Spandau Ballet - The Albums 1980-84 (2012)

EU Import

An imported box set featuring Spandau Ballet's four studio albums released during the years 1981 - 84, when they recorded for the Chrysalis label. No liner notes, no bonus tracks, just cardboard sleeve replicas of the original vinyl releases, but for $13.41 I ain't complaining.

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JOURNEYS TO GLORY (1981)
8 tracks, 37 minutes

Album chart peaks:

• US Billboard 200: #209
• Billboard Rock: #41

Reviewers called out this debut for its artsy pretentiousness, even quoting the band's own lyrics: "The art is pretending it's Art." The ad below includes a descriptive list of the band: 1) art, 2) fashion, 3) music. Music is listed third! Still, it's got a few worthy synthpop tunes (I think the best thing here is track 7, Confused), but the rest is the band trying to find its sound through Gary Kemp, a 21 year old songwriter learning how to write songs plus some out of tune vocals from Tony Hadley. Not the soulful sound they'd later become known for; this music shows more post-punk influences than blue-eyed soul. Overall, there's nothing really objectionable about this lackluster album of tunes consisting of only 2 or 3 chords, but there's nothing to get excited about, either.

It's art. It's fashion.

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DIAMOND (1982)
8 tracks, 40 minutes

Peak on the US Billboard Top 200 chart: Did not chart

Notedly different from Journeys To Glory. Giving it a score of 3 out of 10, Smash Hits called it "boring contrived rubbish." Ouch. Sounds more like contemporaries Haircut 100 or ABC than predecessors Numan or Bowie, but by my count, there's only two decent tracks here: Instinction and She Loved Like Diamond, the latter of which gives us some foreshadowing of what would come next for the band. However, tracks 6-8 are completely unlistenable.

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TRUE (1983)
8 tracks, 36 minutes

Album chart peaks:

• US Billboard 200: #19
• Billboard Rock: #42
• CashBox: #20
• Rolling Stone: #20

Ahhh, that's more like it. It all comes together here. Maturity and new producers can go a long way. Smash Hits called the album less interesting but more enjoyable and that's just fine with me. Fortunately, this was my first exposure to the band. When my buddy Jim loaned me this LP in '83, I took to it immediately and quickly dubbed myself a cassette copy. As I mentioned in an earlier post regarding the title track:

I love the thing, I always have, and I don't care who knows it. I know all the lyrics and will also vocalize the sax solo. These days, I don't have need for the "I heard this song first so I'm a better person than you" condescension, but insufferable teenage me played that card whenever I could. I'd been a fan of the True album for a good six months before this single hit the local radio waves and I had no reservations about sharing that fact with everybody I knew. Like I said, insufferable.

The track that got me hooked, however, was Communication, particularly the chorus, so I'm partial to that tune. But it's a solid album; the only track I'll occasionally skip among the eight here is Foundation.

According to Gary Kemp via the wonderful Tim's Twitter Listening Party, this album was originally going to be produced by Trevor Horn and I would have loved to have heard that.

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PARADE (1984)
8 tracks, 41 minutes

Note: this release was originally purchased as an LP, later replaced by this CD.

Album chart peaks:

• US Billboard 200: #50
• Billboard Rock: #35
• CashBox: #35
• Rolling Stone: #45

Not quite as good as its predecessor, but the singles are every bit as tasty. There's no first-rate ballad like True, but I listened to the heck out of this album when it was released. It's the exact same sound as the True album and that was just what I was looking for in 1984. Stereo Review called the Parade album "a sort of modern-day dance-club Noël Coward with a beat" and since I can't match that description I won't even try.

My top picks are Only When You Leave (which was called "almost too good a start to the LP"), I'll Fly For You, and Round And Round.

Oddly, when the group moved from Chrysalis to Epic, I didn't follow them. I've never heard any of SB's post-Parade music. Easy enough to remedy that oversight.

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Personal Memory Associated with these CDs: I remember I was listening to the True album and dancing around my house in '83 when it finally occurred to me that disco music was still around and had simply been rechristened as "dance music."

The Parade album reminds me of my dorm room during my freshman year at university, fall 1984, when I was full-on music snob and thought I was so very sophisticated because I was listening to Spandau Ballet while my dorm companions were listening to REO Journeywagon or some such. I had to save the rabble from themselves, obviously. Sheesh. With an attitude like that, it's amazing I was able to make any new friends. Of course, it was those very same people who would eventually turn me on to music from Jean-Michel Jarre, Dancing Hoods, and King Crimson; I quickly realized how narrow-minded I was. More on that first semester here and here.

