Old Enough to Forget

"Eyes of a Stranger" is a remarkable song. It put Payola$ on the musical map, and even after over four decades the song is still awesome. The band may have garnered some fans with it's debut and "China Boys" a song that got some sporadic play back in the day ... but I never really liked it all that much. This was the album that was supposed to allow the guys in the band to quit their day jobs, except for Bob Rock who balanced his house duties at Little Mountain Sound and being in the band. A wise choice as history would show. The band was centred on the core of Bob Rock (guitars) and Paul Hyde (Vocals) along with Chris Taylor on drums, and Laurence Wilkins on bass. Lawrence would depart after this album. The band's sound was born out of the British punk scene from the late '70s and their fuck you attitude was on full display with the band's name: Payola$. Yeah, that's a name that'll open doors to radio. I wonder how many conversations took pl...

Crack the Sky. I have no idea why I picked this up. The cover looked intriguing, and the logo was embossed as was the doodad looking thing in the centre. The band looked cool and I figured it was hard rock or glam ... both were appealing. I bought it a couple of years ago and it's been sitting on a shelf waiting to be played. I just kept adding albums to the pile and frankly this one got buried.  I was flipping through my inbox shelf to see what might catch my eye and paused on this one. The heaven's opened up and it was time to crack the sky (it's okay, you can roll your eyes, I did). I dropped the needle and the opening chords to "Hold On" immediately caught my attention. It called to mind Rush for a moment ... only a moment until John Palumbo started to sing, which was of talking narration that gave way to an infectious chorus. The guitar solo was an honest to goodness face melter. Not that it was a blistering flurry of notes, the opposite in fact, but dagnabbi...

A while back while rummaging through the discount bins over at Krazy Bobs I found not one, or two, or three but five albums by Icehouse. This was awesome. Bob had been seeding the bins as I found a lot of records that came home with me that day. Back in the day I had Man of Colours on CD, and I really liked it. The opening one two punch of "Electric Blue" and "Crazy" was so good it almost overshadowed the rest of the album. I was also one of a handful of people who went to the theatre to see "Young Einstein" featuring Yahoo Serious. This was a stinker of a movie my girlfriend, and now wife, has still to forgive me for making her see. The only redeeming part of "Young Einstein" was hearing "Great Southern Land" by Icehouse, and Mental as Anything's version of "Rock and Roll Music" they were both so good. Although if I'm keeping score (she does) it's actually better than "No Holds Barred" Hulk Hogan...

China Crisis was one of those '80s bands I knew of, but had never heard. To me they were just another early English alternative new wave band that never really caught on in North America. That first blush of European new wave synth pop seemed short lived and was quickly assimilated into what would become the sound of the '80s. Fast forward four decades and a couple of years for good measure, I was flipping through the discount bin and there was a very nice looking copy of  Working with Fire and Steel - Possible Pop Songs Volume Two and my curiosity was piqued. Oh, for the record (not this one) there was no "volume one" but it was the band's second album I'd find out later. After a bath and a clean shirt (I replaced the insert) the album was ready. I seated myself on the centre cushion on the couch and had the lyric sheet ready to follow along. I felt very much like the guy on the chair in those old Maxell adverts. I would buy boxes of XLIIS tapes and when I go...

Straight Lines put out two pretty good albums and then folded. Run for Cover was the band's second album and was full of tightly polished light rock songs. It's kind of foggy now but there was a time this was the shit. Coming out of the '70s Straight Lines wasn't ashamed of the past, but it was embracing the future. The songs were tight, the Peter Clarke's vocals were really good and harmonies were on point and the guitar playing was that perfect mix of tasty with a bit of edge that gave the feeling if David Sinclair wanted to he could cut loose with the best of them. Listening now it would be easy to dismiss this as faceless corporate rock of the most generic variety. Which is not only unfair, it's plain wrong.  It may have been my mood but I was really getting into this one. It was really good. Most of the songs were mid tempo, but the band had a killer ballad with "Letting Go" which is probably their best known song, although personally I am partial...

A decade after Heart released  Little Queen , they dropped Bad Animals . To say they were back was a bit of an understatement, Heart was enjoying a career resurgence and were bigger than they'd ever been. Case in point, both albums went triple platinum in the States, while here at home Bad Animals would sell 400,000 copies doubling what they did on Little Queen. I had no idea at the time it was this big a deal. I knew "Alone" (from their self titled comeback in '85) was a huge power ballad, but honestly when I think of classic Heart albums, I don't think of Bad Animals . Time is a cruel mistress that way.  Now to be fair, I didn't have the classic albums when I was younger, although I did have  Passionworks  back in '83 because I liked the guitar solo on "How Can I Refuse?" a song that unfortunately stalled for the band. Of course I thought the big hits were cool, and "Barracuda" is right up there with my favourite songs growing up. Th...

