Crimson's 'Beat' is an interesting case because its the lesser of the 80's trilogy but probably has some of the best material they made around that time! Requirem, Neurotica and the amazing Neal and Jack and Me, never gets old!
I get so happy when there's a new episode in this podcast. The music nerd podcast for the music nerd (while admittedly quite UK-centric, I'm fine with that!)
I was working in a record store when "Do you dream in colour" came out and Bill Nelson came in with the record company rep. He was really, really shy and I was a bit over the top in professing my love for him and I think I scared him
The concept of the podcast and the podcast itself are outstanding - accomplished musicians with incredible knowledge who love music talking passionately and plainly about a variety of albums. The exchanges between Its Hard and Chinese Eyes were my fave bits, so much so that replayed it several times. I love The Album Years.
Diamonds are forever..in this list..one by one... Peter Hammill shines as a musical genius, and his fixed value remains unchanged... He's an inexhaustible source of inspiration and experimentation..as I'll have the happiness to find out firsthand in a little while.. Thank you one more time, Tim and Steven.. You are my best cawboys..even if you haven't..Chinese eyes!!👍🙏😌💎📀♦️🎹💎🎸♦️💕💕🌬🌊🎶
Great job on digging up interesting stuff left between the cracks, especially that Roy Harper, which I never knew was worth checking out. So far so nice. Another album that could fit in this category, or innovative pop, is Nina Hagen's third album since 1978, Nunsexmonkrock, which mixes in some Neue Deutsche Welle and Space-Disco with the Art Punk.
Steven is spot on about the title of “It’s Hard”.I remember a photo in the NME of Pete T with a hand just enough in the vicinity for the caption to read “just because it’s hard doesn’t mean you have to play with it Pete”. Laughed my head off at the time but this shows that Pete not only saved the best songs for his solo album but the best titles too.
“Neal and Jack and Me” is a wonderful track. Out of the 3 80’s albums Beat was the least impressive for me but still contains enough flavor and melody to shine through. I wanted a Bill Bruford drum kit😊
Robert Wyatt's 82 album Nothing Can Stop Us is a collection of covers inc Chic's At Last I Am Free, and a lovely version of Fruit Tree. Anything with Robert's voice on is always worth hearing.
Well, it took me a while, but I finally found it! You mentioned it (unnamed), in a Cure album review. I hadn't looked at that video because I don't like goth music. If this was a ploy to get me to look at other videos, then bravo sir, well played, but rest assured that I will not put up with such shenanigans in future!😂
Back when I was young, around 1970 there was a billboard advertising a local radio station. It showed The Beatles in their “fab four” look, in their Sgt. Pepper garb, and their look in their then current Let It Be period. The caption of the advertisement was “If you don’t change with the times the times change without you.” Something I always remembered.
King Crimson's Beat (the trilogy is my fave KC era), Donald Fagen - The Night Fly and The Who's It's Hard, 3 big favourites there. Eminence Front is indeed a killer track from the latter. As usual I learned about some albums I'm less familiar with too; more to check out. Thanks again chaps for the musical podcast highlight of my week!
Ditto re It's Hard - I'm a big fan of Empty Glass but I have never checked out "All The Best Cowboys ..." Thats that on the top of my list of things to do then.
I subscribe to Steven's observation about the bad taste in the sound of electric jazz players in the 80s. And yet, I much prefer a distorted fender rhodes to a DX7, but over time I've come to appreciate that glassy sound...at least in some corny ballads, not in free improvisation.
@@bonzoboots I think Roger refused to sing it because it’s so personal to Pete.What a track,one of the few rock star whinges that really lands emotionally.And the guitars are sublime.
I'm partial to Beat I suppose, because the first time I saw Crimson was Beat tour at the Greek Theatre in Berkeley '82, sixth row center. Mind blown! Saw Three of a Perfect Pair tour as well in '84, same venue, back a little further. Incredible again.
I don’t often agree with you guys 100% (what would be the fun in that?) but, Steven, you’re spot on with the Who/Townshed review. Exactly what I was saying in ‘82, he’s clearly saving his best stuff for himself! Also thanks for remembering “Trans”, I still listen to it especially “Sample and Hold”!
Love It's Hard and Chinese Eyes. One area where The Who album is stronger than the solo album is that there is nothing as heavy-duty on Chinese Eyes as the epic tracks I've Known No War and Cry If You Want.
The thing with Neil Young's Trans was that it was inspired more by Devo than by Kraftwerk - he had them do tracks on one of his films at the time (forget which) but between this and their 10 minute version of Hey Hey My My, it really opened up an avenue I wish he explored more of as the music really was phenomenal.
