Warren Zevon, Sentimental Hygiene

To the extent this was his (first) comeback album the title doesn't really square. Thanks to his raging alcohol and drug abuse pretty much no one was sentimental over his work by then, not even fans who wanted a second Excitable Boy, and this album sure isn't that. The vague attempts at singles are especially weak, notably (despite Flea) the who-can-dance-to-this dance track "Leave My Monkey Alone" — allegedly against colonialism but you'd have to be daft to miss the addiction reference — and the title track doesn't give you confidence of what's to come (despite Neil Young). But he got good support from many more friends than those, particularly most of R.E.M. who basically served as backup band (and contributed "Even A Dog Can Shake Hands," one of the better rockers), and among others Bob Dylan on the Springsteenesque-in-a-good-way "The Factory" and Don Henley on the thoughtful "Trouble Waiting To Happen." What makes this album work despite its cloddish moments is his willingness to soulstrip bare, and he does, without being edgy or ugly: the setting of "Detox Mansion" is hard to miss, and "Bad Karma" perilously flirts with shifting the blame, but "Reconsider Me" is its highlight and its heartfelt ask as much for himself as for his music. Overall, it's not bad for sheer sentiment, hygiene or no. The 2003 reissue adds the interesting if somewhat disordered instrumental "Nocturne," but also the Spanish language version of "Leave My Monkey Alone," which probably shouldn't have had a gringo sing it. (Content: no concerns.)

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Alice Cooper '80, Flush The Fashion

I suppose a new wave take on Alice Cooper wasn't the worst idea in the world — but then maybe it was since it wasn't ever repeated, even though producer Roy Thomas Baker basically used the same template for the Cars. To balance out the sudden shift in style and his soporific snarl on the back cover neither Baker nor Cooper stray far from his usual topics (drugs and social contempt) nor his usual instrumentation, and wisely just let the synths be ornaments. I like lead-in cover "Talk Talk" and the zippy single "Clones (We're All)" takes only the musical liberties it can get away with; the old verve is back in the almost anthemic "Pain," and I laughed out loud at the sly self-referential wordplay in "Aspirin Damage" ("I've got a Bayer/on my back"). Plus, "Nuclear Infected" could practically be "No More Mr. Nice Guy" for a Three Mile Island generation. Unfortunately the novelty starts leaking out of the music around that point, and while none of the remaining tracks (except the out-of-place "Leather Boots" in the first half) are incompetent they're also not very compelling. That's actually the real problem with this album: at 28 minutes and change he can't afford any clinkers, and since this was one of the few albums he does remember recording, he's simply got no excuse. (Content: drug references, mild adult themes.)

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Sister Sledge, We Are Family

As disco landmarks go, of course "He's The Greatest Dancer" and "We Are Family" (even at 8 minutes plus!) stand the test of time, as much because of Kathy Sledge's earnest vocals as Bernie Edwards and Nile Rodgers' carefully controlled production which prevents them from spiraling into self-parody. But at the same time the other semi-dance tracks like "Lost In Music" and "Easier To Love" seem suffocated by that restraint, as rich as their backing might be, and "You're A Friend To Me" is positively choked by the leash. The R&B influences play off stronger — "Thinking Of You" is a sultry delight — but there's not enough of it on the other tracks for them to benefit. Higher quality than most others around this time, it's hard to deny all the things that made it good, but if the production had let loose a little more it could have been great. The 1995 remaster has two absolutely potty B-side remixes of "We Are Family," destroying everything that made it enjoyable, and the first redo of "Lost In Music" is likewise a HiNRG dud. But its second 1984 remix, by Edwards and Rodgers themselves, while the overdubs are densely dumb does punch the bpm up just enough to really make it jam. Wonder if they'd just do that for the rest of it. (Content: no concerns.)

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The Who, Face Dances

Kenney Jones never deserved half the crap he got. Unlike Keith Moon, he could hold a beat and his liquor, and he was already on the band's recorded output anyway from the refits of Tommy and Quadrophenia to no one's complaint. The problem was really Pete Townshend, who reserved most of his best output for his contemporaneous Empty Glass — but yet this album still manages to pull it off despite that. The lyrics are typically inscrutable and the song titles don't make sense, but Roger Daltrey sings them straight anyway to their benefit ("Cache Cache" the particular exemplar), and rockers like "You Better You Bet," "Another Tricky Day" and "Daily Records" (and John Entwistle's contribution with "The Quiet One") are as good as any of their older singles. Entwistle doesn't hit pay dirt with "You," though, which is a bit too tart for the other tracks, and "Did You Steal My Money" and "How Can You Do It Alone" are kind of dorky, but Moon's most lasting contribution to the band was attitude rather than drumming and a true pro like Jones easily proves it. The 1997 remaster adds three unreleased tracks, all pretty good but especially an early take of "Somebody Saved Me" — obvious tape warble intact — which is far superior to Townshend's reworking on Chinese Eyes (the two live tracks are best not mentioned). The 2021 remaster has four different live cuts to waste your time, but adds those three gems plus a fourth "Dance It Away" and an alternate take of "Don't Let Go The Coat" with different vocals. Either is worth it. (Content: adult themes, mild language.)

