Old Enough to Forget

After All was a band that seemed so full of promise. They were based in Vancouver, and the members were Scott Acomba on vocals, Jordy Birch on bass and backing vocals, Todd Simko on guitar and backing vocals, and Leigh Grant on drums. To me it always seemed like a big deal when an act was signed to Capitol, although I'm guessing they were licensed from Nettwork but that's just a guess on my part. Being on Nettwork had its own cool factor ... what I'm trying to say is that they had backing behind them. I did buy the CD when it came out in '88, and even saw them open for Bruce Hornsby at the old Expo Theatre - a great venue, now gone. It was an odd pairing, but they gave it a good go, and I remember rooting for them as I'd just picked up the album and it was cool to see them run through their short set. "Bullets" was getting a little bit of airplay here at home, and I suspect it was a regional thing, but for me it counted. I can't remember if they got a ...

Idle Eyes released their debut in 1985, and there were two songs that got a fair bit of airplay back in the day. "Tokyo Rose" was pure '80s awesomeness, and "All Day," a song that at the time I didn't really think was all that special. However, those songs helped earn the band a Most Promising Group Juno Award in 1985, beating out Rational Youth, The Arrows and others. The award is a bit of a curse as much as anything, as generally it was like getting a kiss from Judas. I bought the album for "Tokyo Rose" and gave the album a couple of cursory spins, then filed it. My general recollection when thinking about this album was that it was one killer and the rest filler. Yeah, I was pretty merciless back in the day. I used to have a pretty long commute and I often taped entire albums for the car ride, but most of the time it was mix tapes. I don't think I ever taped the album. Once I passed judgment, I moved on pretty quickly to the next shiny thing...