Peter Lemongello

Lemongello spent the first part of his career as a cabaret singer, with several appearances on national TV, including 25 on The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson.[1] He released his first two records (under the name Pete Lemongello) on the Rare Bird record label to no fanfare. In 1973, he signed to Epic Records. He released one single in December 1973; it was unsuccessful and he subsequently left the label.[1][2][3][4]

Frustrated by his lack of record sales, Lemongello hit upon the idea of creating an album to be sold exclusively on TV. Using a city-by-city marketing strategy, he and his partners began their $390,000 Love '76 advertising campaign with a 13-week, around-the-dial, TV blitz in the New York market starting January 1, 1976, and ran commercials on all six of the major commercial television stations in that market between 70 and 100 times a week. The double album sold 43,000 copies within the area, skyrocketing him to local fame, and allowing the campaign to enter the markets of Los Angeles and Las Vegas.[4]

In a profile in The New York Times,[3] he stated, "Look what this country needs is a white, male superstar they can hang their hat on. They want him clean, and they want him now. That's why I'm playing it this way. I can be what they want." An acquaintance and fan named Bob Pascuzzi bankrolled a promotional roll-out meant to generate interest from financial backers that would result in a deal for an album and concerts. Westbury Music Fair was rented for one show, and an album assembled with one side recorded in the studio, the other consisting of remixes of his tapes. One concert promoter conceded the show had sold out at 2,800 tickets but wondered whether Lemongello could repeat his success in cities with fewer Italians and where he had not advertised as heavily.[3]

Private Stock Records signed Lemongello in May 1976. He then ended his self-promotional efforts and released his second album, Do I Love You, in late 1976. To help promote the album, which, as with its subsequent singles, failed to chart,[5] he was sent on tour with labelmate (and future Family Guy composer) Walter Murphy. An appearance given by the duo on March 5, 1977, at the Felt Forum in New York received a mixed review from Robert Ford, Jr., who wrote in a review of the concert for the April 9, 1977 issue of Billboard that "after saturating television screens with commercials that put more emphasis on his handsome face than his thin voice, Lemongello follows up with a live act that does pretty much the same thing".[6]

In August 1976, prior to the release of his Private Stock album, Lemongello was sued by Triad Media Associates, a partner in the promotion of his Love '76 album, for failing to pay an estimated $95,000 he owed the firm, failing to fulfill 8,000 orders for the album, overestimating sales of the album, and arranging to have copies of it sold in a Manhattan record store for a price lower than that which was advertised on television.[7] Lemongello was ultimately ordered by New York State Attorney General Louis J. Lefkowitz to ship the 8,000 copies.[8]

In the fall of 1977, Lemongello was sued by nine music publishers (Razzle Dazzle Music, Rocket Music, April Music, Edward B. Marks Music, Edsel Music, Petal Music, Colgems-EMI Music, Almo Music, and Hammer and Nails Music) for failing to pay mechanical royalties for fourteen of the songs he recorded for his Love '76 album, demanding a payment of $1 per album sold and a lump sum of $5,000 for court proceedings and for each of the litigated songs.[9]

Lemongello later worked as a housing contractor in New York and Florida. In the early 1980s he was accused of masterminding two acts of arson on two luxury houses that his construction firm was working on near St. Petersburg, Florida.[10] Lemongello subsequently pled no contest to charges of arson and insurance fraud, in what his lawyer said was a "business decision" to avoid a trial.[11]

On January 15, 1982, Lemongello and his brother, bowler Mike Lemongello, were kidnapped from a construction site, Mike was forced to withdraw more than $50,000 from a bank, and both were then left in the woods. Manny Seoane and Mark Lemongello (the brothers' cousin), both former Major League Baseball pitchers, turned themselves in to police and in 1983 were sentenced to seven years' probation for the crime.[12]

Lemongello was later charged by FBI agents with bankruptcy fraud and lying on loan applications. He spent 16 months in federal prison and was ordered to pay former Houston Astros pitcher Joe Sambito (a former teammate of his cousin Mark) $439,000 for failing to finish building a home for him and reneging on a contract.[13]

He has performed at many South Florida venues, in dinner theater in Branson, Missouri,[14] and appeared regularly in the summer in Atlantic City, on Long Island, and in upstate New York. In 2012 he had a one-man song and comedy show titled Meatballs, Matzo Balls and Lemon-Gello,[1] and also re-recorded his 1976 song "Can't Get Enough Of You Girl" with producer and songwriter Jimmy Michaels; it appears on the re-issue of the Michaels album More Things Change.

Lemongello was spoofed in the episode of Saturday Night Live that aired May 22, 1976, with Chevy Chase playing a singer named Peter Lemon Mood Ring, who changed colors with every song.[15] Chase reused the name in his 1989 film Fletch Lives.

Singer-songwriter Will Dailey released a promotional video in 2009 for his album Torrent, in which he is forced by his managers to make a (fictitious) commercial for Torrent in the style of the Love '76 commercial.[16]

Lemongello lives in Boca Raton, Florida. He and his wife Karen have a son, Peter Jr., who in 2019 appeared on American Idol.[17]

• Love '76 (1976), Rapp Records
• Do I Love You (1976), Private Stock Records