Rock Evolution – The History of Rock & Roll - 1984 - (page 198)

[Mancitydoogle]

Excellent introduction again OB1!

 

[Mancitydoogle]

We don’t get enough Country on these threads. I first heard this when she collaborated with Golden Smog on the b side of the rare cover of BW s ‘Mercy Now’

Rosanne Cash ‘SEVEN YEAR ACHE’

 

[threespires]

Didn't the BEF ask Mark E Smith to sing 'Solitare' for that album?

That's not the first time I've heard that but I didn't know that was the proposed song. It would have been entirely in keeping with rest of the album. Though given how mild mannered Martyn Ware and Ian Craig Marsh have always struck me I suspect they dodged a bullet there!

 

[Out on blue 6]

From The Lion's Mouth was possibly the album that Joy Division never made and in my opinion a fantastic piece of work. A real shame isn't wasn't big at the time

Singer Adrian Borland suffered with his mental health for many years and committed suicide in the 1999.
Would love to see this on the album thread

The Sound - Winning

 

[hallsteve62]

That's not the first time I've heard that but I didn't know that was the proposed song. It would have been entirely in keeping with rest of the album. Though given how mild mannered Martyn Ware and Ian Craig Marsh have always struck me I suspect they dodged a bullet there!

It's mentioned by Smith in the lyric of the song 'Tempo House' on the 'Perverted By Language' album.

 

[homerdog]

Some great songs that I would have picked have already been highlighted, so I guess that makes it easier for me to pick some slightly lesser known favourites of mine from '81.

I spent most of the first half of the year in the Far East and one of the major benefits was being able to buy pirate copies of albums in Singapore for the equivalent of about 40 pence - manna from heaven for a 17 year old! This meant that I arrived home later that year with a very heavy suitcase, full of about 200 cassettes, and a greatly expanded musical repertoire!

Quarterflash eventually reached number 3 in the US with this song, with the great vocals and sax courtesy of Rindy Ross:
Harden My Heart.

 

[homerdog]

The staccato, funk-tinged, riff, gated snare drum and chanting lyrics drive along Billy Squier's The Stroke. The distinctive 'clapping' sound was achieved by running the tape backwards and applying a reverb effect to the snare drum - who knew?!

The song is a thinly veiled dig at those "stoking the star maker machinery", who are only interested in exploiting musical artists for their own gain. It's a sad reflection on the business that the music industry today is ten times worse now than it was then!

 

[Black&White&BlueMoon Town]

Some great songs that I would have picked have already been highlighted, so I guess that makes it easier for me to pick some slightly lesser known favourites of mine from '81.

I spent most of the first half of the year in the Far East and one of the major benefits was being able to buy pirate copies of albums in Singapore for the equivalent of about 40 pence - manna from heaven for a 17 year old! This meant that I arrived home later that year with a very heavy suitcase, full of about 200 cassettes, and a greatly expanded musical repertoire!

Quarterflash eventually reached number 3 in the US with this song, with the great vocals and sax courtesy of Rindy Ross:
Harden My Heart.

That is a great story on music collecting back then, and an even better song selection.

The vocals are beyond great and the sax is amazing on that song. Interesting that the the song was originally recorded by the Oregon band as Seafood Mama the year prior before they merged with (US band) Pilot to record this song as this new artist. Hard to top that one.

Well done, as it was soon on my list, but I think I'll just stay in Canada for my next one.

 

[Black&White&BlueMoon Town]

Putting this out there so I can claim it, my writeup will be coming later today after work.
Shocked I still have it after OB1's initial songs!

Lunatic Fringe - Red Ryder

This song at the time of its release sounded so unique, it was pretty iconic and a favourite as middle school was ending and high school was beginning. The guitar on this song from writer Tom Cochrane really made it, and had my friends and I singing along at the time, and the words in listening to it now could even apply to today.

The backstory on this is pretty interesting too. Cochrane wrote the song after becoming concerned about a resurgence of anti-Semitism in the 1970s. He was inspired after reading a book about Raoul Wallenberg, who rescued Jews from The Holocaust during World War II.

Some thought this song was written in reference to the murder of John Lennon the previous December, but Cochrane had already written the song before then. He and the band actually recorded the song's first demo the evening of the murder. Cochrane stated that his feelings about the event made him even more determined to release the song as a single even though his record label didn't think it was commercial enough. The rest is history as it has since been featured numerous times in movies and TV shows.

 

[MCFCTrick]

Loved that OB1, especially the full stories of your young American adventure. Happy daze indeed. (and how are the Roberts brothers doing nowadays?)

1981 had so much great music and you covered so much of it there. I still rate Fire as BÖC's finest in a long time.

For me there was one stand out band of that year ... Japan.

I'd followed them since earliest days, but they blew me away with the Tin Drum album, and love that you included Canton in your playlist.
An instrumental, which showcases the great Mick Karn's fretless bass perfectly.

 

[mancity111]

I'm not sure what I have added is the correct version but it is all that came up.

