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...

Crack the Sky. I have no idea why I picked this up. The cover looked intriguing, and the logo was embossed as was the doodad looking thing in the centre. The band looked cool and I figured it was hard rock or glam ... both were appealing. I bought it a couple of years ago and it's been sitting on a shelf waiting to be played. I just kept adding albums to the pile and frankly this one got buried.  I was flipping through my inbox shelf to see what might catch my eye and paused on this one. The heaven's opened up and it was time to crack the sky (it's okay, you can roll your eyes, I did). I dropped the needle and the opening chords to "Hold On" immediately caught my attention. It called to mind Rush for a moment ... only a moment until John Palumbo started to sing, which was of talking narration that gave way to an infectious chorus. The guitar solo was an honest to goodness face melter. Not that it was a blistering flurry of notes, the opposite in fact, but dagnabbi...

A while back while rummaging through the discount bins over at Krazy Bobs I found not one, or two, or three but five albums by Icehouse. This was awesome. Bob had been seeding the bins as I found a lot of records that came home with me that day. Back in the day I had Man of Colours on CD, and I really liked it. The opening one two punch of "Electric Blue" and "Crazy" was so good it almost overshadowed the rest of the album. I was also one of a handful of people who went to the theatre to see "Young Einstein" featuring Yahoo Serious. This was a stinker of a movie my girlfriend, and now wife, has still to forgive me for making her see. The only redeeming part of "Young Einstein" was hearing "Great Southern Land" by Icehouse, and Mental as Anything's version of "Rock and Roll Music" they were both so good. Although if I'm keeping score (she does) it's actually better than "No Holds Barred" Hulk Hogan...

China Crisis was one of those '80s bands I knew of, but had never heard. To me they were just another early English alternative new wave band that never really caught on in North America. That first blush of European new wave synth pop seemed short lived and was quickly assimilated into what would become the sound of the '80s. Fast forward four decades and a couple of years for good measure, I was flipping through the discount bin and there was a very nice looking copy of  Working with Fire and Steel - Possible Pop Songs Volume Two and my curiosity was piqued. Oh, for the record (not this one) there was no "volume one" but it was the band's second album I'd find out later. After a bath and a clean shirt (I replaced the insert) the album was ready. I seated myself on the centre cushion on the couch and had the lyric sheet ready to follow along. I felt very much like the guy on the chair in those old Maxell adverts. I would buy boxes of XLIIS tapes and when I go...

Straight Lines put out two pretty good albums and then folded. Run for Cover was the band's second album and was full of tightly polished light rock songs. It's kind of foggy now but there was a time this was the shit. Coming out of the '70s Straight Lines wasn't ashamed of the past, but it was embracing the future. The songs were tight, the Peter Clarke's vocals were really good and harmonies were on point and the guitar playing was that perfect mix of tasty with a bit of edge that gave the feeling if David Sinclair wanted to he could cut loose with the best of them. Listening now it would be easy to dismiss this as faceless corporate rock of the most generic variety. Which is not only unfair, it's plain wrong.  It may have been my mood but I was really getting into this one. It was really good. Most of the songs were mid tempo, but the band had a killer ballad with "Letting Go" which is probably their best known song, although personally I am partial...

A decade after Heart released  Little Queen , they dropped Bad Animals . To say they were back was a bit of an understatement, Heart was enjoying a career resurgence and were bigger than they'd ever been. Case in point, both albums went triple platinum in the States, while here at home Bad Animals would sell 400,000 copies doubling what they did on Little Queen. I had no idea at the time it was this big a deal. I knew "Alone" (from their self titled comeback in '85) was a huge power ballad, but honestly when I think of classic Heart albums, I don't think of Bad Animals . Time is a cruel mistress that way.  Now to be fair, I didn't have the classic albums when I was younger, although I did have  Passionworks  back in '83 because I liked the guitar solo on "How Can I Refuse?" a song that unfortunately stalled for the band. Of course I thought the big hits were cool, and "Barracuda" is right up there with my favourite songs growing up. Th...

I'm not sure why I filed Cock Robin away as rubbish. There was a bit of buzz when this was released in '85 and I'm sure I saw a video on MuchMusic but honestly have no memory at all. I do though remember watching The Tonight Show that year when they were the musical guest and wasn't impressed, but somehow I can remember they were on the show. The other day I figured it was a good day to go visit Krazy Bob and see what treasures he'd seeded his discount bin with. Sometimes it's a cornucopia of sonic goodies, and other times it's like he decided it was time to dump all of his Hammond organ dance records. It was a banner day and I picked up a dozen records that were all in amazing shape. You guessed it among them was the debut release by Cock Robin. The band was centred on vocalists Peter Kingsbery and Anna LaCazio and they were supported by Clive Wright on guitar and Louis Molino III on drums, both of whom would be gone by the band's second album. This isn...