This Is Art, Kids!

August

Herbie Hancock-Future Shock

Not really a jazz album, but also not really a hip hop album. It’s interesting as a curiosity, but it’s really bad. Even Rockit outstays its welcome. It’s astounding that the same mind behind Maiden Voyage and Sextant could be behind this.

Billy Joel-An Innocent Man

I get why some people hate him, but I’ve always appreciated his candor. The bulk of this album is Joel putting his spin on doo-wop. I like some of this(“For The Longest Time”, “This Night”, “Uptown Girl”, “Tell Her About It”), but at some point you realize that this is Joel singing these songs and not some great soul voice. I can’t imagine listening to this very often.

Nina Hagen-Angstlos

This album is like that one friend you have who you are just like “Let’s hang out with Nina. It’s been a while and she’s so much fun”, but then you realize that you are far too old to be drinking in a cemetery at 3am in the morning. The opening track and “I Love Paul” are both the keepers here.

Depeche Mode- Construction Time Again

A reminder that 80’s synth pop doesn’t have to always equal bad(I had forgotten over the course of this project.). This is my first brush with pre violator Depeche Mode and they had the tools even back then. This is a solid set of tunes, and I love that cover art.

Kenny Rogers-Eyes That See In The Dark

This is pretty terrible. It’s very corny and yacthy. Some of the songs have several lines that don’t even rhyme. It sounds like someone’s cheesy dad decided to try to write songs for the first time. The opener and Buried Treasure(“You can never be all you wanna be, when you’re searching for gold”) are worth hearing for how laughably terrible they are. This also has “Islands In The Stream” as well, but I’ve never been a fan of that song.

XTC-Mummer

A very slow moving, pastoral record. I did a deep dive of these guys a few years back and I think I only wound up keeping “Love On A Farm Boy’s Wages” for this album. These guys are capable of doing good songs in this style(Apple Venus Vol 1 is a masterpiece.), but they just weren’t there yet. I wish I liked this more than I do.

Renaldo and The Loaf-Arabic Yodeling

These guys are friends with The Residents and it sure shows. There’s a lot of musical variety here, but this stuff is a little too offbeat for me.

September

Tom Waits-Swordfishtrombones 

A record that has lived with me for about a decade. A pretty great variety of the two types of songs he does best(Stompers and Ballads.) and probably in my top three by him(I like Rain Dogs and Frank’s Wild Years better.). I don’t really love either of the instrumentals or Trouble’s Braids, but the rest of this is top tier Waits(Especially “16 Shells”. It’s like the soundtrack to someone nasty coming to town.).

Huey Lewis + The News-Sports

Ah Huey, the 80’s softest rock star. I think a large part of his appeal was how utterly harmless he was to most of America. This is terrible, of course, but I do kind of like “If This It.” He enunciates the word girl pretty funny in it though.

Kiss-Lick It Up

I think Gene Simmons is one of the grossest human beings on earth and this hurts me to say, but the first half or so of this kind of goes hard. The riffage is not out of character to some of the power metal that was coming out around the same time(Tell me that “Young And Wasted” couldn’t be a Priest or Motorhead jammer.).The going makeup free was a dumb promotional stunt, but this is probably in their top five or so records(And I should know. I unfortunately did a deep dive of their discography a few years back). Not a record I return to often, but not as bad as some people claim it is.

Junko Ohashi-Point Zero

A city pop record that is a mixed bag. There are some really dope funky jams on here(“Dancing” kinda sounds like a Streets Of Rage track and “Caught In A Shower” has a neat key change.), but there’s also some stuff I never want to hear again(“Sensual Night” has some real farty sounding synths on it.). The bad outweighs the good here.

Motley Crue- Shout At The Devil

I do think that the Crue were one of the better hair metal bands, but their sophomore effort doesn’t do a lot for me. It sounds like the soundtrack to a bad night out at a biker bar. Like a puddle of filth that has glitter mixed into it. I like “Looks That Kill”, but the rest of this is bad(Especially that “Helter Skelter” cover. The snares on that are just mixed too dang loud.)

X-More Fun In The New World

After the slight misfire that was “Under The Big Black Sun”(There are good tracks on that, but as a whole it was a step down.),X take a further step back. They have always had an element of rockabilly to their sound, but it really takes center stage here.Everything just sounds too clean, if I wanted to listen to The Stray Cats, I would just do that.

Sledgehammer-Blood On Their Hands

A british heavy metal band. They kind of sound like if you crossed The Who with Judas Priest. They sound very retro for their time period, and I can’t imagine that helped their career. The music is pretty darn generic and doesn’t move me to either love or vitriol.

Johnny Cash-Johnny 99

Cash must’ve loved Springsteen’s Nebraska(There are two covers from it on here.). Apart from the cringe worthy “God Bless Robert E Lee” this is pretty competent mid tempo country.  Nothing special, but you could do worse.

October

Cyndi Lauper- She’s So Unusual

This is my first listen to a record by Lauper and it’s a mixed bag for me. There are some really great tunes(Time After Time is one of the prettiest, most heartfelt songs of the 80’s), but there is also some really tacky shit on here( “Yeah Yeah” feels like a car commercial jingle and ,while I appreciate Cyndi for writing about such a controversial topic, She Bop’s lyrics are nonsensical.). All of it is covered in some of the most egregiously 80’s sounding fonts and some of it sounds very haphazardly put together(Her vocal for the very flaccid cover of “Since You Were Mine” sounds like a first take.). I’ll keep “Time After Time”, “All Through The Night”, “I’ll Kiss You” and “Girls Just Wanna Have Fun”(That xylophone synth!), but I’m binning the rest.

The The-Soul Mining

You can tell that the lead singer of this band has a lot of hangups with religion and self doubt. Lyrically it’s interesting, but all(Yes, All!. Even “This Is The Day”)the songs are too undercooked for their length(The last song is 9 minutes!). I like “This Is The Day” well enough, but I can’t see myself revisiting this very often.

Coctaeu Twins-Head Over Heels

A transitionary album, from the post punk sound of their first album to heavenly angel land music they would go on to make. This is a very interesting record, as it has a lot of the signature ethereal beauty of their later records, but still retains an angsty sense of doom from their post punk influences (mostly in the way the drums sound. I can’t believe he got these sounds out of a 80’s drum machine). I really love trying to imagine what Liz is singing in these songs “Sugar Hiccup, Life Cereal, Sugar Hiccup!”. You need this record.

Bob Dylan-Infidels

What a dangerous name for such a safe record(I’d imagine that this was Bob trying to shake off his Christian period.) “Jokerman” is the highlight here, but I also like “Don’t Fall Apart On Me Tonight”. The rest of this is generic bar rock. A step up from his two previous records, but not by much.

Mercyful Fate-Melissa

Instrumentally this kicks ass. The riffs are slammin, the drums are propulsive, good bass tone, etc. The problem for me is that King Diamond’s falsetto shit is way overdone. I’m not saying it’s always bad(“Evil” uses it in interesting ways for example), just that he should have limited it to a few songs instead of being peppered throughout the record. A good record with some unfortunate choices.