Old Enough to Forget

I had no idea Ambrosia were THIS GOOD! Holy snot balls, rub tiger balm in my eyes I did not expect this. I mean, I knew of David Pack was from Ambrosia mainly because I'd seen his name on Kerry Livgren's solo album Seeds of Change . I couldn't place the band though, as the only song I could recall was "Biggest Part of Me" that honestly sounded like a cheap knock off of The Doobie Brothers. Heck even the name, Ambrosia sounded wimpy. I thought it was a flower or the kind of drink that came with cherries and a wee tiny umbrella.  The album opens with "Nice, Nice, Very Nice" and it's a killer song that has soaring keyboards and a great groove. Heck Kurt Vonnegut gets a writing credit so you just know it's going to be something ... nice. From the opening song I could not reconcile this as Ambrosia ... this was cool. Turns out the sucky stuff started on their appropriately named album One Eighty from 1980. However, take anything I write with a heapin...

When this came out in 1980 I was just around the corner from becoming a big Kansas fan. The first album I actually bought was Audio Visions and I bought that around a year after it came out after hearing "Relentless" on a mix tape my buddy Gord had brought over - it also had "Flirtin' with Disaster" on it too, so it was a memorable tape - I don't know why I can remember this type of thing, but can't for the life of me tell you why I just went into the kitchen. 1980 had been a pretty big year for Kerry Livgren. Writing and recording two albums was a pretty big deal, especially since both albums are really good. I know I got Audio Visions first but Seeds of Change was recorded earlier in the year - I'm not sure when I bought this one, but it was before Vinyl Confessions in 1982. I do know that my copy of Seeds has the Kirshner logo on the label so it wasn't a later pressing - I'm not sure what this has to do with anything, but it's k...

This is my favourite Kansas album. Other than a couple of songs I'd heard on the radio I didn't really know much about the band. I do know my buddy Gord liked them and I first heard "Relentless" on one of his mix tapes - and that was an awesome tune. I didn't really have any baggage when it came to the band. When I picked up their 1982 release Vinyl Confessions I didn't realize there was a changing on the guard when a young John Elefante replaced Steve Walsh on vocals. By the time Drastic Measures dropped in 1983 I'd gone back and picked up the excellent (to me) Audio-Visions and had started picking up the band's back catalogue and was really getting into the band. I'll be the first to admit my preferences leaned to the rock songs, and the more meandering wiffle waffle stuff I put up with to get to the rock songs. Yeah, I'm thinking about "A Glimpse of Home" from Monolith with it's pure cheese old timey sci-fi radio intro ... b...