I have heard this version from Lee Warne but the original I can only find on you tube but it may be on spotify.

This version is acoustic only , IMO it doesn't do the original justice by any stretch.

If nothing else if you get the time if you haven't heard the song before you tube it.

 

[BimboBob]

Loved that OB1, especially the full stories of your young American adventure. Happy daze indeed. (and how are the Roberts brothers doing nowadays?)

1981 had so much great music and you covered so much of it there. I still rate Fire as BÖC's finest in a long time.

For me there was one stand out band of that year ... Japan.

I'd followed them since earliest days, but they blew me away with the Tin Drum album, and love that you included Canton in your playlist.
An instrumental, which showcases the great Mick Karn's fretless bass perfectly.

That was me. We add our favourite songs from the year, maximum of 4. Join in.

 

[threespires]

In the previous years playlist there was some discussion about what would have happened to Joy Division had Ian Curtis not died. New Order's first single actually points the way quite well because in effect it's a Joy Division song in all but name. JD had written and performed Ceremony prior to Curtis's death and they were convinced it was going to be a commercial breakthrough once it was recorded but that was not to be at least as JD. The others having decided to continue, Bernard Summer found himself in the position of needing to decipher the lyrics from the vocals of a couple of ropey live recordings they'd got (including the one on Still) because Ian Curtis hadn't actually transcribed them prior to his death.

The standalone single was well received and it pointed the way to increased success but then fans and critics were thrown off by the subsequent first New Order album Movement. Which was not as confident and it wasn't until another separate single in 1982 that it became clear they would come through the transition as a bigger band. Despite Movement's patchy reputation as an album I love it not so much because of it's quality, though imo there's plenty to like, but as a snapshot of a moment in time. People talk about 'transitional' albums but rarely can there have been one where the struggle of that transition is so obvious and audible. The album reminds me of one of those scenes from movies where the protagonist turns into a werewolf or some other creature. You have close ups of individual features or muscles as they painfully mutate back and forth between the old and the new before settling into their new form except here you don't get the final form yet. The mix of tracks and even passages within individual songs are like that but the album doesn't end with any resolution; it feels like an enjoyable but slightly tortured work in progress.

So we have an album which is bookended by two separate singles. The first, though not in name, a glorious and perhaps surprisingly uplifting end to Joy Division and the latter a definitive statement of New Order's new identity. In between them Movement stands as a document of lives in transition. Anyway enough gibber.

New Order - Ceremony

It's one of those songs with a complicated version history. There's three versions and the third version is the 'best' but doesn't capture the vulnerability and uncertainty of the original(s). They all have their virtues so unless someone has a strong opinion @OB1 just pick whichever you want.

 

[Saddleworth2]

I'm going to go mainly with singles this year. I think I had max two of the top 100 albums that year. I was in the young family no money stage of my life and albums were for Christmas and Birthday presents only.

These were probably my favourites/the least bad I can think off. I would have chosen 'Don't stop believing' solely for its use in the greatest close out scene of the greatest TV series ever made but its already been chosen. I tried listening to 1980 but suffered a repetitive strain injury of my finger hitting the fast forward far too many times.

Human League - Don't you want me
Start me up - The Stones
Ghost Town - The Specials
It must be love - Madness

 

[OB1]

Some great songs that I would have picked have already been highlighted, so I guess that makes it easier for me to pick some slightly lesser known favourites of mine from '81.

I spent most of the first half of the year in the Far East and one of the major benefits was being able to buy pirate copies of albums in Singapore for the equivalent of about 40 pence - manna from heaven for a 17 year old! This meant that I arrived home later that year with a very heavy suitcase, full of about 200 cassettes, and a greatly expanded musical repertoire!

Quarterflash eventually reached number 3 in the US with this song, with the great vocals and sax courtesy of Rindy Ross:
Harden My Heart.

Good song. I bought the album in ‘81 and the cd at some later point.

 

[OB1]

The staccato, funk-tinged, riff, gated snare drum and chanting lyrics drive along Billy Squier's The Stroke. The distinctive 'clapping' sound was achieved by running the tape backwards and applying a reverb effect to the snare drum - who knew?!

The song is a thinly veiled dig at those "stoking the star maker machinery", who are only interested in exploiting musical artists for their own gain. It's a sad reflection on the business that the music industry today is ten times worse now than it was then!

Another fine choice. I saw Billy in concert at a Pier in NY courtesy of Ross Halfin (and Pete Makowski) at the end of our US trip. He was supporting Pat Benatar. We bumped into Bob Kulick (of Balance and session fame incl. playing on at least one KISS album) there.

 

[OB1]

Loved that OB1, especially the full stories of your young American adventure. Happy daze indeed. (and how are the Roberts brothers doing nowadays?)

1981 had so much great music and you covered so much of it there. I still rate Fire as BÖC's finest in a long time.

For me there was one stand out band of that year ... Japan.