PH Enter K is a mixed bag, but I think "Accidents" is not getting enough credit for being an absolutely ravaging early industrial song. One of my all time Fav PH songs.
@@bowness1 But there's also The Unconscious Life and She Wraps It Up... The more you look at it, the better it gets. And I remember when it came out, I was really shocked at how paired down it was. I told Peter about that in an interview I did with him a few years later and he said "it was the period of 'let there be no guitars'." That was true-synths and heavy production values were so dominant. There were also no bam-boom drums on Enter K and the effects were liminal by comparison. I was blown away at how he'd stripped things down after Sitting Targets-it was clearly a contrarian strategy. A friend in the band I was living with said Enter K almost sounded like demos-that's how different the mainstream trajectory was then.
The 50s nostalgia in Steely Dan's music existed side-by-side with a sometimes dark cynicism. I think lots of people assumed the cynicism came mostly from Fagen, maybe because he seemed to be scowling all the time. But The Nightfly revealed Fagen as the golly-gee-wiz, Leave It To Beaver half of the duo. The source of the cynicism was mostly Becker.
Totally concur with both of you with Townhend's "ATBCHCE". A masterpiece and in my Top 10 albums of all time. I have a soft spot for "It's Hard" (pun intended), and "Eminence Front" is still played at WHO shows and deservedly so. Interesting fact that The WHO did record a version of "Somebody Saved Me" which was added to the 1997 re-release of "Face Dances" on CD.
1983 - 1985 were good Years for Neo-Prog. Ozric Tentacles 1983, Pendragon 1985, IQ (formally The Lens) 1985 The Darkest Hour and The Human Stain by German Proggers Crystal Palace. Reset Album. Excellent if you like PP.
Well.. for sure Townsend has always had a sensibility far removed from the 1970s hard rock aesthetic. So, dropped certain theatrical trappings, he remained a great songwriter.
@@davidlaw689 I might have to disagree as there were weak tracks on both PT's Empty Glass and Chinese Eyes albums. I thought both The Who albums were pretty good despite the weak spots and Face Dances suffered having that American Eagles producer Szymczyk, who was completely wrong for The Who. I think both sets of albums averaged each other out.
The B52s didn't come back with Love shack at all, that was years later. They made an analog synth heavy album called Whammy! which was fantastic and much earthier than the byrne produced one (which I also love). I think Whammy was a great album and very underrated.
That 80s electronic sound tended to work in the pop playfield for me but not on rock or prog rock albums of that time. I occasionally cringe when I hear (even then) that synth/electronic/programmed sound used by prog rock and rock bands. I loved electronic music of the time but not across all genres at the time. I do like that darker tone on Eno's AMBIENT 4: ON LAND. All the power to musicians for stepping out of their musical box as Neil Young did on TRANS, as long as they do it with passion. Interesting music chat today - enjoyed with a big tasty cup of organic fair trade coffee! Thank you, gentlemen!
To me beat is kind of a lesser version of discipline with some mastepieces and some less memorable tracks but not awful .. neal has the energy and polymeters complexity of songs like frame by frame heartbeat is a balad in the same vain as matte kudasai although a bit simpler but still lovely if you ask me neurotica is exctatic downtown New York like thela hun ginjeet - sorry for all the misspelled - so its less memorable and original than discipline but still really interesting .. probably because as they said in interviews they rushed to maie a second album quickly because their gig was only 45 minutes and they needed new material soon
Moving with the times was a bit of a non-sequitur in 1982 because it was right in the middle of New Wave and punk music which only lasted until about 1985. Nik Kershaw was about the last of them before Madonna took the power back and reclaimed the mainstream. Hard rock had a holiday as well, before Gary Moore and SRV came back in the latter half of the 80s.
The Blurred Crusade came out in '82. The Church were always The Church and never really copied anyone, nor did they fit into any one genre or style of music.
The only way to hear music in the 80's in the UK other than through access to bought albums or singles was through TV and radio and most of that came though the BBC. A BBC executive sent out an edict saying not to book punk and new wave acts. This was after what we now think of as their heyday. There was an excuse about them being visually boring which is clearly nonsense and the reality seems to be that he felt uneasy about having them around. This resulted in the BBC booking acts that were not particularly talented and record deals being offered based on what would sell and could be broadcast regardless of the music. Not long before Gary Newman had had hits with a synth and style that seemed to not fit anywhere but was widely admired and initiated. Many less innovative people decided to try making music with synths and drum machines. This all led to the acts that became famous in the UK either with or without synth from the human league to non threatening duran Duran being marketed to school age kids and newspapers running entertainment sections in cahoots with agents to concoct stories with pictures... Leaving nightclubs in the early hours etc etc. So hundreds of excellent bands and solo artists were not widely heard in Britain or rarely played out of bedrooms. Some previous acts trying to keep up with the times were adding synths and 80's production values etc and not being themselves. It was only when guitar bands came back in the late 80's and 90's who were influenced by 60's and 70's music and didn't like all the manufactured bands of the 80's that the older music acts could go back to being themselves and become just as popular. The 80's were not so much new times as a return to the 50's where certain clean cut acts might be booked but wilder rock and roll acts were not.
