Old Enough to Forget

Flash and the Pan was the brainchild of Harry Vanda and George Young. The duo had been active since the '60s, first with a band called the Easybeats, and from there they would launch George's two younger brothers Malcolm and Angus' band AC/DC. They would produce them up to 1978 before the band engaged Mutt Lange (who then was still Robert "Mutt" Lange) to produce their 1979 release Highway to Hell. Mutt was an interesting fellow, and although synonymous now with slick hard rock (or slick Shania albums) he also produced The Boomtown Rats The Fine Art of Surfacing in 1979 as well. From what I've read the origins of Flash and Pan go back to the later '70s, where they had released a couple of singles, starting with "Hey St. Peter" in 1977 and "Down Among the Dead Men" in 1978. They would release their self title album at the end of 1978, and then in 1979 the album would be released in North America on Epic. While I don't really remembe

At the risk of sounding like a broken record and repeating myself, I'll bring you up to speed on my love hate relationship with Payolas. At best I was a casual fan but I will give credit where credit is due. When they were good they were as good as it got. Seriously, "Eyes of a Stranger" is just about as good as it gets, and over the decades the song has woven itself into the fabric of Canadian classic rock.  When the band followed up their 1982 release No Stranger to Danger a year later with Hammer on a Drum also produced by Mick Ronson, there was anticipation in the air. This was going to break the band wide open. "Where is this Love" was the song that got me in the feels and I would have picked up the album except the other song that got radio play was "Never Said I Loved You" where Paul and Carole Pope took turns singing ... in other words it was a duet. To say I had a visceral reaction to the song understates the meaning of the work visceral. I s

Time for a little Canadiana. Funny how some acts can be so influential and yet be totally unknown to the rest of the world. Then again, to be fair some of these albums weren't well known at home either. You pays your money you takes your chance. I didn't have any of these albums back in the day, so it's been an interesting trip down memory lane. With Harlequin and Trooper I knew some of the songs, but on the others they were brand new to me. Sometimes that's awesome, sometimes it makes me sad to be so later to the party. I suppose it's better late than never. Harlequin - One False Move (1982) Lava Hay - Lava Hay (1990)  The Front - Gina's at a Party (1983) The Kings - Amazon Beach (1981) Trooper - Thick as Thieves (1978) Harlequin - One False Move (1982) - Harlequin's third album, and the last of their records to be produced by the legendary Jack Douglas. I still have no idea why I never got this album at the time as I liked the songs I heard on the radi

Getting this was an accident, but I'm not complaining or crying foul. My old record store shuttered and moved to a warehouse and now runs an auction to purge inventory. For me this is a bit of a double edged sword. Over the last couple of years I'd ended up with a lot of stuff as I fished through the dollar section, and every so often splurged when it was my birthday or Christmas. The end result being a shortage of storage space, and an inability to expand as it was made clear from the onset that I couldn't take up more space. It was the auction section that became my win some lose some playground. I'd scan through the listings, and click on a couple here and there to satisfy the minimum bids, then walk away until things closed. This last cycle there were a couple that caught my eye, and this one. Soft Cell's Happiness not Included was on yellow vinyl. I really didn't want it but it looked interesting, and until I brought it home didn't know it was a relati

I love a surprise that has a surprise inside. Recently I was out of town, and generally this means my wife gets to go shopping and I'm dragged along to carry the bags and pay for stuff. As it happens there was a little hole in the wall used record store that seemed to have a lot of grossly overpriced product, but the owner was a quirky character and we got to chatting. The filing system made sense to him, but was otherwise indecipherable to the rest of us. We got onto the subject of power pop and I mentioned a few albums I was looking for. His eyes would light up, as I made my inquiries. "Ooh, I have that one ... but not here." Or "Yeah that's a good one, it's upstairs but I can't get it right now. Are you from out of town? Oh, that's too bad." All the while he was rooting around and pulling out albums I wasn't asking about, and piling them in front of me. Among them was this album by Red Rockers. It looked pretty interesting based on the cov

Franke & the Knockouts released three albums in the early '80s before being counted out. The band's first two records Franke and the Knockouts (1981) and Below the Belt (1982) were on Millennium records, whose big claim to fame was Meco and the insufferable disco reworking of John Williams' "Star Wars Theme/Cantina Band" back in 1977. The label would fold after the band's second album and MCA would pick up the band, and then not know what to do with their third and final album Makin' the Point (1984). The band's debut single "Sweetheart" would crack the top 20 in Canada, and hit the top 10 on the Billboard Hot 100. Their next album Below the Belt contained "Without You (Not Another Lonely Night)" that sat just outside the top 40 here, and went as high as 24 on the Billboard chart. The third album's lone single "Outrageous" didn't make any ripples.  That would be it, and the band would be relegated to being