I'd followed them since earliest days, but they blew me away with the Tin Drum album, and love that you included Canton in your playlist.
An instrumental, which showcases the great Mick Karn's fretless bass perfectly.

@MCFCTrick

Thanks.

Steve’s a Hammer but he came to Napoli match with me because Our Kid was away. He’s still playing drums, in three bands - 2 covers bands and now one that does original material. Not seen Dave in ages as he moved out of London to a quiet place by the sea but he’s fine; last time we met was to see Greta Van Fleet (he had passes) and spent much of the time reminiscing about our US trip.

Agree about BOC, and I like the Japan album a lot.

Please feel free to suggest four tracks from 1981

 

[OB1]

I'm going to go mainly with singles this year. I think I had max two of the top 100 albums that year. I was in the young family no money stage of my life and albums were for Christmas and Birthday presents only.

These were probably my favourites/the least bad I can think off. I would have chosen 'Don't stop believing' solely for its use in the greatest close out scene of the greatest TV series ever made but its already been chosen. I tried listening to 1980 but suffered a repetitive strain injury of my finger hitting the fast forward far too many times.

Human League - Don't you want me
Start me up - The Stones
Ghost Town - The Specials
It must be love - Madness

Thank you. That’s four tracks that needed including.

The Stones just missed out on inclusion in the initial list.

 

[Protein Junkie]

@OB1 mentioning Photographer of rock royalty aka Ross Halfin (or “Halfwit” as Sounds called him”) is going to overtake @Mad Eyed Screamer mentioning Eggheads before too long.-:)

 

[threespires]

I previously described OB1's write up as 'nice', having read it a second time I'm embarrassed I used such a wholly inappropriate word for what is a staggeringly comprehensive description of the music landscape. Having already shot my bolt on my four choices there's a whole raft of artists and songs mentioned in it that are worthy of inclusion and that I hope people pick. In terms of additional thoughts to add I find myself picking through the crumbs from OB1s table but a few things spring to mind.

I'll get a couple of things off my chest first: I'm only the most casual of layman when it comes to Rush but Red Barchetta is my favourite track of theirs, so I was very happy to see that make the cut. On the flip side, if O'Brien were to tell me that Room 101 contains my 1981 musical hell and gave me a choice of Shaddupa your Face or Don't Stop Believin' I would take my chances with the former over the latter every time :-)) I'm not going to claim it's use in The Sopranos is anything other than completely iconic but even that's not enough for it to be rescued in my miserable bastard point of view.

Moving swiftly on, OB1 mentioned Difficult to Cure and I remember my longer haired school pals debating at excessively long length the merits of Joe Lynn Turner relative to Dio and Bonnet. I never ventured the opinion that I preferred Bonnet over both of the others because that was anti-Dio sacrilege. Though rather different in style, Difficult To Cure also had an endless final track like Penthouse and Pavement. What I was surprised by looking at the '81 album chart last night was that both Gillan and Whitesnake got higher in the charts than Rainbow that year albeit only #2 compared to #3.

Looking at the album charts made me notice one cultural phenomena of the time that hasn't been mentioned is Not The Nine O'Clock News. Obviously much of it looks quite tame now but at the time it seemed pretty edgy. To distract kids from setting fire to shit at dinner times, one of the more savvy teachers would tape it and put it on at lunchtimes in one of the classrooms - it was always packed. They released two albums in 1981 both of which went into the top 10 which given that they were mostly spoken word was very impressive. They also off course had parody songs too, probably my favourite of which was There's a Man in Iran aka the Ayatollah song which contained the fantastic lyric " don't Khomeini any closer or I'll fall for your charms". I think I read somewhere that this was where Stephenson first met Connolly as he was playing the Ayatollah in the sketch.

Songs/Artists not mentioned but worthy imo include three or four tracks off Pretenders II; One in Ten by UB40; Radio Free Europe which got REM off and running (I notice they released a 'new' version of it earlier this year in response to the cut in funding of said service); Spellbound by Siouxsie; I know a lot of people were done with The Undertones by this point but I like It's Going To Happen; Reward by Teardrop Explodes was another big hit. Though not really my cup of tea and yet to make it big, Level 42 had their debut album this year. Though I was some way away from discovering them at this point, Penguin Cafe Orchestra released their second album which was the first of theirs I purchased and one which if you're prepared to surrender to the eccentricity can be a real 'happy place' record.

Meanwhile on the folk front there was also an enjoyably curious solo album from Richard Thompson released prior to the following years herculean final effort with Linda. Strict Tempo is an instrumental album (subtitled Traditional and Modern Music for All Occasions) and if you're a fan of the occasional Polka or Hornpipe it's a thoroughly enjoyable though commercially suicidal record. I wonder how many times in music history record company execs have despaired at a sentence from an artist that starts "listen, I've had this idea..."

I realise I've probably blown my chance of any leeway after my Journey comment but were MC-OB1 to allow me to have Luther Vandross as a free historical pick for the benefit of the thread story :-) then I'd probably go with Funeral Pyre by the Jam as my final pick.