Old Enough to Forget

Back in 1980 rock and roll was all over the place. The strange adult contemporary soft rock was right alongside the real rock and roll, and frankly it didn't seem out of place. The Doobie Brothers were probably to blame for much of this music taking over ... but honestly this was always around in some shape or form. Heck Player was mining the same vein back in '77 with "Baby Come Back" and it was Christopher Cross who really cracked it wide open showing there was gold in them there grooves. The derogatory term "Yacht Rock" hadn't been invented yet. This was just soft rock, or commercial rock, or radio friendly rock, or whatever. Now Yacht Rock is a beloved genre. Who'd a thunk it, and frankly a lot of acts who are on the boat shouldn't be ... that's the problem with labels, everybody ends up with one whether they need it or not. The album kicks off with one of the two songs I remembered from back in the day. Actually I thought there was a thi...

Good gravy here were are enjoying the lazy dog days of summer and thankfully the basements is still relatively cool compared to the rest of the house. The tunes are cranked and I'm annoying everyone in the house. Life is good. I suppose the most interesting thing to me in this bunch of records was hearing Leo Sayer's Living in a Fantasy , an album that fits with Cliff Richard's early '80s output produced by Alan Tarney. Man there was some good stuff coming in the early to mid '80s. Leo Sayer - Living in a Fantasy (1980) Christopher Cross -  Every Turn of the World (1985) Chalk Circle - The Great Lake (EP) (1986) Cliff Richard - Wired for Sound (1981) Red Rockers - Schizophrenic Circus (1984) Leo Sayer - Living in a Fantasy (1980) Man, had I known how good this album was I'd have gotten it years ago. I really, really liked the songs Alan Tarney produced with Cliff Richard. Oddly Cliff had a huge hit with "Dreamin'" in 1980, a song produced and ...

Michael Sembello is probably best known as the dude who performed "Maniac" and absolutely nailed the guitar solo. It's a near perfect pop song and a song I always really liked. A lot. I always wanted to get the song, but I didn't want to get the Flashdance soundtrack, because I didn't want to. It was too much like having to listen to the kids from Fame all over again, and I know Irene Cara was a fine vocalist and all that but I never really liked her stuff, and I'm sure the passage of time has softened the edges off my opinion, but I'm sticking to my guns. I do remember almost getting this album. The cover had two oiled up dudes levitating off the ground while the guy in the white diaper cupped the other little dude's junk. It was a weird cover and Michael Sembello with his half black, half white face looked like a reject from the Star Trek episode "Let That Be Your Last Battlefield" was sitting reading an old Godzilla comic. It was a little ...

As a teenager Friday night often meant staying up late and watching "concerts" on TV. Before there was MTV and MuchMusic there was Burt Sugarman's The Midnight Special. Wolfman Jack would do something or other, but there would be "performances" by a lot of popular bands and musicians. Sure, they were likely lip synced, but what wasn't? You mean to tell me Dick Clark's American Bandstand was actually live? There would be a lot of stuff I don't remember, some I actively disliked. Yeah, early Prince in a loin cloth put me off his music for years. Then one night there was Christopher Cross performing "Ride Like the Wind" and after the fog machine more or less covers the stage the band launches in, and there's no Michael McDonald. Were they actually singing? I'm enthralled by this giant guitar playing Baby Huey with a receding hairline. The song gets to the end guitar solo and for the first time you can actually really hear what he's...