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...

At the risk of sounding like a broken record and repeating myself, I'll bring you up to speed on my love hate relationship with Payolas ($). At best I was a casual fan but I will give credit where credit is due. When they were good they were as good as it got. Seriously, "Eyes of a Stranger" is just about as good as it gets, and over the decades the song has woven itself into the fabric of Canadian classic rock.  When the band followed up their 1982 release No Stranger to Danger a year later with Hammer on a Drum also produced by Mick Ronson, there was anticipation in the air. This was going to break the band wide open. "Where is this Love" was the song that got me in the feels and I would have picked up the album except the other song that got radio play was "Never Said I Loved You" where Paul and Carole Pope took turns singing ... in other words it was a duet. To say I had a visceral reaction to the song understates the meaning of the word visceral....

This was the album that was supposed to make The Payola$ huge ... all that was missing was an excellent album to propel Vancouver's perennial group of punk to pop heroes to the big time. They'd been skirting on the edge of success for a few years, and were so close to being a really big deal. The band first made it onto my radar when they released "Eyes of a Stranger" back in 1982 and the song was huge here in Canada (okay, maybe just Vancouver, but it seemed like it was huge). I remember an entertainment segment on the local news where the band was pretty excited about the prospect of being able to ditch their day jobs. A year later the band dropped Hammer on a Drum and "Where is this Love" was the big hit (all things are relative, it was on the radio and I liked it, so it must have been a hit), and remains one of those songs that'll get me right in the feels when I hear it. Mick Ronson had produced both of those albums, and while they did okay, from ...