Yacht Rock - Episode List

Episode List

1. "What a Fool Believes"

   In the pilot episode, Kenny Loggins, under the guidance of Koko Goldstein, reaches out to a struggling Michael McDonald, who's having trouble writing a smooth hit for his band the Doobie Brothers.

2. "Keep the Fire"

   Loggins and McDonald pair up against the duo Hall & Oates for a songwriting competition. Koko is accidentally impaled by his lucky harpoon during the ensuing melee, but is at peace before his death by hearing the smoothest song ever sung, "Sailing", by a young Christopher Cross.

3. "I'm Alright"

   As everyone grieves Koko's death, Loggins lashes out at McDonald and "smooth music" as a whole, causing a rift between the two. Sleazy entertainment executive Gene Balboa, who is producing the movie Caddyshack demands that the movie's director, Harold Ramis, obtain Loggins' talents to write the movie's theme song. Ramis takes advantage of an angry and confused Loggins and gets him to write and record the hard rock song "I'm Alright", much to McDonald's dismay.

4. "Rosanna"

   Steve Porcaro (Steve Agee), the keyboard player of the band Toto, is asked by his girlfriend, Rosanna Arquette, to write a song about her, and she wants him to have Michael McDonald sing on the track. Discouraged by McDonald's disdain for his band, Porcaro devises a three-step plan to make it happen.

5. "Believe in It"

   Toto has been commissioned to write a smooth song for Michael Jackson's Thriller, but Jackson rejects the band, believing after working with Eddie Van Halen on "Beat It" that such material is in his past. Fearing that Jackson will destroy "smooth music" for a decade, Porcaro turns to McDonald, Loggins, Skunk Baxter, Cross, and Vincent Price (James Adomian), to summon up Koko's ghost for help writing "Human Nature."

6. "The Seed Drill"

   "Hollywood" Steve's father demands that Steve stop wasting his time on Yacht Rock, and regales a historic tale of the agriculturist Jethro Tull, whose plot is similar to episode one.

7. "I Keep Forgettin'"

   McDonald and Loggins make a bet about the popularity of McDonald's new song, "I Keep Forgettin' (Every Time You're Near)". Ten years later, Long Beach-based rappers Warren G and Nate Dogg struggle with finding a sound within the gangsta rap world. After the two accidentally hit McDonald with their car and then take him back to their house, a solution is found to everyone's problems.

8. "Gino (the Manager)"

   "Hollywood" Steve returns to the very beginning, where Doobie Brothers producer Ted Templeman explains his dream about the origin of "the smoothest rock ever heard" to Skunk Baxter over lunch. Baxter suggests seeing Koko about it, and Templeman starts seeing his dream come into fruition as he meets a young McDonald, then a background singer for Steely Dan, being talked into joining the Doobie Brothers by Steely Dan and Koko, Loggins showing signs of his imminent break from Messina and solo stardom, and an effeminate Hall and Oates with a very familiar looking manager named Gino, who tries to bully McDonald and Loggins into employing him as a manager. When they refuse, he plots revenge.

9. "Runnin' with the Devil"

   Van Halen puts a curse on Ted Templeman to force him to produce their hard rock song. In a subplot, Loggins loses his car keys and has everyone in the studio helping him look. Comedian Drew Carey makes a cameo appearance.

10. "FM"

    Steely Dan and the Eagles settle a long-time, childish feud with a hit song.

11. "Footloose"

    Jimmy Buffett is convinced by Kevin Bacon (Jason Lee) and Gene Balboa to trick Loggins into making yet another movie song. He is subsequently kidnapped by Buffett and psychotic "Parrot Heads", and it's up to McDonald and James Ingram (Wyatt Cenac) to rescue him.

12. "Danger Zone"

    As the mid '80s approach, McDonald feels that with the death of Yacht Rock, he has become the irrelevant joke he always feared he would become. Loggins, on the other hand, has grown to love doing movie soundtracks and his career is still in high gear. Extraterrestrial/composer Giorgio Moroder is sent to Earth to seek Loggins' assistance in fighting a black hole that will destroy Moroder's planet. Fearing for his friend's life, McDonald tries to rescue him, and in the process, finds his relevancy. By the end of the episode the loose ends of the past 11 episodes are tied together (including the revelation that all of Yacht Rock had been a plan by Koko - to lead to the song Sweet Freedom), but left with a cliff hanger ending as to who murdered Koko.