The Bangles - Different Light

I had always quite liked The Bangles without knowing too much about them. I bought this album ( and its follow-up Everything ) 2 or 3 years after it came out as it was on sale in a record shop in Hounslow, and I recognised a few of the titles such as "Manic Monday" and "Walk Like An Egyptian".

I remember playing it and thinking Wow, this is real good, and for a while I was playing it incessently. Great Tunes, lovely singing and a happy feel to the music ( even if the lyrics aren't always in step with the tone ! )."If She  Knew What She Wants" was my favourite by some distance, with a gorgeous lead vocal and sing-along backing vocals, a lovely ending, and I'd be giving it too her too !

I did notice with surprise though that the first three singles from the album were not actually written by the group. I was also intrigued that three of the four big singles were all sung by Susanna Hoffs, who also shares vocals on "Walk Like An Egyptian", whereas the vocal duties on ther songs are shared across the album.

Looking now at the track listing, can't remember 6 of the album tracks, and wasn't aware "Following" had been released as a single in the UK.

Listening again, "If She  Knew What She Wants" is still my favourite track, whilst "Manic Monday", written by Prince under a pseudonym and the first major hit for the Bangles, is still outstanding. I must confess that when I learnt that "Manic Monday" was written by someone famous I had it in my head for several years it was Bruce Springsteen !

The mournful, acoustic "Following" is very different to everything else on the album and an unusual choice for a single, being the least commerical song on the album. It was also the first to feature Michael Steele as the main vocalist. "Return Post" is slow tempo, blues number also demonstrating The Bangles versatility.

"In A Different Light" & "Not Like You" have a happy, bouncy upbeat tone to them. Both could have been hit singles."Standing In The Hallway" includes some funky keyboards.

"Let It Go" is possibly the most insubstantial song, with a hint of the Beatles, "September Gurls" has very 60's sound and a gentle guitar break, and "Angels Don't Fall In Love" has a slight Country feel

"Walking Down Your Street" doesn't quite sound as good now and "Walk Like An Egyptian" was always my least favourite song on the album.

Overall, it's still a great pop album though.

Track Listing :

1. Manic Monday
2. In A Different Light
3. Walking Down Your Street
4. Walk Like An Egyptian
5. Standing In The Hallway
6. Return Post
7. If She Knew Want She Wants
8. Let it Go
9. September Gurls
10. Angels Don't Fall In Love
11. Following
12. Not Like You

Released 1986
UK Chart Position : 3

Singles :

Manic Monday ( No 2 - 1986 )
If She Knew What She Wants ( No 31 - 1986 )
Walk Like An Egyptian ( No 3 - 1986 )
Walking Down Your Street ( No 16 - 1987 ) 
Following ( No 55 - 1987 )

B52s - Cosmic Thing

The B-52s were trendy when I was a teenager, with "Rock Lobster", "Planet Claire", "Private Idaho", and "52 Girls" in particular, being popular. However, they had disappered from my, and most people's consciousness until the release of "Love Shack" at the end of 1989. The follow-up early in the following year was "Roam", which I had initially thought was a song about the Italian city ! As I liked both of these songs I bought the album when it came out.

I remember liking the album and thinking nearly all the songs were good, but I can't honestly remember any of them except the two hits, apart from it was less zany and more melodic than their earlier work.

Indeed, after playing Cosmic Thing there are a few tracks I can't remember hearing before, and am already struggling to remember how they go.  The opener "Shake That ( Cosmic Thing )" and "Junebug" have a jerky beat expected of a B-52's song but now sound dated and awful, whilst "Dry Country" has quite a nice vibe but an unmemorable tune and sounds like one of Prince's rejects.

On the other hand, on replay there are certainly some fabulous songs. Both "Deadbeat Club" and "Topaz" have beautiful tunes and the two girls deliver gorgeous, infectious vocal harmonies. "Deadbeat Club is all the better for having a slower tempo than is typical for the B-52s and for me is the stand out track in the album, whilst Topaz also has a nice finish.

"Love Shack" was a global hit and has some unforgetable lines - "Hop in my Chrysler it's as big as a whale" and " I got me a car, it seats about twenty" and well as Cindy Wilson's shouted "Tin roof rusted !", but let's not analyse the story of the song too closely !

"Roam" remains a great song, again with great harmonies and catchy hand-claps in the chorus.

