Old Enough to Forget

Hot on the heels of We're an American Band , Grand Funk teamed up again with producer Todd Rundgren and released Shinin' On in March of 1974. The album is probably best remembered for the band's cover of "The Loco-motion" that took the Little Eva classic written by Gerald Goffin and Carole King and turned it to eleven and delivered one of the greatest distorted guitar solos of all time. The album is short, just a little over half an hour, and contained eight songs. Depending on how you look at it, the album is pretty uneven and somewhat generic. However, when they were good, they were next level. The album opens with the title track, and that one is pretty great. The previously mentioned "Loco-motion" was the reason I picked up the album - well, that's not entirely true, it was in the dollar bin and in pretty decent shape - I would have picked it up regardless, but I was stoked to get the choo choo song. What I wasn't expecting was how unbelieva...

The little sticker on the shrinkwrap says, "You may remember David Baerwald from David & David's Boomtown ..." You bet, I remembered David Baerwald. Back in 1986 Boomtown was an album with moments of sheer brilliance. The whole album may not have been as top shelf as the first few tracks, but that didn't matter - it is an excellent album. I waited for a follow-up ... and waited, and then in 1990 it was a solo David, David Baerwald,  who dropped Bedtime Stories . I snapped it up. "All For You," the opening cut, is still my favourite song on the album. It was mesmerizing. I'm not sure if the song got any airplay, it may have, but that may have been wishful thinking on my part as it was on a lot of mix tapes at the time and I heard it a lot in the car. The CD had a great booklet with all of the musician credits and lyrics. Oddly, when I found a sealed copy of the record (a great score), it just had a plain paper insert - the picture of David walking wit...

Looks like I almost got stuck in the '70s this month. Not a bad thing. Considering how much I go on about the '80s and all that, blah blah blah - I have collected a lot of stuff from the decade of my childhood. Which shouldn't really be a surprise considering most of what's available on vinyl is heavily concentrated in the '60s and '70s. When CDs came out I quickly jumped ship ... hence the lack of records from my favoured decade. Still, man, there was some great stuff coming out of my childhood, and a lot of new to me stuff that has truly stood the test of time. Let's take a look at this months ... Five For Fighting No. 10 Nick Gilder - Frequency (1979) Joan Armatrading - Armatrading (1976) Ian Thomas - Calabash (1976) Linda Ronstadt - Prisoner in Disguise (1975) The Vapors - Magnetic (1981) Nick Gilder - Frequency (1979)  Nick followed up City Nights and "Hot Child in the City" with Frequency and the single that should have been huge, "(Yo...

You should never say never. Just ask Don Henley. So here I am feeling like I'm betraying my youth by testing to see how thick the ice is now. Pretty friggin' thick. This was a day I sort of dreaded, but was expecting. I mean it's not like this wasn't coming. Over the last couple of years I'd put myself through a lot of stuff I never thought I'd actually sit and listen to - let alone actually (begrudgingly) admit to enjoying. It was musical hell (there was no ice, straight into the pit baby!) when a song from Culture Club came on the radio. I never expected that to change ... ever. Still, a lot of things have frozen over, or at least chilled enough to numb the pain these albums once brought to my ears. Adrian, who runs my favourite record store and feeds my habit, had been trying to clean up and refresh some inventory and he went a little nuts on the bargain bins - especially the dollar section. I'd popped in just to say hi and see what was up - and in short ...

The Hometown Band released albums in 1976 and 1977, and served as Valdy's backing band for a little while, and then as quickly as they were, they weren't. As a kid there weren't a lot of choices in terms of television channels - CBC was a universal constant, which explains why so many kids of my generation revered Mister Dressup and Ernie Coombs. We knew there was a Mister Rogers, but he didn't live in our neighbourhood. Casey and Finnegan were awesome, and in a pinch there was always The Friendly Giant and Rusty and Jerome. However, CBC was also home to the Juno Awards , which for a long time was the home of iffy Canadian Content that aspired to greatness, and often settled for mediocrity. We did have our own rock royalty - Bachman Turner Overdrive as our resident kings of rock, and Anne Murray was our queen. If she put out an album she won an award. I remember watching those mid to late '70s shows eagerly hoping to catch a glimpse or even better yet a performance ...

If push ever came to shove and I had to honestly list my favourite songs, "Jane" would be near the top. I can't really describe what it is about the song that just crushes all my buttons, but it did - and still does. When this came out in '79 the sheer number of killer songs that were out that year was astounding (look it up, make your own list). The album though was a different thing altogether. Freedom At Point Zero was an album a buddy of mine had, and I remember listening to it once . Expecting more than it could possibly deliver, I was profoundly disappointed. I don't know if I even made it to the second side. I borrowed the record and put "Jane" on a mix tape, and then gave it back - he didn't want it back, but I didn't want it either. When the band had another hit with "Find Your Way Back" a couple years later I never even bothered trying to find the record ... I had written the band off. Fickle I know, but my roots didn't g...

Avoid Freud  was released in the fall of 1980, but it wasn't until the following spring that "High School Confidential" seemed to be playing everywhere. We'd giggle when Carole sang, "It makes me cream my jeans when she comes my way." On the radio it would be bleeped, but it didn't matter. Most of us, or at least me, had no idea that it was a lesbian love song. It didn't matter - the song was infectious. There was of course the inevitable backlash when something becomes too popular. For me, there was always something about Carole Pope's voice that was nails on a blackboard. I will admit that I liked "High School Confidential" right up until I didn't ... but with time I like it again. I had never heard anything other than what I heard on the radio. I had no desire to pick up an album, and when the Payolas released "Never Said I Loved You" in 1983 with Carole singing the duet with Paul, I would have a visceral reaction to th...