LOL, Steven. Early Marillion fans = 'Metal Boneheads'. 👍 Re: Sparks becoming a 'new wave pop band', weren't they ALWAYS a new wave pop band? Re: Steven not appreciating Donald Fagan or Steely Dan, some might say it's because Steven doesn't have a jazzy bone in his body. And I'm a huge fan of his solo work and especially Porcupine Tree, but there's just such a jazzy undercurrent to Fagan and SD's music that without that appreciation I can see how it comes off sterile and over-produced.
And that amazes me, too. Surely, he must have heard tracks such as "Bodhisattva" or "Black Friday" and umpteen others and thought "Wow!". I just don't get how he who could've missed that.
I don't know - I just listened to "The Sea Refuses No River," which I didn't know, and it sounds just like Springsteen sung by Townshend- pretty much everything about the structure and instrumentation. Disappointing to these ears
Avalon is transcendent. I saw them on this tour in Santa Barbara with the Stranglers opening (feline tour). That was 1983. In 2024, it is still an album i find a “chandelier” of an album.
@@apollomemories7399 its bland and boring, I used to have to endure listening to those albums often when I worked in a record/CD shop as one of my colleagues loved them, I never understood the draw to them, I like what Steve Albini said about them, “Music made for the sole purpose of letting the wedding band stretch out a little.”
@@sspbrazil Steve Albini? He of the most wanton compression values in the entire history of record production? A fraudulant hipster spent force and now almost erased from musical history. He talked a load of baloney. He absolutely ruined that Page & Plant album. Perhaps if your shop had had a decent hi-fi then you might have enjoyed an enirely different listening experience. Oh and by the way, Jimmy Page loved them and he sure did know about "stretching out", but he also knew a brilliant guitar solo when he heard one and they came through in spades on all SD albums. Re-visit, re-listen, re-learn.
@@apollomemories7399 we had an excellent system in the shop, it had zero to do with the system, I’ve had to hear Steely Dan all sorts of situations and high end systems through my life, you can have all the opinions you want about Steely Dan, but for me they are band that looks great on paper, but in practice, they are booooooring. All that self masturbatory musicianship produces a bland result. There are two songs I can listen to by them at this point of my 57 years on this planet, one is Peg and the other is Dirty Work, beyond that, I agree with Steven Wilson, their albums sound like what they are, a bunch of session musicians creating music for elevators. Another band that comes to mind like Steely Dan is TOTO. A band that looks fantastic on paper, but has made some of the most bland pop music ever. As far as Albini goes, I can’t think of another producer that was more authentic and cared more about bands and his craft than Albini, so much so that he didn’t even liked to be called a producer and he refused to take Producer points on albums he recorded, he wanted that revenue to go to the bands, he always regarded himself as an Audio Engineer and he was a great one at that, his drum sound alone is a testament to his work. Albini hated compression and with good reason, he was recording albums during the beginning of the loudness wars and compression ruined the nuance of so many albums because of that, in fact he once said this about compression, “I want to find the guy that invented compression and tear his liver out. I hate it. It makes everything sound like a beer commercial.” Albini is not erased from the history of music because he passed, his work still stands and he will be remembered as one of the most dedicated and respected people in the music industry by many bands and music fans alike, not by you obviously, so just stick to your overproduced produced Steely Dan, but I won’t. Never been a big fan of Jimmy Page either, so his live for Steely Dan doesn’t really have any value to me. Jimmy was great in the studio and doubling guitar parts in recordings, but he’s one of the sloppiest guitar players I’ve ever seen live, almost unlistenable, and what about that performance at Live Aid where he was so strung out he was drooling? Steely Dan could stretch out alright, for extended naps.