"Channel Z" has a good beat, more great vocals from the ladies and also has a great ending where you thing the song has finished, before one final repeat. Fred also delivers a good line in "Where's my umbrella ?"

The closing number "Follow Your Bliss" is an lightweight instrumental although the guitar riff would not be out of place as a theme tune in a 1960's spy caper.

As a general rule of thumb though, apart from "Love Shack", the better material is those where Fred Schneider's vocal are backing rather than to the fore. Similarly, attempts to revive the original B52's eccentric style fare less well than more conventional tunes.

Overall, Cosmic Thing is a good come back album, but is a bit patchy. But when it is good, it is very good.


Track Listing :

1. Shake That ( Cosmic Thing )
2. Dry County
3. Deadbeat Club
4. Love Shack
5. Junebug
6. Roam
7. Bushfire
8. Channel Z
9. Topaz
10. Follow Your Bliss

Released 1990
UK Chart Position : 8

Singles :

Love Shack ( No 2 - 1989 )
Roam ( No 17 - 1990 )
Channel Z ( No 61 - 1990 )

Jon Anderson - Olias of Sunhillow

It is at least 40 years since I last heard any of this LP and I can't say I was particularly looking forward to sitting through it again, but as George Michael requested, listen without prejudice !

I bought this album after hearing a couple of the songs on Nicky Horne's 70's late night radio show on Capital Radio. I had no idea who Jon Anderson was, so it was a bit of a surprise to later learn he was the singer in Yes.

A few months later Punk Rock exploded into the country's consciousness and I started listening to The Clash, The Stranglers, The Jam, The Sex Pistols etc, which are a bit of a contrast to the cosmic witterings of Jon Anderson !


Despite being untrained, Anderson plays all the instruments on the album, not that you would guess that. As a result there are no guitar solos, keyboard wizardary or pulsating bass lines but a lot of synthesized music, and an effective use of his voice. A lot of the instrumental pieces are reminiscent of Vangelis, who gets a thank you on the sleeve, and who later collaborated with Anderson, but his participation on this work is strenuously denied. In some ways Olias is also similiar to Mike Oldfield's multi-instrumentation offerings.

This is a concept album, and the story is told on the inside cover. There is some nice looking art work but the story is hard to fathom. Thankfully, the tale of 4 tribes fleeing an dying planet on a Noah's Ark ship is now clearly explained on Wikipedia.

Perhaps unfortunately I was able to find the full album on YouTube, but I noticed that the most popular track had only 40K hits, with most around 10-12K, and one less than 500 hits. One slightly annoying feature of listening on YouTube are the gaps between the tracks, whereas on the record they seemlessly flow.

For me the highlights of this LP are the two pleasant songs "Sound Out The Galleon" and "Flight Of The Moorglade" which have a similarity to the later Yes hit "Wonderous Stories". The early instrumentals on side one ( "Ocean Song" & "Dance of Ranyart" ) are pleasant and inoffensive, being possible music for shampoo adverts, but the album then drifts into a mixture of Buddist, Hindi and perhaps even Japanese influences. "Olias ( To Build The Moorglade )" sounds like a Yes on a bad day.

Listening to side two, I was beginning to get bored with the mystical musings, apart from the gentle spanish style guitar at the end of "Chords", but the finale "To The Runner" is another airy, joyous song finishing with a haunting synthesizer close, similiar to "Shine On You Crazy Diamond Part 9" which ends Pink Floyd's Wish You Were Here.

In summary, Olias of Sunhillow has its moments and is a showcase for Jon Anderson's vocal talents, but could do with a better balance between the simple acoustic songs and the spaced out, repetitive instrumental experimentation. However, it is a product of its time, with its mumbo jumbo lyrics, a new age hippy vibe and its creator probably being out of his head on dope most of the time, but it is fine if you like that sort of thing.

And amazingly, I have written all of this without saying it's pretensious crap !

Track Listing :


1. Ocean Song 
2. Meeting (Garden Of Geda) 
3. Sound Out The Galleon 
4. Dance Of Ranyart 
5. Olias (To Build The Moorglade) 
6. Qoquaq ën Transic
7. Naon
8. Transic Tö
9. Flight Of The Moorglade
10. Solid Space
11. Moon Ra 
12. Chords 
13. Song Of Search
14. To The Runner 
 

Released 1976
UK Chart Position : 8

The Alarm - Standards

Rhyl's finest's greatest hits album, even if very few of the songs were hits. Sometimes described as Wales' answer to U2, although more usually as a poor man's U2 or Clash wannabees, The Alarm made a handful of strong tracks, typically rousing songs with anthemic hooks full of earnest big statements.