Previously revisited for the blog:
The Twelve Inch Mixes (1986)
The Singles Collection (1985)

Rodriguez - Searching For Sugar Man: Original Motion Picture Soundtrack (2012)

From the CD's back insert:

In 1970, singer-songwriter Sixto Rodriguez released his debut album to little fanfare in the U.S., and the story could have ended there. But the LP found its way South Africa's underground, where its Dylanesque anti-establishment punch sparked rebellious young Afrikaners at the dawn of the anti-Apartheid movement. Widely bootlegged and traded, the prophetic music fueled the conscience of a disenfranchised youth, despite the fact that Rodriguez's life and whereabouts were a mystery. It took nearly three decades before he was rediscovered, right at home in Detroit.

This soundtrack features the most definitive songs from Rodriguez's two albums, and reveals an artist whose lyrics are timeless, and whose message of hope confirms the resonating power of music.

Like many people, I came to the music of Rodriguez via the 2012 Academy Award–winning documentary film Searching for Sugar Man. I won't go into the whole thing in this space, but you should watch it if you haven't already. It's an amazing, bittersweet success story of suffering artist. As for the music, it is simply fantastic folk-pop protest music from the early '70s. It is of its time and it's a shame it wasn't more popular here in the U.S. upon release. I should spin this thing more often than I do.

"The recordings, off two albums and a few track sessions, prove Rodriguez to be a gifted songwriter with a penchant for lyrical flourishes influenced by Bob Dylan, and echoing Van Morrison’s jazz-rock-soul masterpiece, 'Astral Weeks.' At times, it recalls another great Latin soul singer-songwriter of the period, Jose Feliciano." - L.A. Times

No liner notes to speak of, but lyrics are included.

Peak on the US Billboard Top 200 chart: #76

Tracks: Don't skip any. I'll be honest - the songs are even better after you've seen the documentary.

1. Sugar Man
2. Crucify Your Mind
3. Cause
4. I Wonder
5. Like Janis
6. This Is Not a Song, It's an Outburst: Or, the Establishment Blues
7. Can't Get Away
8. I Think of You
9. Inner City Blues
10. Sandrevan Lullaby – Lifestyles
11. Street Boy
12. A Most Disgusting Song
13. I'll Slip Away
14. Jane S. Piddy

Tracks 1, 2, 4, 5, 6, 9 and 14 are taken from the album Cold Fact (1970)
Tracks 3, 8, 10 and 12 are from the album Coming from Reality (1971)
Tracks 7, 11 and 13 were recorded for Rodriguez' unfinished third album and were later included as bonus tracks on the Coming from Reality 2009 US re-issue

Record World, April 11, 1970, p. 18

Personal Memory Associated with this CD: Watching the doc quickly followed by purchase of the CD. I've always wanted to re-watch the film at some point and now I'm thinking that today might be that point.

Peter Blegvad & Andy Partridge - Gonwards (2012)

I'm sure there was a reason I bought this CD a year ago, I'm just not sure what it was. From the label's website:

Gonwards is the second release by Peter Blegvad and Andy Partridge.

Mixing spoken word and songs, the material is voiced by Blegvad and features music played, programmed and assembled by Andy Partridge and Stu Rowe (in whose Swindon-based digital studio the recordings were made).

The trio has produced an album that began as a re-imagination of the myth of The Blues and grew from there to encompass a multitude of musical and lyrical themes; the latter including a roll call of words and terminology for use in The Blues, musings on alcohol and St. Augustine, the role of the car and much more.

A typically brilliant and playful fusion of disparate elements from two of Rock music's most inventive eccentrics.

That last sentence is key. I'm a simple man with simple tastes. That's not to say that the lyrics/poetry and music don't each have their moments; it's an interesting listen. Once.

I feel like I'm at a coffee house for open mike night. Maybe one of the songs was featured in a TV ad?

Peak on the US Billboard Top 200 chart: Did not chart

Tracks: I'm strangely drawn to The Devil's Lexicon. The Impeccable Dandy In White is as close to an XTC song that there is on the thing.

Personal Memory Associated with this CD: none

Donald Fagen - Sunken Condos (2012)

Fagen's fourth solo album has all the trappings we've come to expect from his white boy jazz-funk-pop: thick inverted chords, clean production, smooth but energetic grooves, wry lyrics, excellent craftsmanship and musicianship. Co-producer Michael Leonhart's contributions can't be overstated (this album appears to be as much his as Fagen's). There's just one thing missing here: melodies. Granted, every song doesn't sound like One Note Samba, but there's some that are close (I'm looking at you, track 8) and there's certainly nothing I whistle after the album is over - no danger of earworms here. Still, I like the grooves better than those on Morph the Cat so I'm digging this album a little better than its predecessor. It's too bad I always compare everything Fagen puts out to The Nightfly, but I can't help it. The professional music critics loved it, but I'm not in that club. I'm not blown away, but I'm not skipping any tracks, either.