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The Yes Album

The band was in the weeds by this point, in real danger of getting dropped by Atlantic, and they needed a win. This wasn't really it but slightly more often than not it gets close. Typical of their later output their longform pieces are the best ones, even if the lyrical concepts are clumsy; anti-war "Yours Is No Disgrace" is incredibly poignant and supple, some of their best work ever, along with the oblique but earnest three-part "Starship Trooper" with Steve Howe's satisfyingly heavy guitar self-duet. Unfortunately, they're split by the sloppy "Clap," recorded live for no good reason and thus a famine amidst plenty, and while "A Venture" is charming in miniature "I've Seen All Good People" after awhile gets dreary in length, the kind of overwrought metaphysical chess metaphor that would make Bobby Fischer slit his wrists. Closing track "Perpetual Change" is particularly instructive: full of fascinating moments you want more of, but like your hyperactive nephew keeps erratically running off to other tangents, even audibly near the end when the music abruptly pans into one channel in an idea that probably sounded better to the engineer than it does in my ears. Well, live on to record another day, I suppose. The 2003 remaster adds a studio version of "Clap" which largely eliminates my objections to the album live cut, but the bowdlerized single versions of "I've Seen All Good People" (as "Your Move") and "Starship Trooper" (as "Life Seeker") are unnecessary, and so is the excessive 2014 Panegyric multi-format release. (Content: no concerns.)

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The Brothers Johnson Greatest Hits

An enthusiastic if uneven collection, the chief issue is it's too all over the place. "Free and Single" and (to its great shame) "Stomp!" are fun but excessive with the disco and stingy with the funk, while their new wave 80s output is even less credible; "Funk It" doesn't rise above all the me-too style clones around that time and slow jam "Tokyo" gets aimless, which goes for most of the slower tracks except for the luxurious "Strawberry Letter #23" and maybe the jazzish "Q." On the other hand, "Get The Funk Out Of My Face," "Ain't We Funkin' Now" and especially the exultantly exuberant "Ride-O-Rocket" are funk classics that no party should be without. It hits most of their singles, most good, some weaker, but none of them short on effort. (Content: no concerns.)

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Radiohead, A Moon Shaped Pool

There is profound beauty in this album and profound sadness, affected by their woes in the studio (including the ill-fated title track for Spectre, which the studio rejected but appears on the deluxe edition) and the end of Thom Yorke's marriage, yielding almost 52 minutes of swirling fog and ambience. Lyrics wash over you, beat changes add occasional colour, but the resignation and moroseness yields an almost monochromatic soundscape that envelops the entire first side and much of the second. "Burn The Witch" starts credibly enough, the sci-fi lyrics of "Decks Dark" are interesting and "Ful Stop" and "Identikit" break up the viscosity, but for all its high quality technique and emotion it's really an album one could only drown in. Flailing about as you sink under the audio, no bottom beneath your feet as your struggles weaken, your last thoughts as it all fades are the silver sky and the darkness below. I think that's an artistic achievement; I'm just not sure what of. (Content: no concerns.)

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Joy Division, Closer

Somewhat more of the same, and even against the throes of Ian Curtis' suicide I'm sorry to say I really expected more than that. The dirges and muddy vocals which seemed so original and organic on Unknown Pleasures come across as almost cynically deliberate the second time around — as an example, lead-off "Atrocity Exhibition" still oozes the same claustrophobic feel but the poppish "Isolation" right after it feels forced and its faux peppy electrobeat incongruous. I mostly blame Martin Hannett for this, but the band went along with it, so it can't all be his fault. And, in fairness, the recording's better this time; the presence of some actual technique makes it a bit more listenable. Fortunately the second side largely redeems the first: "Heart and Soul" manages to groove without being cloying ("A Means to an End" to a lesser extent), Curtis sings deeply and honestly amid piano and drums fed with gritty reverb in "The Eternal" and "Twenty Four Hours" makes the most of its grim milieu with his tunelessly emotive vocals sunk almost unintelligibly into a sharper, stronger rollercoaster riff. These all set up "Decades" well to close it out, even if its somewhat abrupt transitions can't carry itself the full way. One wonders what would have happened if there had been a third album, and he never had to meet his sad demise; New Order doesn't really seem an appropriate sequel nor stylistically its next logical step. The 2007 remaster includes a second live disc, as throwaway as most are, but it does include a solid rendition of "Love Will Tear Us Apart" which really should have made the album instead of banished to a single. But a great single, to be sure. (Content: intense emotional themes.)