I bought the 12 inch single version of "Where Were You Hiding When The Storm Broke" and regularly would sing along to the "One By One","Two By Two" and "Three By Three" chants in the second verse. It's hard to think that was in 1984, as I thought it was a few years later than that !

I bought this album after hearing the heroic and wistful "New South Wales" sung in Welsh, and was a little disappointed to find the English version on it.....

The full album of Standards is available twice on YouTube, although both had different track listings to this. Both were missing the final two tracks on my LP, but had other songs not on my LP, so I had to separately search for these in order to play.

Not surprisingly I enjoyed hearing again and singing along to the two Clash style calls to arm ( "Sixty Eight Guns" & "Where Were You Hiding When The Storm Broke"). "The Stand" is not nearly as outstanding but could easily be an album track on London Calling or Sandinista with its Joe Strummer style vocal and Clash style backing vocals. "Absolute Reality" and "Unsafe Building" are better than I remember and I found myself tapping my toes to them.

The Springsteen-esque "Spirit of '76" is probably the best piece of work The Alarm came up with, and the mix of frustration, bitterness, sadness and determination is still very powerful - all seven minutes of it. If I had to recommend just one song by The Alarm, it would be this one. Bryan Adams is probably very jealous of it.

A couple of the late career attempts at aiming for the mainstream mass market ( "Rain In The Summertime" & "Sold Me Down The River" ) still sound prety good, and the wife actually liked "New South Wales", which features a Welsh Male Voice Choir.

The LP ends with a cover of John Lennon's "Happy Christmas ( War Is Over )" which is sung quite nicely and also features the Welsh Male Voice Choir, but I am not sure what the point of it was.

The other songs on the album are nice. Whilst they are not particularly memorable, I would rather listen to them than most things !

Track Listing :

1. The Road ( 1990 - )
2. Unsafe Building ( 1981 - )
3. The Stand ( 1983 - No : 86 )
4. Six-Eight Guns ( 1983 - No : 17 )
5. Where Were You Hiding When The Storm Broke ( 1984 - No : 22 )
6. Absolute Reality ( 1985 - No : 35 )
7. Strength ( 1985 - No : 40 )
8. Spirit of '76 ( 1986 - No : 22 )
9. Rain In The Summertime ( 1987 - No : 18 )
10. Rescue Me ( 1987 - No : 48 )
11. Sold Me Down The River ( 1989 - No : 48 )
12. A New South Wales ( 1989 - No : 31 )
13. Happy Christmas ( War Is Over ) ( 1989 - )

Released 1990
UK Chart Position :47

A-Ha - Stay On These Roads

This is the third album by A-Ha which I essentially purchased  as I liked the title track when it was released as a single.

I remember this as a strong album with a lot of good tunes but looking at Wikipedia I was surprised to see that 5 of the 10 tracks were released as singles. In addition to "Stay On These Roads", I recall "Touchy" being a hit, and of course the Timothy Dalton James Bond Theme Song "The Living Daylights" but couldn't remember "You Are The One"  or "The Blood That Moves The Body" being singles. In fact I couldn't remember the latter at all !

On replay this is still an outstanding LP. If I try to be critical "This Alone Is Love" plods on a bit too long and could be edited, and "Hurry Home" could fade out a bit earlier too. However, this really is nit-picking on a top quality set of songs.

For me the highlight is "Out Of The Blue Comes Green", an epic song with a great melody and a terrific vocal. Indeed, the album is a showcase for Morten Harket to demonstrate the full range of his talent as a singer. "Stay On These Roads" features soaring high notes in the chorus, and a big dramatic powerful coda after the a calm piece of gentle keyboard playing of the main reframe. It is still stunning and not one to try in Karaoke !

Elsewhere, "Touchy" and "You Are The One" are still catchy-pop numbers, although Morten does look alot like a young Richard Gere in the official "You Are The One" video. "There's Never A Forever Thing" is a slow ballad that also features another strong vocal.