I'm not sure why I filed Cock Robin away as rubbish. There was a bit of buzz when this was released in '85 and I'm sure I saw a video on MuchMusic but honestly have no memory at all. I do though remember watching The Tonight Show that year when they were the musical guest and wasn't impressed, but somehow I can remember they were on the show. The other day I figured it was a good day to go visit Krazy Bob and see what treasures he'd seeded his discount bin with. Sometimes it's a cornucopia of sonic goodies, and other times it's like he decided it was time to dump all of his Hammond organ dance records. It was a banner day and I picked up a dozen records that were all in amazing shape. You guessed it among them was the debut release by Cock Robin. The band was centred on vocalists Peter Kingsbery and Anna LaCazio and they were supported by Clive Wright on guitar and Louis Molino III on drums, both of whom would be gone by the band's second album. This isn...

Back in 2023 Jamie Rowe dropped his new project Kalamity Kills. It was an album I supported when he launched his kickstarter. Yeah, my name is buried deep in the credits on the CD. I've been a fan of Jamie for a long time. His work with Guardian seems to be what most of the casual fans want to hear, but it was his solo work, and the power pop he crafted with London Calling that cemented me as a fan. The handful of albums with AdrianGale were unabashed '80s rock, and while awesome were deliberately nostalgic and boy howdy there were good. Jamie is hard to pin down stylistically as he seems to flit from genre to genre. His previous album was a country hybrid Welcome Home that was pretty decent, but to me it was just generic paint by numbers modern country (then again I ain't much of a country fan). Which means it was as good as anything else out there and if that was your cup of tea, your cup runneth over. That shouldn't read as a shot, I just think he's an artist cha...

Hold Out came after a three year hiatus, and it would set the pattern for his releases through the '80s. After the success of Running on Empty it seemed like an eternity between records but his audience was waiting patiently and Hold Out would become his lone number one album on the Billboard charts. The album didn't do as well here in Canada but it would crack the top ten stalling at number six. This was the album I came to a few years later when my friend Steve couldn't stop heaping praise on the record. At the time I was enjoying Lawyers in Love and I did like the songs I'd heard on the radio. Over the years I've had this album on vinyl, then CD and now again on vinyl. Why get it again? It was on sale ... and I'm a sucker ... and despite some pithy comments to come, I really liked this album. It's always fun going back and reading up on things that are decades old and discovering the vitriol some artists are blessed with from the various critics. Jackso...

Released in December of 1976, Hotel California would go on to become one of the best selling albums of all time. In the US it would go platinum twenty six times, and here in Canada it would move over a million units. As impressive as those numbers are, it would be Their Greatest Hits (1971–1975) that was released at the beginning of 1976 that has over 44 million reported sales. If you're keeping score there have been ten albums in the modern era that have reported sales of over 40 million and the Eagles hold the number 5 and 6 spots. I finally bought my copy well after the shine had worn off and the band had splintered into little pieces with the members trying their hands at being solo artists. Some with more success than others. As a kid I'd heard the album quite a few times. Heck I remember sitting in my friend's bedroom while the record played and that was probably around 1980 and us kids were still listening to the album. Aside from the title track I loved "Life ...

Voices Carry was the debut album by 'Til Tuesday, and the the title track is one of the best songs to come out of the '80s. Of course I'm a wee bit biased. The band would only release three albums before calling it a day. Oddly the band's commercial trajectory was inverse to the quality of it's releases (at least that's how I remember it, I've not listened to them in decades). I really liked the followup  Welcome Home , but I loved the band's final album Everything's Different Now  - but by the time it was released people had moved on, and as time marched on "Til Tuesday was more or less relegated to one hit wonder status. Which was a shame. When Aimee started dropping solo records I picked them up as they came out, although I'll admit that after Lost in Space in 2002 my interest started to wane. I have yet to hear her last couple of albums. I've gotten way ahead of myself. When this dropped in '85 it was so fresh, and so differen...

FM is one of those bands I knew of as a kid but had never heard anything by them. Over the years I'd hear the song "Phasors On Stun" and knew about Nash the Slash but that was about it. They were a mystery wrapped in bacon and stuffed into an enema. I recently found a couple of the band's records (not at the same time, but close enough that they were both sitting on the shelf waiting to be played) and I figured I'd play the first one. Surveillance was released in '79 and featured Cameron Hawkins on vocals, keyboards and bass, along with drummer Martin Deller and Ben Mink on stringed things (guitar, violin, mandolin) who replaced Nash after he'd left to pursue a solo career. This was Ben's second album with the band. The first time through I have to admit I wasn't really paying attention but it was cool, and I really enjoyed the science fiction vibe. Musically it was kind of progressive but it had enough of a straight ahead rock feel to keep me inte...

Back in the day it seemed like all the cool kids had a copy of the Steve Miller Band's Greatest Hits 1974–78 . The band had been pumping out albums since 1968, but the label figured the keys to success were to be found by only taking songs from the holy trinity of albums released between (stop reading if you know where this is going) 1974 and 1978. Although to be fair (did you add the extra 'to be fair' in your head?) the band didn't release anything new in '78 but the hits album came out ... I'm guessing on the assumption that it would be a hit before it was. The only thing I ever had as a kid by the band was a 45 of "Take the Money and Run" that I played a lot, and I always wanted to get more, but never did. Not even the legendary greatest hits record. Of course over the years I would end up with an awful lot of his stuff.  There was a lot of good stuff out there by Steve Miller, but it was the hits I wanted to hear. I didn't mind his blues stuff...