This was my first and for a long time only Aerosmith album. Growing up my older cousin Jeff had an 8-track copy of Toys in the Attic, and that album was a greatest hits album on its own. However, as a kid my record buying was sporadic and my small collection was played to death. I got Rocks in 1979 (I love how I can remember this, but I will forget to buy eggs when I'm out shopping) at the thrift store where I got my comics and Robert A. Heinlein paperbacks. They didn't have a lot of records, but I did find a copy of the Beatles White Album on white vinyl, the first two Prism albums, April Wine Live , and Rocks . Probably all in the same year - I lost them all to water damage, but have replaced most of them - although I'll likely never find that Beatles album, and if I did couldn't afford it. I almost bought Tour of Japan by Teaze several times ... but never did. I recently picked it up, and it is the shit! I should have bought it as a kid. Back on topic ... So here w

It's Valentine's Day, who loves you baby? Jesus Loves you. Since my first VD post was probably a little suspect, let's try and wash things clean with a little classic Christian rock. I'd always wanted to get the first couple of DeGarmo & Key albums, but never did. I did pick up their double live album No Turning Back in '82 that contained a decent selection of songs from their first three records, so it sort of scratched that itch. I am getting ahead of myself though. The first record of theirs I got was their third release This Ain't Hollywood , and at the time I found myself mostly ambivalent to many of the songs on the album. There were a couple I really liked, but mostly I listened to it because I wanted to like it, and frankly I didn't have so many records that I had a lot of choice. I remember the CCM Magazine review wasn't a glowing endorsement either. Funny the shit that sticks in the old bean. The other day my wife and I were scouring throug

Happy Valentine's Day (VD, har de har har). For today's listening enjoyment I decided to spin one of rocks greatest collection of love songs. This is not high art ... and I should be a little ashamed of what is about to happen. But I really have no shame, so here goes. Let's peek under the covers and listen to Whitesnake's 1984 release Slide it In . Like a lot of people, this was my introduction to David Coverdale and Whitesnake. Which puts me firmly in the camp of the great unwashed, but I didn't care. I didn't have a deep well of musical knowledge at the time, other than what I liked I liked. Even now I'm surprised that I wasn't reading Rolling Stone, or reading Guitar Player and stuff back then. Oh sure, I'd flip through them in the magazine rack when I was looking for my comics, but I wasn't spending my limited cash on them. I'd rather pour over the credits and listen to the records in my room. Which is what I did. Oddly, that's what

I had no idea what to expect here. The cover caught my eye, and I thought the logo was cool. It reminded me a bit of Crown of Thorns, or Angel ... turns out when I actually compared them they were nothing alike. For all I knew, this was going to be a disco record, after all it did come out in 1979, and the back photo was hard to peg. Still, I'd been baited with that Patrick Juvet record ... but I was thinking this was more rock, mainly because Leland Sklar was the bass player, and while Leland has played on literally thousands of albums, I generally assume he's a measure of quality. If nothing else, the bass playing will be good. When I got home I looked up Alvin Taylor as I wasn't as familiar with him but his list of credits is still pretty impressive. He was the behind the kit on Bob Welch's French Kiss, except for Sentimental Lady. He drummed with Elton John, Eric Burdon, Sly & the Family Stone and George Harrison. As for Billy Thorpe, I figured I'd wait unti

A few nuggets here. The Alice Cooper records has seen better days, but I've found some really cool stuff too. Besides it's all for a good cause. Alice Cooper - Love it to Death (1971) Visions: Mission Andromeda (1987) The Records - The Records (1979) Trooper - Money Talks (1982) Eddie Schwartz - No Refuge (1981) Alice Cooper - Love it to Death (1971) While Billion Dollar Babies was my jam, and I love that album, it never really spurred me to become an obsessive fan. I mean don't get me wrong, when I heard his stuff I never turned it off, and when in the mid '80s he had a career resurgence I was there.  A while back I walked into a shop, and out front was a box that was full of records with a sign saying FREE . Well, it was worth a look. There sandwiched in between an old Irish Rovers record (that I had already. Don't judge me) and some obscure soundtrack was a pretty beat up copy of Love it to Death. "Well what have we here?" I slip the record out, and