Joe Walsh - There Goes the Neighborhood

When I first bought There Goes the Neighborhood I knew who Joe Walsh was, but other than a couple of songs on the radio I hadn't had the opportunity to hear any of his solo records. This was also true of the Eagles, but that's only tangentially related. The first Eagles record I'd pick up was Eagles Live in 1980 which more or less cemented my appreciation for Joe Walsh as a player. When Joe released There Goes the Neighborhood in '81 it would be my gateway into his solo career. I didn't quite know what to do with this one when I first heard it - this was a weird album. To me Joe Walsh was the rocker who wrote "In the City" for The Warriors soundtrack and was the guy who did "Rocky Mountain Way" and despite my teenage protestations that Triumph did it better - in the long run, Canada's other power trio couldn't hold a candle to the original. Of course "Life's Been Good" is pretty much the quintessential Joe Walsh song, but that was from But Seriously, Folks... his previous album from 1978.

All of this is just a long winded way of saying I was expecting (wanting) more of the rock and roll Joe Walsh, not whatever this was. I remember being profoundly disappointed the first time I played this through. However, it didn't take very long for me to change my mind. I didn't grow up on his solo albums, so I didn't realize that more often than not his music was introspective, organic and meticulously constructed. I just expected straight ahead three chord rock and roll.

Despite this not grabbing me right away, I still played There Goes the Neighborhood ... a lot. I was determined to like it, and by gum I was going to like it. Honestly it wasn't hard to like this. Probably the first song to get my attention was "Rivers (of the Hidden Funk)" with the steady groove that was masterfully played by George "Chocolate" Perry. It didn't hurt that the song also featured Don Felder, who co-wrote and accompanied Joe on guitar. I wish they'd have let loose at the end of the song ... instead we got a fade out. A bummer of a holdover from the '70s. FADE OUTS SUCK.

Once I started getting into the album it didn't take long for the songs to get under my skin. I liked that Joe revelled in the absurd as much as he did the reflective and poignant - yeah, that's right I think Joe Walsh is more often than not poignant. Just when you think you have him sorted out, up pops "Down on the Farm" and my first thought, and still is, what the hell is going on? The fact that he brought in David Lindley to play fiddle (credited as violin) and Russ Kunkel to sit in on the triangle while Joe Walsh tried not to hit his teeth while playing the jaws harp (which is the more polite name than what I grew up calling it) on what is essentially a throwaway track is mind boggling. I love this song.

Joe Walsh was at his best when balancing the absurd and the poignant (I told you he was poignant) and he never stoops to crafting novelty songs. "Things" that opens the album is a blend of both worlds and Joe and the band gamely work their way through the songs. This was Joe arguably at the top of his game.

I always thought this was a hit record, one that he'd be able to hang on his wall. After all his previous studio albums had been certified gold, with But Seriously Folks... going platinum it didn't seem unreasonable to think There Goes the Neighborhood would be another feather in his hat. Nope. To me it was a hit, and I would be in line cash in hand as each album dropped over the next decade. Sure each record would sell a little less than the one before but it didn't matter, there was always something worthwhile and this was the album that set the hook ... line and sinker.

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 , ...

Billy Rankin - Growin' Up Too Fast

Growin' Up Too Fast was never widely released on CD (if at all), and it was one of the albums I really wanted to get back after a basement flood wiped out my vinyl collection in the '90s (when no one really gave a shit about records, and my insurance gave me a couple hundred bucks for an appraised $10,000 collection). Way back in 1984, my (dearly departed and greatly missed) buddy Dave let me borrow his cassette copy, which included a bonus track of "Get It On (Bang A Gong)." When I eventually bought the album, I didn't know it was a bonus track, or even what a bonus track was. If that sentence was hard to read, just go back and skim it. I'm sure you'll get the gist. I'd find out later Billy was an off-and-on-again member of Nazareth and wrote some absolutely killer songs for them. At the time, though, all I knew was this guy laid it out cold with the opening cut, "Baby Come Back," then proceeded to lay down one killer tune after another bef...

Garfield - Strange Streets

I'd seen this before in the bin, but kept flipping through the stacks. I'd see it a few more times, each time stopping to look at it a little more. There was something kind of cool about the cover where the stylized Celtic knot had the dotted yellow line - it was a strange street for sure. I pulled the record out of the jacket and I was struck by the centre image. There was the familiar Mercury label, the same one I'd seen a thousand times on BTO's Head On album. Well, I'd bought things based on odd associations before - like when I had to buy anything that Solid Rock Records released (this was generally a good thing) - so who knows, maybe this was a hidden gem. There weren't any real scratches or rash, just a lot of dirt and dust. It seemed to clean up okay, but we'll see how it goes. The album opens with the title track, and this wasn't straight-ahead pop or rock. It was leaning toward the progressive, but with a pop bent. Oddly enough, the vocals rem...

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