Paper Lace - Paper Lace

Paper Lace, oh man. "The Night Chicago Died" and "Billy Don't Be a Hero" (although I don't think it was their version I remember. That honour went to The Bo Donaldson and the Heywoods in North America) were earworms of the highest order when I was a little kid. There was something decidedly infectious about the songs, and while as I got older I developed a certain disdain for the songs that moved me in my youth, there was always a spot in my heart for this stuff. It's why I still like to listen to "Seasons in the Sun" and "Last Kiss" and am not ashamed to admit this was my jam.

Of course, Paper Lace was never a band who seemed to rise above their early success and were more or less thrown onto the pile with the other AM gold singles that bombarded the airwaves in the '70s. Revered but still mostly forgotten.

This particular Polydor release appears to be a repackaging of ...And Other Bits Of Material, the band put out in 1974. As to whether it was available here I don't know. I figure this was put together and the embedded sticker with the "hits" was no doubt supposed to help give the album a push.

The album was produced by Mitch Murray and Peter Callander, who also wrote the majority of the songs on the record. The songs were more or less straight-ahead pop songs, with a little bit of the emerging glam sound, but frankly there wasn't enough bite to give the songs the requisite edge required to qualify as rock and roll.

The first side kicks off with "The Night Chicago Died," and frankly this was why I bought the album. "Billy Don't Be a Hero" is as maudlin as ever, and frankly I have no idea why this wasn't a hit here, as I can't really tell the difference between their original version and the Bo Donaldson cover. I suspect they're different, and I don't have the ability or desire to do an A&B comparison.

The song I was curious to hear was "Hitchin' a Ride," as this was a song I absolutely adored as a kid. My aunt had the 45 of Vanity Fare's version, and I played that over and over and over on her old suitcase record player. Considering those were all written by Murray-Callander, I had hoped Paper Lace would kill the song. They did, but not in the good way. I suppose if I wasn't aware of the other version this would have been cool ... and it may grow on me ... but that assumes I'm going to play this record more than a few times.

Oddly enough, this would more or less mark the end of the band's recorded output, which kind of surprised me. After all, it wasn't unusual for so-called "One Hit Wonders" to actually have a pretty deep catalogue that flew under the radar after their initial brush with success. Considering they had a couple of huge songs in the U.K., it's strange they didn't get another kick at the can.

Then again, based on the strength of the album, it actually sort of makes sense. The album is enjoyable for what it is, and frankly this was more a late echo of the '60s bleeding into the '70s.

Oh well, this was a fun album and full of nostalgic goodness, and frankly that opening one-two punch of "The Night Chicago Died" and "Billy Don't Be a Hero," and the album's closing track "Cheek to Cheek," was worth what I paid for the album.

It was a dollar.

A buck's a buck.

Styx - Paradise Theater

Styx was hands down one of my favourite bands as a kid. They were a strange band, even back then. They were a hard rock band, almost progressive at times, who had a penchant for sucky ballads. I know there's a tendency for people to zero in on "Babe" as the song that killed the band's credibility. The roots go way back to almost the beginning when Styx released "Lady" on their second album. It showed a side to the band that needed to be kept in check, and for the most part the band kept things on a pretty tight leash. The band had been setting a gruelling pace, releasing an album a year (two in 1972) and by the time they released Paradise Theater (if I end up writing theatre later it's because that's how we spell it here) in 1981 they'd dropped ten albums in less than a decade. I snapped this up as soon as I saw it, and it became a fixture on my turntable. Like the band had announced on "Borrowed Time" from 1979's Cornerstone , ...

David Baerwald - Bedtime Stories

The little sticker on the shrinkwrap says, "You may remember David Baerwald from David & David's Boomtown ..." You bet, I remembered David Baerwald. Back in 1986 Boomtown was an album with moments of sheer brilliance. The whole album may not have been as top shelf as the first few tracks, but that didn't matter - it is an excellent album. I waited for a follow-up ... and waited, and then in 1990 it was a solo David, David Baerwald, who dropped Bedtime Stories . I snapped it up. "All For You," the opening cut, is still my favourite song on the album. It was mesmerizing. I'm not sure if the song got any airplay, it may have, but that may have been wishful thinking on my part as it was on a lot of mix tapes at the time and I heard it a lot in the car. The CD had a great booklet with all of the musician credits and lyrics. Oddly, when I found a sealed copy of the record (a great score), it just had a plain paper insert - the picture of David walking wit...

Gary Numan - The Pleasure Principle

"Cars" was really the only song I knew by Gary Numan. I knew the name of the album the song came from. Over the years bits and pieces of trivia are accumulated, but in terms of his music it was still distilled down to one song ... It would be too easy to write Mr. Numan off as a one hit wonder, and I suppose in terms of actual chart hits this was his defining moment as a solo artist. Of course this really means nothing, as Gary Numan would drop an album a year pretty much through to the end of the '80s. He'd then slow down a little but continued to make music. While The Pleasure Principle was Gary Numan's debut solo release in '79, he actually cut his teeth on a couple of albums in a band called Tubeway Army, first with the band's self-titled release in 1978, and then on Replicas that came out in April of '79. By the end of Tubeway Army's run most of the band would follow Gary into his solo career. Paul Gardiner, who had been with Gary from the b...

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