Understood. And respected. I love the 3 album run by Nick Drake. Both were great in their own ways. _________________ May we all get to heaven
'Fore the devil knows we're dead...
ZZ TOP
THE BEST OF ZZ TOP
1977-WARNER BROTHERS
Produced By BILL HAM
1. Tush
2. Waitin' For The Bus
3. Jesus Just Left Chicago
4. Francine
5. Just Got Paid
6. La Grange
7. Blue Jean Blues
8. Backdoor Love Affair
9. Beer Drinkers And Hell Raisers
10. Heard It On The X
So, you have a couple of choices here. You can either go with the later Greatest Hits package that includes all of the beard wearing, fancy car in the video pop that they started doing in the 80's, or you can stick with this 1977 quick and easy dose of Texas boogie that shows what made them one of the better blues rock bands of the 70's. My money is on this one, which contains "Tush", "Heard It On The X", "La Grange", and a bunch of other really great classic songs that just need to be played really loud sometimes.
Nothing wrong with "Legs" and "Got Me Under Pressure"...it's just that sometimes, you just gotta boogie. So make sure you have this music around for those times, without the pop interruptions. Thank you. And you're welcome.
Link _________________ May we all get to heaven
'Fore the devil knows we're dead...
1. Guns In The Sky
2. New Sensation
3. Devil Inside
4. Need You Tonight
5. Mediate
6. The Loved One
7. Wild Life
8. Never Tear us Apart
9. Mystify
10. Kick
11. Calling All Nations
12. Tiny Daggers
1987 was the year of INXS, Michael Hutchence, Kick, and that video where the guy keeps flipping over the signs with the words on them. Everywhere you turned, there was another hit single from this album, and rightfully so. It was the perfect sound for 1987, and the tunes were catchy as hell. You could seriously make a case for playing every track here on the radio. This was pop rock at its height. And the songs really did keep coming. And coming.
INXS has, unfortunately, not aged very well. You can still hear the hits and why they were hits, but the music sounds more dated every year. But this is a great time capsule piece, and was really one of the better successful albums as a whole of its time.
Link _________________ May we all get to heaven
'Fore the devil knows we're dead...
STING
THE DREAM OF THE BLUE TURTLES
1985-A&M
Produced By STING & PETE SMITH
1. If You love Somebody Set Them Free
2. Love Is The Seventh Wave
3. Russians
4. Children's Crusade
5. Shadows In The Rain
6. We Work The Black Seam
7. Consider Me Gone
8. The Dream Of The Blue Turles
9. Moon Over Bourbon Street
10. Fortress Around Your Heart
Maybe the best way to describe what this album became was on February 14th, 1987. the legendary Los Angeles rock radio station KMET was changing their format, and they were playing as many rock songs as they could without interruption. When the time came, they announced that they were now a new age station, and they led off with "If You Love Somebody Set Them Free".
And so has been the career of former Police frontman Sting. He's gone from a punk/new wave icon to a new age borefest, and he's never stopped. The good thing about Blue Turtles is that it's as close to his former work in rock as he's ever been, and it does contain some pretty good songs. but unless you're into the lite jazz music that he's now so well known for, you'll be disappointed. Even as good as this sounds, it's still a major step in the wrong direction. To be fair, it's his direction. But it can be a tough one to grasp.
Link _________________ May we all get to heaven
'Fore the devil knows we're dead...
KATE ST. JOHN
SECOND SIGHT
1997-THIRSTY EAR
Produced By KATE ST. JOHN & JOSEPH RACAILLE
1. Don't They Know You've Gone
2. Where The Warm Winds Blow
3. Songs And Silhouettes
4. A Flicker Of Gold
5. My Lonely Love
6. Notti Senza Amore
7. J'attendrai
8. Fireworks
9. A Foolish Dance
10. Dark Heavens
11. Colonel Sinnott's Song Of Love
Kate St. John was the reed player in the strange 80's one hit wonder band Dream Academy. She was the only one of the trio to go on to a solo career, with St. John's consisting mostly of soundtrack work. She did released a couple of solo albums that, while being very quiet and pretty pieces, are also very good records. You have to be in a mellow mood to get into this...don't put this on if you want to rock. But this quiet, whimsical music might suit you in a mellow mood. "A Foolish Dance" is the closest thing to a pop song here...which is kind of refreshing.
If you want to hear what Kate's one hit was like, go back in time to 1987's "Life In A Northern Town". A pretty cool song...and nothing at all like her solo work.
Link _________________ May we all get to heaven
'Fore the devil knows we're dead...
DAR WILLIAMS
END OF THE SUMMER
1997-RAZOR & TIE
Produced By STEVEN MILLER
1. Are You Out There
2. Party Generation
3. If I Wrote You
4. What Do You Hear In These Sounds
5. The End Of The Summer
6. Teenagers, Kick Our Butts
7. My Friends
8. Bought And Sold
9. Road Buddy
10. It's A War In There
11. Better Things
Dar Williams is what a lot of folk music was in the 90's. Smart, witty, and maybe a little too adult contemporary sounding to be paid enough attention to...but also very, very good. Williams released two very excellent albums during the decade, Mortal City from 1996, and End Of The Summer. She hits home with some great lyrics and melodies, including "Party Generation" (When he turned 34, but who's counting, he couldn't find anyone who wanted to party) and "Teenagers, Kick Our Butts" (a song about being surpassed by the "Know It All" generation). Brilliant stuff.
Williams gets a tad snoozy in spots (it IS folk music, after all). But she's also a treasure of great songs and great recordings. A forgotten jewel of the 90's. Shame. _________________ May we all get to heaven
'Fore the devil knows we're dead...
