Wave pivot in 1980 is telling. It speaks to an artist’s yearning for credibility, for an acknowledgment that he, too, could handle music with genuine rock grit and emotional complexity. For those of us who grew up with his poster on our walls, the song evokes a powerful wave of nostalgia. It reminds us of an era when youthful angst was expressed through catchy, three-minute bursts of raw feeling. Cassidy’s version, with its tight production and New Wave shimmer, may lack the original Who’s chaotic Mod-era passion, but it successfully captures the central theme of a wistful, yet inevitable, break-up—a feeling we all recognize from our own transitions from youthful idealism to adult reality. It’s a beautifully melancholic artifact from the end of one career chapter and the beginning of another, more complex, musical period.