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Pink Floyd, The Wall

The decline of the classic lineup started here, along with Roger Waters' terminal ego-driven navel-gazing. It's very difficult to gin up much sympathy for a self-absorbed rocker's unilaterally imposed barrier between him and the world, even if his daddy did die in the war, but minus the wacko fascist flourish the album asks you to treat it as an unalloyed tragedy and it just isn't. Plus, a few shining exceptions like "Comfortably Numb" and maybe "Young Lust" aside, the hulkish pretense of the whole thing means no song stands well on its own (as a single "Another Brick in the Wall Part II" gave schoolkids a great stick to beat their teachers with, but absent its context it's hardly sophisticated criticism). What gets the album past this is its sheer theatricality, one of the few records — let alone double albums — to really meet the concept of "concept," with peerless production values and some genuinely satisfying catharsis. But the rage is too unfocused to be meaningful ("One of My Turns" indeed) no matter how acute, and while your humble jerk critic and every subsequent angsty generation will listen to it for awhile non-stop, eventually you'll grow out of it just like Pink did and I did and Waters didn't. Come for the self-inflicted psychological wounds, stay for the art. The movie (because it was inevitable there'd be one) adds some Final Cut-like linking songs that work well and an excellent extended "Empty Spaces" in the form of "What Shall We Do Now?", though Bob Geldof doesn't really hit Waters' vocal range and the omission of "Hey You" is glaring. Overall the movie version is an improvement, but issuing "When The Tigers Broke Free" as a single had the same issues "ABITW Part II" did, and the soundtrack has yet to appear in its entirety on any re-release even though it's obviously ripe for it. (Content: violent imagery, S-bomb in "Nobody Home" and "The Trial.")

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Curtis Mayfield, Super Fly

Oh, for the era when soundtracks were albums, and vice versa. Mayfield is much more direct in his anti-drug message than the movie's ambiguous flirtations with it, and the lyrics consequently come off too obvious ("Pusherman," "Freddie's Dead"), but the two instrumentals are rich without relying on unseen cues, especially the incredible "Think"'s soulful groove and reedy melody. The other slower moments are a mixed bag: "Eddie You Should Know Better" is meditative and forthright yet "Give Me Your Love" feels lazy and reads worse. Still, "No Thing On Me (Cocaine Song)" is proud, Black and positive without being snide, sour or stereotyped, and "Superfly" somehow manages to stay classic without being dated. The CD reissue adds two single mixes of questionable value, though I'm sure they made a profit for the Man at Rhino. (Content: N-bombs in "Pusherman," drug references.)

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Danny Elfman, So-Lo

Not so much a contractual obligation album as a contractual supplication one after getting dropped by IRS, this Oingo Boingo album in all but name was Elfman's only official solo effort until his quarantine release in 2021. It's still not their best: trapped in their A&M malaise until Dead Man's Party, it was an acknowledged low point for the band (Kerry Hatch and Richard Gibbs departed and only appear on one track, a leftover off Good For Your Soul) and their previous energy and subterfuge just aren't consistently apparent. Still, "Gratitude" in its several incarnations was a credible radio hit (and even made the soundtrack for Beverly Hills Cop), "Cool City" is just seamy enough and "Tough as Nails" and "Everybody Needs" still have their old caustic tang. Other than "Gratitude" none really stands out but at least none really sags. So low, indeed. The various reissues have alternative edits of "Gratitude," not always to the song's benefit. (Content: adult themes.)

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Jimmy Barnes, Soul Deep

In the context of Cold Chisel a solo soul covers album makes some demented sense. Not that Joe Tex lead-in "I Gotcha" has aged particularly well, but it serves Barnes' bad-boy aesthetic, and he's got sufficient range and groan to match the male vocalists he apes ("(Your Love Keeps Lifting Me) Higher and Higher" and his duet with John Farnham in "When Something Is Wrong with My Baby" in particular). His girl covers are less accomplished: the Supremes retread "Reflections" is a little by-the-numbers and "River Deep Mountain High" is just leaden. Similarly, "Here I Am (Come and Take Me)" doesn't have enough runway to take off. But even if he doesn't really do anything new with these songs, what's here is cromulent and competent, though any added artistic value seems slight. (Content: mild adult themes in "I Gotcha.")