LIZ PHAIR
EXILE IN GUYVILLE
1993-CAPITOL
Produced By BRAD WOOD & LIZ PHAIR
1. 6'1"
2. Help Me Mary
3. Glory
4. Dance Of The Seven Veils
5. Never Said
6. Soap Star Joe
7. Explain It To Me
8. Canary
9. Mesmerizing
10. Fuck And Run
11. Girls! Girls! Girls!
12. Divorce Song
13. Shatter
14. Flower
15. Johnny Sunshine
16. Gunshy
17. Stratford-On-Guy
18. Strange Loop
Before you go all giving Alanis Morissette the credit for giving women the voice in the mid 90's, don't forget that it was Liz Phair who opened the door for Alanis, and everyone else who followed. And compared to Phair's debut album, Alanis sounds like the pop princess she used to be before Jadgged Little Pill. Exile In Guyville came from nowhere. It's stunningly underproduced and raw, provocative, dirty, sung by a girl who showed her nipple on the cover and who says "fuck" like a gangsta rapper. Oh, and the album is supposedly a song for song response to the Rolling Stones' Exile On Main Street...but you'll have to figure that one out for yourself.
Bottom line is, Exile is a really great album, and an important one at that. There are catchy melodies and great hooks from the deadpan Phair, a low fi mess of a record that amazingly works on almost every level. One of the better albums of the 90's. She never got close to this again. But it sure was great while it lasted.
Link _________________ May we all get to heaven
'Fore the devil knows we're dead...
STEELY DAN
COUNTDOWN TO ECSTASY
1973-MCA
Produced By GARY KATZ
1. Bodhisattva
2. Razor Boy
3. The Boston Rag
4. Your Gold Teeth
5. Show Biz Kids
6. My Old School
7. Pearl Of The Quarter
8. King Of The World
Steely Dan is guilty of several musical crimes, including the fact that they almost singlehandedly invented the adult contemporary genre. That being said, it's sometimes infuriating that this band made some pretty great music. Countdown To Ecstasy is their second album, and it was just in the beginning phases of becoming the Becker & Fagen show. There are plenty of highlights here: "Bodhisattva" and especially "My Old School" are great tracks, and the much underplayed "Show Biz Kids" is a never ending groove with none other than Rick Derringer playing a tasty slide guitar throughout.
For an 8 song album, there is some filler. But this is about as cool as this band would ever get. They had great moments on their debut, and they would have some later, but Countdown is really about as good as they got. Well worth checking out...or rediscovering.
Link _________________ May we all get to heaven
'Fore the devil knows we're dead...
STEVE WINWOOD
BACK IN THE HIGH LIFE
1986-ISLAND
Produced By RUSS TITLEMAN & STEVE WINWOOD
1. Higher Love
2. Take It As It Comes
3. Freedom Overspill
4. Back In The High Life Again
5. The Finer Things
6. Wake Me Up On Judgement Day
7. Split Decision
8. My Love's Leavin'
1986 was the height of Steve Winwood's solo career...and for good reason. Back In The High Life has some of his catchiest songs. The title track, "Higher Love". "The Finer Things", and "Split Decision" all made the radio a little more pleasant in '86. His writing is sharp, his playing is sharp (as always), and even his choice of guest musicians is pretty impressive (Joe Walsh, James Taylor, Chaka Khan).
A track or two may teeter off into boredom, but otherwise, this is almost as good as Winwood got (Arc Of A Diver is better). It's still one of the more mature and upbeat albums of the 80's. And it does so without getting stupid, which, for the 80's, is really saying something.
Link _________________ May we all get to heaven
'Fore the devil knows we're dead...
PUBLIC ENEMY
FEAR OF A BLACK PLANET
1990-DEF JAM
Produced ByHANK SHOCKLEE, CARL RYDER, ERIC SADLER & KEITH SHOCKLEE
1. Contract On The World Love Jam
2. Brothers Gonna Work It Out
3. 911 Is A Joke
4. Incident At 66.6 FM
5. Welcome To The Terrordome
6. Meet The G That Killed Me
7. Pollywanacraka
8. Anti-Nigger Machine
9. Burn Hollywood Burn
10. Power To The People
11. Who Stole The Soul?
12. Fear Of A Black Planet
13. Revolutionary Generation
14. Can't Do Nuttin' For Ya Man
15. Reggie Jax
16. Leave This Off Your Fu*kin Charts
17. B Side Wins Again
18. War At 33 1/3
19. Final Count Of The Collision Between Us And The Damned
20. Fight The Power
Public Enemy was scary, subversive, outspoken, and strong. Now, Public Enemy is seemingly better known for housing the joke that became Flava Flav. But 27 years ago, this was powerful stuff. It's lost some of its shine...hip hop from this period doesn't always age very well...but you can still feel the angst in tracks like "911 Is A Joke" and "Fight The Power". A downside all those years ago was that it contained a lot of non-songs, but now it seems to be one of the album's strengths. And Chuck D was always smart and angry enough to command your full attention.
Fear Of A Black Planet (along with It Takes A Nation Of Millions To Hold Us Back) was the height of this group and their legacy. They ended up being remembered more for Flav than for their message, which was angry and intelligent and powerful...political music doesn't often, unfortunately, age well. But in 1991, this was truly the shit. A frightening album, for sure, but entertaining and smart as well.
Link _________________ May we all get to heaven
'Fore the devil knows we're dead...
You cannot post new topics in this forum You cannot reply to topics in this forum You cannot edit your posts in this forum You cannot delete your posts in this forum You cannot vote in polls in this forum