@@sspbrazil OK, so you kissed Albinii's ass. I didn't rate him at all. Nor could I care less for his pseudo-altruism, as he would in fact have had a grand cheek to call himself a "producer" anyway. He only got elevated into the inner-circle of the likes of Jimmy Page as some kind of marketing push by the record label looking to promote the lastest hipster "grunge" guy, like anyone cared. He's just another in a long list of so-whats along the likes of Rick Rubin and Nigel Godrich. It's all front, smoke and mirrors. And there you go, bringing up Live Aid like a total Normie. You should know that Page's guitar roadie was not present and the dweeb that was handling his guitar had dropped it, banging it out of tune and then summarily handed it to Page. You can visibly see Page trying to strangle the damn thing into some semblance of tuning with his exaggerated playing style employed to try and rescue the situation. For you, as some sort of self-appointed opinionated wannabe, you should bloody well know this and be ashamed of yourself. And you being only 57, catagorically means you never ever even got close to seeing Led Zeppelin live. So don't mke me laugh. I'm 65 and first saw LZ in Glasgow, Scotland in December 1972, aged 13. I saw them again at Earls Court, London in 1975 and at Knebworth in 1979 in front of 225,000. You haven't got a clue. I don't think you'd recognise a decent guitar player even if Albini rammed them into you. And as for TOTO? Spare me. You immediately give away your all-american boy credentials immediately. But, at least you dodn't mention Kiss, like 99% of your other countrymen dragged up on a musical diet of drek. I'm really struggling to fatham what on earth looks "good on paper" regards these total tossers. But, I'm sure you'll be able to tell me. And I really don't think that Peg is perhaps the utmost choice in all things Dan. There are other more adventurously exciting or cool tracks such as Bodhisattva, King Of The World, Third World Man and even ouutakes such as Kind Spirit, Were You Blind That Day and The Bear. It needn't always be ten to the dozen blistering rock drenched in guitar solos and heavy drums, man. Besides, Albini would have given both ears to work with the likes of SD, but he came too late and only got to work most of all with second-rate scuzz that today, nobody remembers or gives a toss for.
Thought SW was a bit hurriedly dismissive of Cale’s MFANS. It’s a dark, harrowing listen infected with a deep despair. His complaint about “synths” seemed especially lazy. It’s largely acoustic guitars, strings and piano with (I seem to recall) Cale trying to capture the songs in one take. TB’s right with this. It is one of Cale’s best. I think SW doesn’t like the Welsh. 😂
Crimson's 'Beat' is an interesting case because its the lesser of the 80's trilogy but probably has some of the best material they made around that time! Requirem, Neurotica and the amazing Neal and Jack and Me, never gets old!
I get so happy when there's a new episode in this podcast. The music nerd podcast for the music nerd (while admittedly quite UK-centric, I'm fine with that!)
Gotta love having the research assistant there when needed!
love all the Hammill coverage
My favourite John Cale album is Fear. Absolutely fantastic!
I was working in a record store when "Do you dream in colour" came out and Bill Nelson came in with the record company rep. He was really, really shy and I was a bit over the top in professing my love for him and I think I scared him
The concept of the podcast and the podcast itself are outstanding - accomplished musicians with incredible knowledge who love music talking passionately and plainly about a variety of albums. The exchanges between Its Hard and Chinese Eyes were my fave bits, so much so that replayed it several times. I love The Album Years.
Diamonds are forever..in this list..one by one...
Peter Hammill shines as a musical genius, and his fixed value remains unchanged...
He's an inexhaustible source of inspiration and experimentation..as I'll have the happiness to find out firsthand in a little while..
Thank you one more time, Tim and Steven..
You are my best cawboys..even if you haven't..Chinese eyes!!👍🙏😌💎📀♦️🎹💎🎸♦️💕💕🌬🌊🎶
Great job on digging up interesting stuff left between the cracks, especially that Roy Harper, which I never knew was worth checking out. So far so nice. Another album that could fit in this category, or innovative pop, is Nina Hagen's third album since 1978, Nunsexmonkrock, which mixes in some Neue Deutsche Welle and Space-Disco with the Art Punk.
OMD! Loved it! And so articulate you are. You sure know the right word when you happen to need it! Love this podcast. Please keep 'em coming!!!
I love the Roy Harper mentions in some of these videos. He's such an underrated musician.
and he's way, way ahead of many. I own every note he's ever recorded.
Bill Nelson, master of the E-bow, was on Jukebox Jury at the time, showing off a radical hair-do. 😆
Steven is spot on about the title of “It’s Hard”.I remember a photo in the NME of Pete T with a hand just enough in the vicinity for the caption to read “just because it’s hard doesn’t mean you have to play with it Pete”. Laughed my head off at the time but this shows that Pete not only saved the best songs for his solo album but the best titles too.
As a music geek love hearing other music geeks talking about my era of music
“Neal and Jack and Me” is a wonderful track. Out of the 3 80’s albums Beat was the least impressive for me but still contains enough flavor and melody to shine through.
I wanted a Bill Bruford drum kit😊
Robert Wyatt's 82 album Nothing Can Stop Us is a collection of covers inc Chic's At Last I Am Free, and a lovely version of Fruit Tree. Anything with Robert's voice on is always worth hearing.