I didn't really like "The Living Daylights" when it first came out, thinking it to be a bit overblown and not having a great tune, but listening to it now I thought it was really good. And I should have remembered "The Blood That Moves The Body" as the one with a similar sound to "The Living Daylights" and could have been a Bond theme tune !

This album isn't just about the great singing though, the music is rich and varied and it is full of good, thoughtful, melodic and well structured songs.

Finally, the Norwegian band were not the inspiration for the Alan Partridge catchphrase, which came from elsewhere in Scandinavia.

Track Listing :

1. Stay On These Roads
2. The Blood That Moves The Body
3. Touchy
4. This Alone Is Love
5. Hurry Home
6. The Living Daylights
7. There's Never A Forever Thing
8. Out Of The Blue Comes Green
9. You Are The One
10. You'll End Up Crying

Released 1988
UK Chart Position : 2

Singles :

The Living Daylights ( No 5 - 1987 )
Stay On These Roads ( No 5 - 1988 )
The Blood That Moves The Body ( No 25 - 1988 )
Touchy ( No 11 - 1988 )
You Are The One ( No 13 - 1988 ) 

 

Adam And The Ants - Kings Of The Wild Frontier

And now hopefully for a little bit of fun, from an era when looking like a cross between a native Red Indian, a pirate, a highwayman and a dandy prince splashed with some face painting was fashionable. Throw in a combination of Burundi Beat drumming, twangy guitars, swaggering bravado, a sense of camp and at times nursery school lyrics and you have the receipe for Adam And The Ants, and their brief period of pop dominance in the early 80s.

A flatmate at college ( the same person who sneered at ABC ! ) was heavily influenced at the time, and tried to dress like Adam Ant for a brief period. I never bothered, as even then I knew, at best, I would end up looking like the guitarist !

Whilst "Ant Music" is the song that clinched the band's fame and fortune and encouraged everyone to unplug the jukebox, the earlier "Dog Eat Dog" is a much more interesting piece of music. The title track sunk without trace when first released but did much better when re-released during the height of their popularity. At this time, Adam And The Ants were trying to be taken seriously so it pre-dates the pantomime of "Prince Charming" and "Stand And Deliver", which were still to come

I remember with fondness the silliness of "Los Rancheros" and "Jolly Roger" but the rest of the album is a blank. I'm not sure how well this will have aged !

Not very well as it happens.......

There are still some highs, but there are also plenty of lows. "Dog Eat Dog" remains a great song, and "Ant Music" still sounds good. The fun songs have pop melodies that still make you smile, catchy hooks to sing along to, there's some great guitar play that Hank Marvin would be proud of, and clever backing vocals. "Human Beings" has a good bass line and a good chant ( Blackfoot, Pawnee, Cheyenne, Crow, Apache, Arapho ! ) even if the lyrics are nonsense.

However, it is easy to see why the track "Kings Of The Wild Frontier" wasn't a hit first time around as although the drumming is innovative and there is an effective guitar riff, it is mostly noise and shouting.
 
Unfortunately though, when Adam And The Ants try to be meaningful or threatening they struggle to maintain the attention, such as  "Ants Invasion", "Killer In The Home", "Don't Be Square", with just the guitar as a saving grace. "Physical" is virtually unlistenable and whilst "Press Darlings" might have been biting at the time, now it just sounds petty.

I read that Kings Of The Wild Frontier was voted Best British Album at the 1982 Brit Awards. It wouldn't win that award now......

I'm not sure how, but my copy of Kings of The Wild Frontier is the version released in the US, so has a slightly different track listing to the album released in the UK. It also explains the stick stating "Contains the three English top ten hits" rather than British or UK !


Track Listing :

1. Dog Eat Dog
2. Ant Music
3. Los Rancheros
4. Feed Me To The Lions
5. Press Darlings
6. Ant Invasion
7. Killer In The Home
8. Kings Of The Wild Frontier
9. The Magnificent Five
10. Don't Be Square ( Be There )
11. Jolly Roger
12. Physical ( You're So )
13. The Human Beings

Released 1981
UK Chart Position : 1

Singles :

Dog Eat Dog ( No 4 - 1980 )
Ant Music ( No 2 - 1980 )
Kings Of The Wild Frontier ( No 2 - 1981 )

AC/DC - Highway To Hell

I was never a big fan of Australia's AC/DC ( even though the Young brothers and Bon Scott were from Scotland, and later Brian Johnson was from Durham ), but two of my school friends were heavily into at the time. Having borrowed a couple of their earlier albums from them, there were a few songs I quite liked, such as "Whole Lotta Rosie", "Rock and Roll Damnation", "Riff Raff" and bagpipe flavoured "It's a Long Way To The Top If You Want To Rock And Roll". The occasional song, such as the double entendre packed "Big Balls" was quite witty.