Peak on the US Billboard Top 200 chart: #12

Tracks: My top picks are I'm Not The Same Without You, Memorabilia, Miss Marlene, and Planet D'Rhonda. The cover of Isaac Hayes' Out Of The Ghetto sounds great, but do you really want to hear an AARP member sing those lyrics? Maybe that's a weak attempt at humor that I'm just missing.

Personal Memory Associated with this CD: None for this album, but I can definitely recommend that you skip Fagen's 2013 book, Eminent Hipsters, of which the last half consists of ranting diary entries about his 2012 tour (in which he doesn't perform songs to promote this album - wha?). Eminent Hipsters: when you want to publish a book but you don't want to write a book.

Previously revisited for the blog:
Morph the Cat (2006)
Kamakiriad (1993)
The Nightfly (1982)

Ben Folds Five - The Sound of the Life of the Mind (2012)

In 2012, I warmly welcomed back Ben Folds Five after a long absence. The group was easily one of the best bands of the 1990s and, even with Folds' solo work keeping me company, it had been too long. Folds plays a much more percussive piano when he's with these guys and I missed Robert Sledge's distorted bass. This is the trio's first studio album since 1999's The Unauthorized Biography of Reinhold Messner, but I didn't care for that album or Naked Baby Photos, so I'm going to think of this as their first studio album since 1997's Whatever And Ever Amen. Great stuff here; I like the way Folds' songwriting has matured. He seemingly grew up listening to the same music as me, has a great ear for melody, and likes to throw in some unexpected chord progressions from time to time. Add some lyrics so clever I actually pay attention to them and, baby, you got a stew goin'. A solid return to form; if they ever decide to travel to my corner of the world, I need to catch their act live ASAP.

Currently, this is my second favorite BFF album to Whatever And Ever Amen. In addition to some great songs, I enjoy the artwork by Eric Joyner.

Peak on the US Billboard Top 200 chart:  #10

Tracks:  It's not often that an album leads off with the weakest track, but that's the case here. As a result, I usually skip Erase Me and start with the second track. But one bad track of ten isn't a bad batting average at all. My favorite track is Draw A Crowd, no contest. Other highlights are Michael Praytor Five Years Later, and the final trio of tracks: Hold That Thought, Away When You Were Here, and Thank You For Breaking My Heart. The last song's most obvious influences aren't Billy Joel or Todd Rundgren, but all the European composers from the Romantic Era whose sonatas and etudes Folds must have played thousands of times in piano lessons as a youth.

Personal Memory Associated with this CD:  Once purchased, this CD (on repeat) kept me company on a five hour drive to San Antonio in October 2012. I'll confess to listening to Draw A Crowd more than the other tracks.

Previously revisited for the blog:
Lonely Avenue (2010)
Naked Baby Photos (1998)
Ben Folds Five (1995)

Norah Jones - ...Little Broken Hearts (2012)

As you can guess from the title, this is a break-up album. The brokenhearted songwriting is good and the production by the innovative Danger Mouse is interesting, but that's a hit-or-miss combination that, at times, makes this effort sound like a generic indie pop album. Jones is better than that.  As Stephen Thomas Erlewine writes in his review, "it takes effort to ignore the alluring haze and hear the songs that lie beneath." Overall, I prefer Jones' earlier, sparse piano-based sound to this ethereal synth-pads and guitar strumming, but this CD still has its moments when it isn't trying to be the soundtrack to a David Lynch movie. Metacritic gives it a 69, which is slightly high IMO. I'm waiting for Jones to step back into my comfort zone.

FYI: the album cover is based on a film poster for the 1965 Russ Meyer film, Mudhoney. The thought of Norah Jones as Russ Meyer heroine is quite enticing indeed.

Peak on the US Billboard Top 200 chart: #2

Tracks:  My favorites are Good Morning, She's 22, Out On The Road, and the deliciously evil Miriam in which Jones takes on the persona of the vindictive, murderous ex ("Never been the killin' kind, but you know I know what you did"). But, really, who would cheat on Norah Jones? I usually skip Take It Back and 4 Broken Hearts.

Personal Memory Associated with this CD:  None, but Jones gets bonus points for her cameo appearance in the movie Ted.

Previously revisited for the blog:
Feels Like Home (2004)
Come Away With Me (2002)

Asia - XXX (2012)

Italian Import

Note: the CD I listened to was the Deluxe Edition with 2 bonus tracks and a DVD.