That is an album we discuss in a 1982 episode.
Well, it took me a while, but I finally found it! You mentioned it (unnamed), in a Cure album review. I hadn't looked at that video because I don't like goth music. If this was a ploy to get me to look at other videos, then bravo sir, well played, but rest assured that I will not put up with such shenanigans in future!😂
@@punkfloyd-m9k Marvellous album.
Back when I was young, around 1970 there was a billboard advertising a local radio station. It showed The Beatles in their “fab four” look, in their Sgt. Pepper garb, and their look in their then current Let It Be period. The caption of the advertisement was “If you don’t change with the times the times change without you.” Something I always remembered.
Rob's here all week, guys.
King Crimson's Beat (the trilogy is my fave KC era), Donald Fagen - The Night Fly and The Who's It's Hard, 3 big favourites there. Eminence Front is indeed a killer track from the latter. As usual I learned about some albums I'm less familiar with too; more to check out. Thanks again chaps for the musical podcast highlight of my week!
love both “It’s Hard” and “All The Best “Cowboys Have Chinese Eyes”, I agree with Tim on “It’s Hard”.
And Empty Glass and Face Dances.
Ditto re It's Hard - I'm a big fan of Empty Glass but I have never checked out "All The Best Cowboys ..." Thats that on the top of my list of things to do then.
Love ""Enter K"! "The Unconscious Life" especially.
Broadsword and the Beast was a great album from 1982. For next week, hopefully.
Correct! And, yes, it could have been in this week's episode as it was quite a 'modern' departure for the band.
I subscribe to Steven's observation about the bad taste in the sound of electric jazz players in the 80s. And yet, I much prefer a distorted fender rhodes to a DX7, but over time I've come to appreciate that glassy sound...at least in some corny ballads, not in free improvisation.
@24:57 - one of Towshend's most autobiographical self-immolations was "However Much I Booze" was on Who By Numbers, but telling sung by Pete.
@@bonzoboots I think Roger refused to sing it because it’s so personal to Pete.What a track,one of the few rock star whinges that really lands emotionally.And the guitars are sublime.
Gabriel's Security is the lp of that year as far as i'm concerned, a masterpiece.
Indeed , it was brilliant , so was the tour that I attended a few times that year !
I'm partial to Beat I suppose, because the first time I saw Crimson was Beat tour at the Greek Theatre in Berkeley '82, sixth row center. Mind blown! Saw Three of a Perfect Pair tour as well in '84, same venue, back a little further. Incredible again.
Sparks need a lot more respect, especially from Steven Wilson (said respectfully!) 🙂
Angst In My Past is one of my favorite albums by them.
Hi Larry 🙋♂️
I don’t often agree with you guys 100% (what would be the fun in that?) but, Steven, you’re spot on with the Who/Townshed review. Exactly what I was saying in ‘82, he’s clearly saving his best stuff for himself! Also thanks for remembering “Trans”, I still listen to it especially “Sample and Hold”!
Steven is so resolute today,nice.
Would love a Steven Wilson/Bill Nelson collaboration wow
Love It's Hard and Chinese Eyes. One area where The Who album is stronger than the solo album is that there is nothing as heavy-duty on Chinese Eyes as the epic tracks I've Known No War and Cry If You Want.
Didn't Cardiacs legendarily get similar treatment from Marillion's audience, with Fish again telling them to listen.
Probably, as Marillion fans are generally a bunch of mongoloids
I'm convinced one day Peter Hammill will pull the wrong piece of paper out of his pocket and end up putting his shopping list to music
Transformer man is one of the greatest songs of all time. It is heartbreaking if you know the backstory of it while also being musically hilarious.
Shots fired 🔥🚒 video thumbnail accurately captures the theme of this one.🎉😅. Clearly music is not just music.
The thing with Neil Young's Trans was that it was inspired more by Devo than by Kraftwerk - he had them do tracks on one of his films at the time (forget which) but between this and their 10 minute version of Hey Hey My My, it really opened up an avenue I wish he explored more of as the music really was phenomenal.
Grace under pressure: I saw a video of John Waite doing a gig a few years ago where he got a lot of pretty awful heckling.
Toyah's Angels and Demons came out around this Year. 7min Prog. track. Must have played it 100's of times. One to put in a Prog. Playlist.
Even MORE 1982? Awesome!! Or was it Dece (short for decent) back then?!!!
Excellent stuff, even though I've not heard nearly everything here. My favourite is Eno: Ambient 4, such an important album in my life.
we won't ask why
PH Enter K is a mixed bag, but I think "Accidents" is not getting enough credit for being an absolutely ravaging early industrial song. One of my all time Fav PH songs.