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Funkadelic, Maggot Brain

For as many choice moments as it offers this album's awfully hard to wrap your head around. Oh, sure, it starts out strong enough with Eddie Hazel's incredible guitar on the title track (notwithstanding George Clinton's grim musings of Mother Earth being pregnant for the third time ... by us), but then left-turns into pleasing but incongruous flower power gospel with "Can You Get To That" and then acid heavy funk in "Hit It And Quit It" (and we know what). Analogously on the flip side, I dig the Jimi vibes of "Super Stoopid" but I can't reconcile it with the dorkily appealing "Back In Our Minds" nor the scatological long-form "Wars Of Armageddon," clearly aspiring to the Beatles' "Revolution No. 9," except bereft of class, quality of production or any sort of internal structure. And then there's the gatefold itself: on the front the Afro-personification of allegedly knocked-up Mother Earth, teeth glistening and bared, either emerging from or sinking into the loamy soil (if the back is any indication, sinking), along with unsettling liner notes from no less than The Process Church of the Final Judgment concluding that "the tide will not ebb until all is destroyed." It's still worth a spin for all that, and the extended solo in "Maggot Brain" is not to be missed, but lurching aimlessly from amiable funk to menacing cacophany one does wonder whom, exactly, Geo. Clinton et amis considered their audience to be. (Content: adult themes and drug references, S-bombs in "Wars of Armageddon" and "Maggot Brain.")

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Joe Satriani, Surfing With The Alien

Some of Satriani's finest technical work surfaces here but unfortunately the real problem with this arresting red beauty is compositional. Besides its questionably short length most of the tracks on the second side don't exactly know where they're supposed to be going ("Hill of the Skull," "Circles") or only noodle their way there with difficulty ("Lords of Karma," "Echo"), and the obvious splattered-on drum machine riffs don't help. But when he's on, he's on: not just the scintillating title track or the deft "Ice Nine," or the fresh and crispy "Satch Boogie," but most of all the practically poetic "Always With Me, Always With You" with its central solo waxed so heartfelt his amplifier fairly sings. Just stop listening around the halfway point unless you're bored and you'll still get your money's worth. Current reissues omit the iridescent John Byrne Silver Surfer art due to a licensing dispute with Marvel; find any of the earlier pressings if you can for the full experience. (Content: pure instrumental.)

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Jethro Tull, Thick As A Brick

If this were a prog rock concert, the high-quality production would be well worth the price of admission and I might even stay seated for the whole thing. But this is a take-home album, for goodness sake, and in the manner of a passive-aggressive orthodontist Ian Anderson is going to make you sit through all of it whether you want to or not. Only the limitations of the LP yielded the band's solitary concession to split it in half. As musings on life and childhood and art, the lyrics are creative enough (as is that famous tabloid gatefold); as a self-indulgent satire of the worst excesses of the concept album, the idea is certainly clever. But a good idea doesn't necessarily make 43 minutes of it worth continuously sitting through, even when the execution's solid. As proof, the 25th anniversary reissue includes a 1978 live performance ... that's less than twelve. (Content: mild adult themes.)

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Meco, Star Wars and Other Galactic Funk

The first half: an inspired and wacky disco rework of the Star Wars theme, complete with cantina bridge and character themes, enjoyable on repeat for hours on end. The second: a flaccid, underdeveloped jazz fugue that screams contractual obligation — the descriptor "galactic" solely applies in the sense that whatever planet it sounded good on wasn't this one. Fortunately for the album 2.5 stars rounded up is three, but look for it at an EP price because that's really what you're getting. Like most novelty acts, lightning only struck once here. (Content: pure instrumental.)

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The Ink Spots' Greatest Hits

All but forgotten pioneers of Black music, Bill Kenny and his compatriots were singing R&B in the 1930s and '40s before it was even called that, enlivened by their instrumental skill and signature "talking bass" vocal bridges. Now that the semi-official 1979 compilation If I Didn't Care is all but out of print, intermittent retreads like this somewhat wanting 2012 UK Fabulous release are the easiest way for modern audiences to hear these distant trailblazers croon. Compared to most of the reissues, this album has an incomplete cross-section of their hit singles but includes enough of the hits like "If I Didn't Care," "The Gypsy" and "Java Jive" to please while also throwing in less-well-known versions, covers and B-sides. (Most notable: their version of "You Always Hurt The One You Love," which sounds nothing like Spike Jones' inspired style pastiche; he even added a Hoppy Jones mimic to do the spoken word.) The selection was no doubt budgetary, and the programming sells the band a little short by making them sound more samey than they were, but it's tracks you won't get many other places and a clear stylistic evolution is obvious from the 18 tracks as a whole. What this band needs most is a remaster: the poor quality of their early recordings can be forgiven because of the technology of the time, but this groundbreaking initial incarnation (other, less accomplished, versions followed) deserves better than to disappear into obscurity on the back of bad audio. Unfortunately, however, by remaining the remit of budget outings and special products like this one, and with no one to carry their torch, they still won't get the respect they ought to for as long as they get packaged like this. That's why you should listen to them. (Content: no concerns.)

