Adam Ant - Friend Or Foe (1982)

Note: this release was originally purchased as an LP, later replaced by a CD. Mine is the original CD reissue, not the 2005 reissue that included 12 bonus tracks. I hope the liner notes are better on the 2005 edition because the ones here are horrible; they didn't even give us lyrics.

This release is much different than 1980's Kings Of The Wild Frontier. Gone are the tribal beats and, for the most part, the drum-sticks-on-concrete percussion. In their place are a bunch of pretty good tongue-in-cheek pop songs with over-the-top production. I listened to this album a lot in '82-'83 because I liked it but also because I thought listening to New Wave music by post-modernist Brits made me cool (it didn't). Unfortunately, this was Ant's last decent release. I bought and quickly sold 1983's Strip and didn't even bother with 1985's Vive Le Rock. I'll pull out this disc every now and then whenever I feel a twinge of nostalgia, but still prefer Kings Of The Wild Frontier.

Press of the time:

• Trouser Press: "consolidates previous styles with assorted influences and a newly developed sense of melody."
• Smash Hits (7 out of 10): "sharp, incisive and immediate"
• Stereo Review: "hard to tell whether this depressing album of 'sex music for ant people' is the result of incompetence of indifference."
• Rolling Stone (★): "Adam is a man with limited musical ideas, and apparently he used them all up on Kings of the Wild Frontier"
• Robert Christgau (B-): "four of these are arrogantly catchy"

Album chart peaks:

• US Billboard 200: #16
• Billboard Rock: #13
• CashBox: #17
• Rolling Stone: #18

Tracks: Favorites include the title track, Desperate But Not Serious (#66 pop), and the big hit single, Goody Two Shoes (#12 pop, #7 rock). My least favorite tracks are Something Girls and Cajun Twisters. The cover of The Doors' Hello I Love You isn't as good as it could have been, but the rest are entertaining enough.

Personal Memory Associated with this CD: This is the first album for which I knew the actual release date ahead of time. On the October Tuesday of its release, my friend Jim and I anxiously drove to the nearest mall record store (40 miles away) and each purchased an LP. I can't remember if we took my jalopy or his. [note: Jim has contacted me and claims we rode in his "compressed rust Pontiac Astre"]

My friend Brett went to see Ant on his tour in support of this album. INXS opened. What a double bill; I shoulda been there. At least Brett brought me a sleeveless concert shirt.

Brett's young brother and I tried to figure what was said in the album closer, A Man Called Marco. The best we could figure, he was saying "Allow me to introduce my five-foot-seven" which, being in our mid-teens, guessed he was bragging about his impressive manhood. Several decades later, I discover that he says "Allow me to introduce my Firebird VII" which is a classic Gibson guitar. I don't know if fact trumps fantasy here or not.

Previously revisited for the blog:
Antics in the Forbidden Zone (1990)