Never EVER do a Google image search for "Asia XXX". Sickos. The XXX of the title refers to the 30 years that had passed since the band's debut album.

Still riding the dragon's wings. This isn't the best complete album the band has released since their original members reunited in 2007 (that would be Phoenix), but it does contain some of the best songs the band has written since the early '80s. In fact, if this had been released in 1984, it would have smoothly continued the band's tradition of catchy 5-6 minute prog-pop songs with bad lyrics. I think Mike Paxman's production is much better on this disc than Omega, but still yearn for a little harder edge and more guitar. Speaking of guitar, Steve Howe recently left the group again, but the band hired a new guitarist and will carry on. For me, that means when a new Asia album is released, I'll be listening closely to samples before purchasing instead of blindly buying new releases unheard.

Peak on the US Billboard Top 200 chart: #134

Tracks:  The best songs are Tomorrow The World, Bury Me In Willow, and Face On The Bridge. Skip the tracks Reno (Silver And Gold), Ghost Of A Chance, the "Midnight Mix" of I Know How You Feel, and the silly call-and-response of Al Gatto Nero.

The bonus DVD contains a 20 minute "making of" featurette that looks like it was shot on an iPhone with an Instagram video app. Also included are music videos for Face On The Bridge and Faithful. Only need to watch once and I'm guessing all of this disc can be found on YouTube anyway. I should have just bought the regular edition.

Personal Memory Associated with this CD: None

Previously revisited for the blog:
Omega (2010)
Phoenix (2008)
Fantasia: Live in Tokyo (2007)
Alpha (1983)
Asia (1982)

Escort (2012)

Canadian Import

Escort is a Brooklyn-based indie disco orchestra. That's right, disco music. Great songwriting, performances, and production that offers up a collection of tunes that wouldn't have been out of place in the late '70s (real musicians, no sampling, no autotune). The group came about when two club DJ's wanted to make records in the spirit of the old ones they normally sampled.

And you just know I couldn't pass up a release from a disco revival band. I'm too old for a night out disco dancing, but I think I might risk it if Escort was playing.

Peak on the US Billboard Top 200 chart:  Did not chart

Tracks: 11 tracks, 53 minutes. I like 'em all because its just so easy to listen to, but I'll pick Caméleon Chameleon, a fantastic remake of A Sailboat In The Moonlight, A Bright New Life, and Karawane as the top tracks. It's not the best song on the album, but the video for All Through The Night was named to several "best of" lists because of its use of archival Muppet Show footage.

Personal Memory Associated with this CD:  I came across this album when Rolling Stone magazine ranked it at #40 of its list of the 50 Best Albums of 2012:

Disco never died. It was just hiding out in Brooklyn, where this 17-piece club orchestra crafted its debut set of glitter-caked grooves. In a year when we lost such giants of the genre as Donna Summer and Robin Gibb, there is something reassuring about how faithfully tunes like "Cocaine Blues" and "Starlight" channel the sleek, sexy sound of Studio 54 at its peak, down to the last high-hat and brass flourish. "A knife, a fork, a bottle and a cork/That's the way we spell New York," vocalist Adeline Michèle sings. Up-all-night civic pride rarely sounds so fun.

How am I supposed to pass that up? I didn't and this disc has been in heavy rotation for the past month.

The Beach Boys - That's Why God Made The Radio (2012)

The summer fun is back! Brian Wilson reunites with the band for the group's 50th (!) anniversary and brings his trademark harmonies and teenage-fun-in-the-sun lyrics. My tongue-in-cheek complaint is that Wilson's modern production is too good. To me, the Beach Boys need to be heard through a hand-held transistor radio! ;-) Don't expect auto-tune, though - these guys don't need it!

The bad news: there's nothing here to compare to their greatest hits from the '60s.
The good news: there's nothing here as bad as Kokomo.

Metacritic has this rated at 64, which is a little low IMO. If you've got teenagers at the pool or the lake, don't play this. But if it's just us middle-aged folks, this is perfect for a summer afternoon in the sun. After all, Exclaim called this the "the dad-rock album of the year." I can dig it.

Peak on the US Billboard Top 200 chart: #3

Tracks: Far from flawless, these 39 minutes are a bit uneven, but I enjoy most all of it anyway. The track that sounds the most like the Beach Boys of old is Isn't It Time. Also, the suite of final tracks is simply beautiful, including From There To Back Again, which ranks up there with the group's best ballads. The oddest track is The Private Life Of Bill And Sue which I can only guess is a commentary on reality TV programming.

Personal Memory Associated with this CD: Too new.

Previously revisited for the blog:
20 Good Vibrations: The Greatest Hits (1995)