Rick Springfield still going strong

He may not be the biggest star on radio or TV, but his career is far from over and his fan base hasn't diminished.

Some die-hards in Connecticut got a change to get up close and personal with Rick Springfield.

Every story on TV has a reason for being. Okay, I'll admit it, the reason this story's here is because of my wife and her thirty years being a fan of one musician. He's the guy I'm walking with. You might not recognize him on sight, you certainly will on sound and even today, it's probably the main reason people know who Rick Springfield is.

"That was the beginning for me. It's amazing, it's been over 30 years. That's wild."

Still he sells out at Foxwoods and tours the country, not because of radio airplay, but because of amazingly dedicated fans and the power of the internet.

The Rick Springfield groups on Yahoo generate thousands of individual messages from fans every month and then there's the chat room on rickspringfield.net. It's the kind of power artists never had before.

"Yeah. I think so and it's been specifically fan generated too. It's not something I went after, because I didn't understand that. They all got together and then I kind of found it through fans coming and going, 'there's these websites they have for you'," says Springfield.

"You didn't know people were talking behind your back?" asks Geoff.

"No, and it's scary because anything you do is instantly broadcast around the world," says Springfield.

Of course scary is all perception. In hard to hold, his 1984 movie, scary was art imitating real life

"Yeah, it was back then, certainly. The fan attention was pretty manic. Now, it's almost like a party."

And now what would have been unthinkable is possible, leaving the stage and going out into the audience.

"It's gotten a lot saner, but a lot more fun to me. My connection to the folks is a lot more fun.

Now, over thirty years since he had his first hit on the charts and nearly 25 years since Jessie's Girl and General Hospital, Rick Springfield is back on the radio with is album shock, denial, anger acceptance. Without a major label behind him, it's been promoted by the fans and their work seems to be paying off.

"We actually have a single that's getting play now and getting more play than any single I've had since 1988. It's called beautiful you, and it's actually see it on the charts."

Which means, we're still seeing Rick Springfield.

"The whole General Hospital thing was a two edged sword. People thought I was a soap opera actor that someone took in the studio and gave him this song, Jessie's Girl and all these other songs and said, 'we're going to make you a star' and didn't realize I've been playing since I was 12 years old and writing since I was 15."

And he hasn't stopped yet.