Tribute To Quiet Legend As Songwriter For Elvis, The Drifters, Ray Charles And Others, Doc Pomus Left A Treasure-House Of Music

Tributes, tributes. There are dozens of tribute discs crammed onto record store shelves these days, but most are terrible.

They’re done for the wrong reasons, by the wrong people, purely for a quick buck. Before you become permanently cynical, though, check out “A Tribute to Doc Pomus.” It honors an unlikely hero: a Jewish polio victim from Brooklyn who shaped the pop charts like few other songwriters of his time.

Artists singing on the record are Bob Dylan, Shawn Colvin, Lou Reed, B.B. King, Aaron Neville, Rosanne Cash, Dion, Dr. John, Irma Thomas, John Hiatt, Los Lobos, The Band, Solomon Burke and, yes, Brian Wilson. What makes this tribute so heartfelt is that these artists knew and cherished Pomus. They didn’t just hop a bandwagon because their manager or record label smelled an opportunity.

Pomus, who needed a wheelchair from age 5, wrote songs for Elvis Presley (“Surrender,” “Little Sister,” “Suspicion,” “Viva Las Vegas”), the Drifters (“This Magic Moment”), Ben E. King (“Save the Last Dance for Me”), Dion & the Belmonts (“Teenager in Love”), Ray Charles (“Lonely Avenue”), Fabian (“Turn Me Loose”) and the Coasters (“Young Blood”).

There were many more - more than a thousand songs, but “plenty of ‘em stinkers,” Pomus once joked.

Pomus, who died four years ago at age 65, was paid handsomely for his efforts, so this is no hard-luck story. But unlike the greed merchants infecting the industry today, he gave much of his money back to struggling artists.

“Doc was humanity central,” his friend, Joel Dorn, said recently in a phone interview from New York. “He helped a lot of people who wouldn’t have had funerals, teeth, suits for special occasions, whatever. And he did it quietly. He didn’t hire a publicist and say, ‘I’ve done three nice things. Call Reuters.’

Dylan, John Lennon and Paul Simon all sought out Pomus for songwriting advice. B.B. King once called him from Memphis for help. Pomus’ specialty was lyrics (he often collaborated with others on the music, notably his cousin, Mort Shuman). “Doc always had notebooks of lyrics, even in bed,” said Dorn. “He was always jotting down lyrics.”

Pomus’ ability to match lyrics with musical meter was his greatest gift. He had been a performer - a blues shouter who stood on crutches on back-alley bar stages - so he knew musical as well as literary language. His versatility was extraordinary, as the tribute disc shows. He ran the gamut from serious songs (“I Count the Tears”) to lighthearted novelties such as “Sweets for My Sweet.” The latter is sung winsomely by Brian Wilson on the tribute record.

There’s not a weak track on the record, though there are a couple of unusual reinterpretations. Colvin transforms the playful “Viva Las Vegas” into a dark, moody track that treats Vegas like a nightmare, not the pleasure dome featured in the Presley movie of the same name. Lou Reed does a starkly stunning version of “This Magic Moment,” taking an all-time great romantic song and giving it a shivery chill.

Other artists just rock out gloriously. Dylan’s “Boogie Woogie Country Girl” is one of the hottest songs he’s cut in years. It was originally done by Big Joe Turner - a close friend of Pomus - and Dylan shifts it into overdrive. Following a similar path is John Hiatt on “A Mess of Blues” (with the simple lyric: “since you’re gone I’ve got a mess of blues”); and The Band on the Coasters’ hit, “Young Blood.” It’s about a man infatuated with a young woman (“she’s got that young blood”) whose dad warns him to “keep away from my daughter.”

Perhaps the most outstanding tracks are by Aaron Neville and Dion. These were the two songs produced by Dorn, and each enhances the original.