That and Don't Tell Me are my two Enter K favourites. Both brilliant live too.
@@bowness1 But there's also The Unconscious Life and She Wraps It Up... The more you look at it, the better it gets. And I remember when it came out, I was really shocked at how paired down it was. I told Peter about that in an interview I did with him a few years later and he said "it was the period of 'let there be no guitars'." That was true-synths and heavy production values were so dominant. There were also no bam-boom drums on Enter K and the effects were liminal by comparison. I was blown away at how he'd stripped things down after Sitting Targets-it was clearly a contrarian strategy. A friend in the band I was living with said Enter K almost sounded like demos-that's how different the mainstream trajectory was then.
"There was always a slight nostalgia in Steely Dan and almost reclaiming this sort of fifties coldwar era..."
The 50s nostalgia in Steely Dan's music existed side-by-side with a sometimes dark cynicism. I think lots of people assumed the cynicism came mostly from Fagen, maybe because he seemed to be scowling all the time. But The Nightfly revealed Fagen as the golly-gee-wiz, Leave It To Beaver half of the duo. The source of the cynicism was mostly Becker.
Howz that? Fagen wrote all the lyrics
Totally concur with both of you with Townhend's "ATBCHCE". A masterpiece and in my Top 10 albums of all time. I have a soft spot for "It's Hard" (pun intended), and "Eminence Front" is still played at WHO shows and deservedly so. Interesting fact that The WHO did record a version of "Somebody Saved Me" which was added to the 1997 re-release of "Face Dances" on CD.
Although that Who version of Somebody.. did have PT on vocals. The Who also recorded "Dance It Away", but it's still unreleased.
Work of Heart is an underrated Roy Harper album.
Re saxophone: Careless Whisper was 1984, Mr Wilson 😉
Love your channel, please sort out the lighting. Daisy X
I would have thought Signals by Rush may have been mentioned on this episode as it was hugely influenced by the sounds of that time.
Yes, it could have been in this week's episode as it was quite a 'modern' departure for the band. It is discussed in one of the 1982 episodes.
@@bowness1 I didn't realise it had been discussed in one of the other episodes. Which one was it?
@@mikes-ev8gx It might be the one that will be live next week (which focuses on Prog releases from 1982).
1983 - 1985 were good Years for Neo-Prog.
Ozric Tentacles 1983, Pendragon 1985, IQ (formally The Lens) 1985
The Darkest Hour and The Human Stain by German Proggers Crystal Palace. Reset Album. Excellent if you like PP.
The Its Hard alb cover reads like the anti-pinball wizard
Paradox Drive: Talking Hammills? Peter Heads?
Pete Townshend's early to mid 80s solo output was lightyears ahead anything The Who put out in the same time period.
except Quadrophenia. Or do you mean anything The Who put out in early 80s only?
Well.. for sure Townsend has always had a sensibility far removed from the 1970s hard rock aesthetic. So, dropped certain theatrical trappings, he remained a great songwriter.
@@apollomemories7399 The Who’s 80s catalogue only.
@@davidlaw689 I might have to disagree as there were weak tracks on both PT's Empty Glass and Chinese Eyes albums. I thought both The Who albums were pretty good despite the weak spots and Face Dances suffered having that American Eagles producer Szymczyk, who was completely wrong for The Who. I think both sets of albums averaged each other out.
😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂
The B52s didn't come back with Love shack at all, that was years later. They made an analog synth heavy album called Whammy! which was fantastic and much earthier than the byrne produced one (which I also love). I think Whammy was a great album and very underrated.
Indeed. Tim is making it up as he goes along. He probably reads Wikipedia on each album to be discussed, just before they hit record.
New admirer of the channel. I could listen to you guys talk about albums all day!
yeah but u shouldnt believe any more than about 20% of the info they dish out.
All the best cowboys is a perfect Lp imho.
except that ludicrous title.
@@apollomemories7399 ludicrous it may be but boring it ain’t.
On land is one Eno's best.
Stev-o Is so wrong about Beat! 😂😂 Nonesense!
Also i absolutelly love Neil Young's Trans
Yes Tim. Tell me more.
That 80s electronic sound tended to work in the pop playfield for me but not on rock or prog rock albums of that time. I occasionally cringe when I hear (even then) that synth/electronic/programmed sound used by prog rock and rock bands. I loved electronic music of the time but not across all genres at the time. I do like that darker tone on Eno's AMBIENT 4: ON LAND. All the power to musicians for stepping out of their musical box as Neil Young did on TRANS, as long as they do it with passion. Interesting music chat today - enjoyed with a big tasty cup of organic fair trade coffee! Thank you, gentlemen!
