Disc of the day
Heaven 17 - Penthouse And Pavement
From Sheffield, synth pop and funk to stick it to Thatcher. Currently being played live!
Features Disc of the day
Steely Dan
Can’t Buy A Thrill
(ABC, 1972)
Frontal lobe-beating duo's ace debut of quantum groove rocking.
"Thus treads heavily the titanic STEELY DAN, casting a long shadow upon the contemporary rock wasteland," wrote a pseudonymous Donald Fagen on this LP's sleevenotes, "aspiring to spill its seed on barren ground." Now there's ambition. Luckily there was a little more to Can't Buy A Thrill than simply scoring some yucks against the Church Fathers. The first official album by Fagen and partner Walter Becker, New Yorkers in Los Angeles, was an acerbic, high IQ collection of immaculately turned-out songs that blended R&B and rock, and saw time running out on a cast list of "gentleman losers" whose lives were "boiling over" in various stages of dissipation, whether by personal foul-up or predetermined bad luck. Yet as on the Fagen-sung gloomy cha-cha Only A Fool Would Say That, there's a quality of sympathetic sarcasm present too - let he who is without sin, etc. - and for all the cleverness, with smilingly bitter break-up hit Reelin' In The Years there's still room for a bongload and a drive with the top down in ways guaranteed to beguile us expecting-rain England Town saps. There's the occasional odd note - soon-to-go vocalist David Palmer's clear and athletic tones heard on kept man's blues Dirty Work, for example, seem to shear off the maladjusted cynicism and humour of the group - but overall this is pure class, more than enough to disprove its own title.
Ian Harrison
Posted by Ross_Bennett at 6:00 AM GMT 07/04/2009
Further Listening
Steely Dan – Pretzel Logic (ABC, 1974)
Randy Newman – 12 Songs (Reprise, 1970)
Prefab Sprout – Steve McQueen (Kitchenware, 1985)
Previous Disc of the day
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Heaven 17 - Penthouse And Pavement
From Sheffield, synth pop and funk to stick it to Thatcher. Currently being played live!
6:00 AM GMT 18/03/2010
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Creedence Clearwater Revival - Green River
Essence De Choogle from John Fogerty and crew. Badass!
9:54 AM GMT 17/03/2010
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The The - Soul Mining
Matt Johnson's self-excoriating - but tunepacked! -classic.
6:00 AM GMT 16/03/2010
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Various Artists - Axe Attack Vol II
Metal Britannica inspires MOJO metal amnesty. Studded leather wristbands aloft!
2:32 AM GMT 12/03/2010
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The Pop Group - Y
For connoisseurs of pop-as-rupture-in-the-space/time-continuum
6:00 AM GMT 11/03/2010
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