Ian Thomas - Riders on Dark Horses

I was ten years old when I first heard Ian Thomas' "Painted Ladies" on my AM radio. I still really like the song, and throughout the 70s, he was the consummate singer-songwriter. Even his 1979 song "Pilot," which was equal parts irritating and cool with its quirky recorder (yes, a recorder) runs, was a song I kind of liked, but it wasn't a song I was too fond of. However, when Ian performed it on SCTV with Bob and Doug (his brother Dave), it took on a second life. I knew of Ian Thomas from many of his own songs, but also from the various covers of his songs by other artists, from Santana to Chicago. But it was Manfred Mann's Earth Band's retooling of "The Runner" that really floated my boat (oddly, I never did pick up a copy, and it is still on my list of things to look for one day).

Fast forward to the summer of 1983, and I'm lining up to see the Strange Brew movie, and in the opening credits, Ian Thomas delivers the title song, and it was a killer track. It would herald in the '80s for Mr. Thomas, and the point where I really took interest was when a year later I heard "Do You Right" on the radio - and that was it. I was completely hooked. I picked up Riders on Dark Horses and pulled song after song onto my mix tapes. So I started going backward and picking up Ian's past work, and while I enjoyed it, I was more into looking forward than looking back.

This isn't to say that the music on "Riders" was hard rock or (gasp) metal (he'd save that for his awesome contributions to The Wanker's Guide to Canada - a story for another time) but there was something that felt current and fresh - after all, this was ringing my bell, and I wasn't exactly looking for nostalgia in 1984. I was looking for what was new, and despite the fact that Ian had been around since my childhood, it didn't phase me at all. Of course, for long-term fans, I suspect this was a problem, and if you read some of the reviews out there, they didn't share my enthusiasm for the album.

The album was co-produced by Mick Ronson and Max Norman. Ian enlisted Aldo Nova (yes, that Aldo Nova) to play guitar on the album (it's part of the fun trying to guess which tracks he's on), which to me was cool, while to others may just seem like a play to try and be relevant. The incomparable Peter Fredette also provided backing vocals. Haters gonna hate, I guess.

The songs were a blend of his '70s singer-songwriter sensibilities with the new sounds that were coming down the pipe - just listen to "Progress" and you can hear the same biting lyrics (some would argue heavy-handed) and observational tendencies that were all over his previous albums. One of the near-perfect pop tunes he crafted for this album was "Your Love Heals" a song that is a little too fast to be a ballad, but too slow to be a rocker. The song is a mid-tempo masterpiece that still, after all these years, stops me in my tracks. The album closes out with the title track and has over time become one of his more haunting tunes and one of my favorite songs from his entire catalog. Of course, I seem to say that about a lot of songs. It's like going to a candy store and pointing at the various sweets, "I like that one...and that one...and that one too.

I'll be honest, I was often a pretty lazy listener. I was into the tunes and if the songs were catchy, that was enough for me. The fact that Ian put in the effort to craft deeper pop songs wasn't something I truly appreciated until later, when my tastes matured a little more (not that I did, mind you).

He had a hell of a run through the remainder of the '80s when he followed up this album with 1985's "Add Water" and 1988's brilliant "Levity." He was getting better as time went by, although if I'm going to call out an album as being too much of its time, it would be "Add Water," which hasn't aged as well despite having some of his best songs on it.

Riders on Dark Horses though was the album for me that seemed to be the perfect blend of what had come before and where he'd be going in the future. Is it his best album? Probably not (Air Pirates anyone?) but it's up there.