It's Hard: Eminence Front is the stand out song. But Cry if You Want is great. As is Anthena. The rest of it is low grade Who.
I want a t-shirt like yours Steven but there is none in stock.
To me beat is kind of a lesser version of discipline with some mastepieces and some less memorable tracks but not awful .. neal has the energy and polymeters complexity of songs like frame by frame heartbeat is a balad in the same vain as matte kudasai although a bit simpler but still lovely if you ask me neurotica is exctatic downtown New York like thela hun ginjeet - sorry for all the misspelled - so its less memorable and original than discipline but still really interesting .. probably because as they said in interviews they rushed to maie a second album quickly because their gig was only 45 minutes and they needed new material soon
Trans is such an incredible album , so misunderstood and not respected for the amazing record it actually is.
Moving with the times was a bit of a non-sequitur in 1982 because it was right in the middle of New Wave and punk music which only lasted until about 1985. Nik Kershaw was about the last of them before Madonna took the power back and reclaimed the mainstream. Hard rock had a holiday as well, before Gary Moore and SRV came back in the latter half of the 80s.
The Blurred Crusade came out in '82. The Church were always The Church and never really copied anyone, nor did they fit into any one genre or style of music.
In 1982 didn't exist Yamaha DX7
The only way to hear music in the 80's in the UK other than through access to bought albums or singles was through TV and radio and most of that came though the BBC. A BBC executive sent out an edict saying not to book punk and new wave acts. This was after what we now think of as their heyday. There was an excuse about them being visually boring which is clearly nonsense and the reality seems to be that he felt uneasy about having them around.
This resulted in the BBC booking acts that were not particularly talented and record deals being offered based on what would sell and could be broadcast regardless of the music.
Not long before Gary Newman had had hits with a synth and style that seemed to not fit anywhere but was widely admired and initiated.
Many less innovative people decided to try making music with synths and drum machines.
This all led to the acts that became famous in the UK either with or without synth from the human league to non threatening duran Duran being marketed to school age kids and newspapers running entertainment sections in cahoots with agents to concoct stories with pictures... Leaving nightclubs in the early hours etc etc.
So hundreds of excellent bands and solo artists were not widely heard in Britain or rarely played out of bedrooms.
Some previous acts trying to keep up with the times were adding synths and 80's production values etc and not being themselves.
It was only when guitar bands came back in the late 80's and 90's who were influenced by 60's and 70's music and didn't like all the manufactured bands of the 80's that the older music acts could go back to being themselves and become just as popular.
The 80's were not so much new times as a return to the 50's where certain clean cut acts might be booked but wilder rock and roll acts were not.
LOL, Steven. Early Marillion fans = 'Metal Boneheads'. 👍 Re: Sparks becoming a 'new wave pop band', weren't they ALWAYS a new wave pop band? Re: Steven not appreciating Donald Fagan or Steely Dan, some might say it's because Steven doesn't have a jazzy bone in his body. And I'm a huge fan of his solo work and especially Porcupine Tree, but there's just such a jazzy undercurrent to Fagan and SD's music that without that appreciation I can see how it comes off sterile and over-produced.
And that amazes me, too. Surely, he must have heard tracks such as "Bodhisattva" or "Black Friday" and umpteen others and thought "Wow!". I just don't get how he who could've missed that.
I don't know - I just listened to "The Sea Refuses No River," which I didn't know, and it sounds just like Springsteen sung by Townshend- pretty much everything about the structure and instrumentation. Disappointing to these ears
The Nightfly - album of the year. Even over The Dreaming, Nebraska, Avalon, Combat Rock...
Avalon is transcendent. I saw them on this tour in Santa Barbara with the Stranglers opening (feline tour). That was 1983. In 2024, it is still an album i find a “chandelier” of an album.
Don't love the Hamm.
A matter of taste, obviously. He´s polarizing. I think he´s the most brilliant songwriter in pop/rock, by far.
I agree with Steven on Steely Dan, great musicians, but bland music.
Bland? It's anything but "bland".
@@apollomemories7399 its bland and boring, I used to have to endure listening to those albums often when I worked in a record/CD shop as one of my colleagues loved them, I never understood the draw to them, I like what Steve Albini said about them, “Music made for the sole purpose of letting the wedding band stretch out a little.”
@@sspbrazil Steve Albini? He of the most wanton compression values in the entire history of record production? A fraudulant hipster spent force and now almost erased from musical history. He talked a load of baloney. He absolutely ruined that Page & Plant album. Perhaps if your shop had had a decent hi-fi then you might have enjoyed an enirely different listening experience. Oh and by the way, Jimmy Page loved them and he sure did know about "stretching out", but he also knew a brilliant guitar solo when he heard one and they came through in spades on all SD albums. Re-visit, re-listen, re-learn.
