Haircut One Hundred - Pelican West

The year was 1982, and my nineteen-year-old self was still a couple of years away from getting into the European-tinged pop that would eventually start expanding my musical palate. Haircut One Hundred is a band I appreciate a lot more now than my younger self would have. The catchy "Love Plus One" appears on a lot of '80s compilations for good reason - it's a great song. I'm saying this now, but if you'd asked me the other day, I'd have drawn a blank.

I'd gone into Krazy Bob's looking for a specific album (still can't find it) and got to chatting with Bob. We got on the subject of British new wave. He asked me if I had any Haircut One Hundred. I said I knew the name but couldn't recall any of their stuff.

"What about Nick Heyward?" he asked.

Again, I knew the name but was drawing a blank on anything specific. I know he's on a compilation somewhere in the library in the studio, but knowing and knowing aren't the same. So he pops out from behind the counter and comes back a few minutes later.

"Here, you have to get this."

Dagnabbit, it's more than a dollar, but not stupid expensive either, so I figure why not? After all, he was quite insistent, and generally when we chat about stuff, we agree on a lot of things.

What I find amazing now is how talented these kids were. Yeah, kids. Geez Louise, Nick Heyward, the principal singer and songwriter, was 21 when this came out, and all the guys look like they just used their high school yearbook photos for the back cover. The level of maturity is rather astounding. The arrangements are pretty dang sophisticated - you have to love a band who can create complex pop that leans heavily on percussion and an amazing horn section. When I was 21, I was writing songs about how much I hated Smurfs.

I mentioned new wave earlier, and I guess these guys were sort of in that group of bands coming out of the UK at the time, but I'm not sure that's the label I'd use. Then again, as I often say, I'm not really good with genres.

Man, 40 years later and to my ears this still sounds fresh. I love the fact that on the back cover there's a picture of a rotary phone. That's probably the most dated thing about the album.

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