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EMF, Schubert Dip

I like this more than most alternative dance in that you can, you know, dance to it. Now, do also be advised that the lyrics are throwaway, the music doesn't really go anywhere and the beats are generally indistinguishable from track to track; there were only really two songs (the twisty thumping hit "Unbelievable" and the new wave-NRG four-on-the-floor of "Children"), maybe three ("Girl of an Age"'s unattainable subject) that seriously hooked me in. That suggests an obscured talent not well demonstrated on the remainder but that doesn't mean the album's bad, just not what it could have been. Other than the ill-advised Mark David Chapman cameo on "Lies" ("that's the way destiny works") and the obnoxious live hidden track "EMF," it's something energetic you don't have to listen to very closely, and I'll never condemn an album solely for that. (Content: F-bombs in "EMF.")

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The Beach Boys, Smiley Smile

The chief sin of this album is being the castoffs of Smile instead of actually being Smile, but Smile has solely achieved its legend by not existing such that it becomes the tabula rasa justification for every pre-meme meme about Brian Wilson's genius. (In these later, more enlightened times, we have Wilson's own 2004 attempt, as well as the actual early recordings as The Smile Sessions. By also not being Smile, they enable Smile to continue being better than any album that ever existed.) This is not to say, however, that Smiley Smile is an unappreciated jewel cursed by cultural circumstance. The production is largely lo-fi home studio quality, and not in a good way, and the intentionally simplified nature of the recordings comes off more as lazy than inspired. Yet the damnedest thing about this profoundly unprofessional work is how earwormy some of it is: tracks like "Heroes and Villains" and "Vegetables" (crunch crunch) — and of course "Good Vibrations" — are so inventive and audacious they'll sit in your auditory tract for days, and you'll like it, as they're so appealingly original that the unapologetic technical faults (like, notoriously, the control booth's "good" in "With Me Tonight") end up just being part of the magic. That said, an album this haphazard is bound to throw more than a few duds, and it does; the "W. Woodpecker Symphony" probably sounded better as an idea than the actual track, "Wind Chimes" is unpleasant and particularly unfocused, and worse still for the baffling "She's Goin' Bald" and vaguely creepy "Gettin' Hungry." But it ends well on an atmospheric note, most strongly the gauzy, trembling first love story of "Wonderful" but also the amiable "Whistle In." The verdict still stands: not Smile, and the myth remains undefeated, but enough rough elements of it exist that the fans can still what-if with conviction. Capitol paired this album in CD reissues with the less adventurous but also less gonzo Wild Honey, also not Smile, and not nearly noteworthy enough to stand even with its unrefined predecessor. To fix this, they threw in a radically different "Heroes and Villains" with a differing bridge and ending, along with a couple good quality B-sides (especially their acapella version of "Their Hearts Were Full of Spring") and one of the longest versions of "Can't Wait Too Long" from the Wild Honey sessions. Unfortunately, the "various sessions" and early take of "Good Vibrations" are at best intermittently interesting, but I do like this two-for-one idea. (Content: mild adult themes on "Gettin' Hungry.")

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Tangerine Dream, Optical Race

Sterile and formulaic, but it's the right kind of sterility and formula, and the album even brags about it, too: in the CD liner notes, on the other side of the flap from the die-cut cover, it proudly states it was produced on an Atari ST complete with the fuji. (No doubt Jack Tramiel didn't pay a dime for that plug, either.) Birthed in the midst of their more approachable, synth-heavy 1980s phase, they still take too long to get to it — nearly all of the first four tracks are well-produced but uninteresting — but persistence rewards you with gentle beats ("Cat Scan" and the title track), some precision melody weaving that makes the most of the algorithmic approach ("Turning Off The Wheel") and an appealing slow closer ("Ghazal (Love Song)"), even if the saccharine's a little heavy to the taste. For formulaic, sterile new age fusion you could do a lot worse. (Content: pure instrumental.)

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