@@apollomemories7399 we had an excellent system in the shop, it had zero to do with the system, I’ve had to hear Steely Dan all sorts of situations and high end systems through my life, you can have all the opinions you want about Steely Dan, but for me they are band that looks great on paper, but in practice, they are booooooring. All that self masturbatory musicianship produces a bland result. There are two songs I can listen to by them at this point of my 57 years on this planet, one is Peg and the other is Dirty Work, beyond that, I agree with Steven Wilson, their albums sound like what they are, a bunch of session musicians creating music for elevators. Another band that comes to mind like Steely Dan is TOTO. A band that looks fantastic on paper, but has made some of the most bland pop music ever.
As far as Albini goes, I can’t think of another producer that was more authentic and cared more about bands and his craft than Albini, so much so that he didn’t even liked to be called a producer and he refused to take Producer points on albums he recorded, he wanted that revenue to go to the bands, he always regarded himself as an Audio Engineer and he was a great one at that, his drum sound alone is a testament to his work.
Albini hated compression and with good reason, he was recording albums during the beginning of the loudness wars and compression ruined the nuance of so many albums because of that, in fact he once said this about compression, “I want to find the guy that invented compression and tear his liver out. I hate it. It makes everything sound like a beer commercial.”
Albini is not erased from the history of music because he passed, his work still stands and he will be remembered as one of the most dedicated and respected people in the music industry by many bands and music fans alike, not by you obviously, so just stick to your overproduced produced Steely Dan, but I won’t. Never been a big fan of Jimmy Page either, so his live for Steely Dan doesn’t really have any value to me. Jimmy was great in the studio and doubling guitar parts in recordings, but he’s one of the sloppiest guitar players I’ve ever seen live, almost unlistenable, and what about that performance at Live Aid where he was so strung out he was drooling? Steely Dan could stretch out alright, for extended naps.
@@sspbrazil OK, so you kissed Albinii's ass. I didn't rate him at all. Nor could I care less for his pseudo-altruism, as he would in fact have had a grand cheek to call himself a "producer" anyway. He only got elevated into the inner-circle of the likes of Jimmy Page as some kind of marketing push by the record label looking to promote the lastest hipster "grunge" guy, like anyone cared. He's just another in a long list of so-whats along the likes of Rick Rubin and Nigel Godrich. It's all front, smoke and mirrors.
And there you go, bringing up Live Aid like a total Normie. You should know that Page's guitar roadie was not present and the dweeb that was handling his guitar had dropped it, banging it out of tune and then summarily handed it to Page. You can visibly see Page trying to strangle the damn thing into some semblance of tuning with his exaggerated playing style employed to try and rescue the situation. For you, as some sort of self-appointed opinionated wannabe, you should bloody well know this and be ashamed of yourself.
And you being only 57, catagorically means you never ever even got close to seeing Led Zeppelin live. So don't mke me laugh. I'm 65 and first saw LZ in Glasgow, Scotland in December 1972, aged 13. I saw them again at Earls Court, London in 1975 and at Knebworth in 1979 in front of 225,000. You haven't got a clue.
I don't think you'd recognise a decent guitar player even if Albini rammed them into you.
And as for TOTO? Spare me. You immediately give away your all-american boy credentials immediately. But, at least you dodn't mention Kiss, like 99% of your other countrymen dragged up on a musical diet of drek.
I'm really struggling to fatham what on earth looks "good on paper" regards these total tossers. But, I'm sure you'll be able to tell me.
And I really don't think that Peg is perhaps the utmost choice in all things Dan. There are other more adventurously exciting or cool tracks such as Bodhisattva, King Of The World, Third World Man and even ouutakes such as Kind Spirit, Were You Blind That Day and The Bear. It needn't always be ten to the dozen blistering rock drenched in guitar solos and heavy drums, man.
Besides, Albini would have given both ears to work with the likes of SD, but he came too late and only got to work most of all with second-rate scuzz that today, nobody remembers or gives a toss for.
The group of artists you talk about is getting a bit repetitive imo.
Van Morrison being #1 awful!
Thought SW was a bit hurriedly dismissive of Cale’s MFANS. It’s a dark, harrowing listen infected with a deep despair. His complaint about “synths” seemed especially lazy. It’s largely acoustic guitars, strings and piano with (I seem to recall) Cale trying to capture the songs in one take. TB’s right with this. It is one of Cale’s best. I think SW doesn’t like the Welsh. 😂
@@paulhargreaves1497 Especially as all of his 80s input sounded exactly the same.