In December 1979 there was alot of excitement in my school that AC/DC were coming to play at the Brighton Conference Centre on their Highway To Hell Tour, and a number of sixth formers were going. Not wanting to be left out I agreed to go along and purchased a copy of the new album so that I would be familiar with the new songs. As you can see, I splashed out £2.99 !

I don't remember much about the concert except that I quite enjoyed it, but looking at the set-list available on the internet, only three of the new songs were included in the set performed that night. With his death in February 1980, it turned out to be one of Bon Scott's last performances.

Highway to Hell was AC/DC's global break-through album, being their first top-10 success in the UK and first album to break the top 100 in the US - it made the top 20. It established the band as one of the major hard rock acts in the world.

I haven't listened to this album since I left school in 1980, and whilst "Highway to Hell" and "Touch Too Much" were major hit singles in the UK, the only other song on the track list that I would say I was familiar with is Walk All Over You and its anthem-like chorus. In fact, whilst I remembered "Touch Too Much" I had forgotten it was actually an AC/DC song. Most people should recognise the riff on opener "Highway to Hell" but I suspect the rest of the material will be fairly monotonous and a challenge to listen all the way through.

Having now sat through the whole album, it is top-loaded so that the stronger songs are at the beginning. After the high point of "Touch Too Much", the fourth track, things start to wane with the closing song on side one, "Beating Around The Bush".

Side Two has little to grab the attention, with three routine songs, with "Shot Down In Flames" the best of them, followed by two very forgettable songs, which I just wanted to end, to close out the album.

However, Highway To Hell was a clear attempt to become mainstream, and to that end it succeeded. A lot of rough edges have been smoothed off, and global domination followed. There are a few decent riffs, but don't listen too much to the lyrics. There is a shortage of the genuinely funny lines found on the earlier albums, and some of the words wouldn't pass modern day political correctness. In this respect Highway To Hell hasn't aged very well.

As to the accusation that AC/DC are boring and samey, I liked the rebuttal from guitarist Angus Young :

"I'm sick and tired of people saying we put out 11 albums that sounded exactly the same. In fact, we've put out 12 albums that sounded exactly the same".

Track Listing :

1. Highway To Hell
2. Girls Got Rhythm
3. Walk All Over You
4. Touch Too Much
5. Beating Around The Bush
6. Shot Down In Flames
7. Get It Hot
8. If You Want Blood ( You've Got It )
9. Love Hungry Man
10. Night Prowler

Released 1979
UK Chart Position : 8

Singles :

Highway To Hell ( No 4 - 1979 )
Touch Too Much ( No 29 - 1980 )

Introduction

What To Do During The Lockdown?

After going through a nostalgia filled exercise to sort-out/clear up the mess caused by the spread of football programmes in the garage and spare room ( and writing about the experience elsewhere in the blog ), it’s time now for the next exercise to keep me busy during the lockdown………….

I have a pile of somewhere between 250 to 300 LPs from the 70s & 80s laying in the Study. However, I’ve not had a working turntable for something like 15 years so it is ages since I played any of these records, or maybe 40+ years for some of them. Indeed, it may not even be possible to play some of them now as I’m not sure what condition the records are in.

The big idea is to play every one of these LP’s in their entirety from YouTube ( assuming there are all on YouTube ! ). As the LPs are already in alphabetical order it will take a long time until I get to ZZ Top, probably enough time to grow a suitable beard in tribute ! There is also a risk I might stop at The Cure and keep playing those albums over and over………

The A’s and early B’s are potentially quite a promising start ( Adam & The Ants, A-Ha, The Alarm, B-52s, The Bangles and The Beautiful South, offset only by AC-DC and Jon Anderson ). It looks like most of the dross comes later in the alphabet.

However, it will all begin with ABC’s “The Lexicon of Love”.