The Music Of The 80s - Favorites, Classics And Rarities

[SpenN]

I'm sure you're wondering where the name Harem Scarem came from. It's really not that big a mystery - everyone always assumes that there is a big story behind the naming of a band (especially when the name is as unique as Harem Scarem!) However, the real story is simply that Harem Scarem is the name of the first Bugs Bunny cartoon. At the time the guys needed a name for the band, they were fans of Bugs Bunny and thought it would make a good name for the band!

 

 

 

Harem Scarem was formed out of the remains of two virtually unkown bands in Canada in the late 1980's. Harry Hess had been the lead vocalist with the metal band Blind Vengeance and Pete Lesperance had been the guitarist for Minotaur. They formed to become the primary songwriting force behind Harem Scarem and are responsible for creating a large part of the Harem Scarem sound. Along with drummer (and excellent vocalist in his own right!) Darren Smith and bassist Mike Gionet, they went on to form the original line-up of Harem Scarem.

 

 

 

The members of the band remained unchanged until shortly after the recording of Voice of Reason when Mike Gionet left the band for personal reasons. Barry Donaghy (formerly of Blu Bones) stepped in and more than filled the void left by Mike's departure.

 

 

 

The band exploded onto the music scene in 1991 with their self-titled debut album, Harem Scarem. The first album spawned several singles and videos which proceeded to take Canada by storm. Songs like "Slowly Slipping Away", "Honestly" and "Hard To Love" were pure gold on the radio and started to create an international following for this new band. While the world was just starting to find out about Harem Scarem, lucky listeners in their native Canada had already become familiar with their distinctive sound through countless performances in local bars and clubs. However, before that the band had recorded a demo tape that was instrumental in their signing with Warner Music Canada. The self-produced and recorded demo was almost unprecedented for an unkown band -- they even managed to get the demo pressed on CD for potential labels. (These days it's commonplace for even local bar bands to make and distribute their own CDs, but at the time, it was still a very expensive risk for the guys to take.) Copies of that original demo CD are now treasured collectibles among HS fans, and even pop up on eBay every once in a while. The band wrote the songs and recorded the demo before ever playing in front of a live audience, knowing that people wanted to hear original songs that weren't just put together in an hour. They took their time and got the right mix of ballads and rockers together in order to attract faithful listeners. In the end, I think it's safe to say that their plan worked out well, since they are now known worldwide.

 

 

 

The release of their second album, Mood Swings, brought even more acclaim from fans and critics alike. With this album, the band also became very popular in Japan. Mood Swings was the first of Harem Scarem's album to be released in Japan, and they developed an instant following there. (The first album was quickly issued in Japan, along with 3 bonus acoustic tracks.) The difference between Harem Scarem and Mood Swings is noticable from the first notes of "Saviors Never Cry". Pete turned up the volume on the guitars and the songs took on a much harder edge. Many people consider the first album to be an AOR classic, but definitely not a hard rock album. Mood Swings provided the extra oomph that the debut album did not, and truly is a "hard rock" album. Harry and Pete really grew as songwriters with this release and showed that they were more than a fluke on the debut album. The "bigger" sound atrracted new fans, but also retained all the qualities that people loved about the first album -- fantastic melodies, seamless harmony vocals, and the unbelievable fretwork of Pete Lesperance. This is the album that fans who had seen the band live really expected from them. It was also an album that the band was much happier with. Because, while the debut album opened the door for them, it wasn't a good example of the songwriting talent possessed by both Harry Hess and Pete Lesperance. It may have put them on the map, but quickly had a dated sound. As the 80's had become the 90's, pop/rock had faded from popularity a bit and been replaced by a harder-edged grunge/alternative sound. While Mood Swings certainly isn't a grunge album by any stretch of the imagination, it had a harder edge that was more in tune with the times.

 

 

:mtc:

[hitman531ph]

EDDY GRANT

 

Eddy Grant stands amongst an elite group of artists as one who has not just merely moved successfully across the musical spectrum, but has actually been at the forefront of genres and even created one of his own. From pop star to reggae radical, musical entrepreneur to the inventor of ringbang, the artist has cut a swathe through the world of music and made it his own.

 

Born in Plaisance, Guyana, on March 5, 1948, the young Edmond Grant grew up on the sound of his homeland, tan singing, an Indo-Caribbean vocal style whose roots lay in south Asia and are the backbone of modern chutney. Then in 1960, the Grant family emigrated to England, taking up residence in the working-class Stoke Newington area of London. The young teen's musical horizons swiftly expanded, embracing R&B, blues, and rock that percolated across his new island home.

 

In 1965, Grant formed his first band, the Equals, and long before the days of Two Tone, the group was unique in being the first of Britain's multiracial bands to receive any recognition. The West Indian contingent comprised Jamaican-born singer Lincoln Gordon, with his twin brother Derv and Grant both on guitar, while the rhythm section of bassist Patrick Lloyd and drummer John Hall were native-born white Englishmen. Like most of the teenaged bands roaming the capital at the time, the Equals cut their teeth on the club and pub circuit and finally inked a label deal with President Records in early 1967. Their debut single, "I Won't Be There," didn't crack the charts but did receive major radio support. This, alongside an expanding fan base wowed by their live shows, pushed their first album, Unequaled Equals, into the U.K. Top Ten. At the request of his label, Grant had also been working with the Pyramids, the British group who had backed Prince Buster on his recent U.K. tour. Besides composing songs for the band (and one for Buster himself, the rude classic "Rough Rider"), Grant also produced several tracks, including the band's debut single and sole hit, "Train to Rainbow City." In 1968, the Equals scored their own hit with "I Get So Excited," the group's debut into the Top 50. Although their follow-up album, Equals Explosion, proved less successful than its predecessor, as did the next single, the quintet's career was indeed about to explode. "Hold Me Closer" may have disappointed in the U.K., where it stalled at a lowly number 50, but in Germany, the single was flipped over and "Baby Come Back" released as the A-side. It swiftly soared to the top of the German charts, a feat repeated across Europe. Later that spring, a reissued British single finally received its just due and reached number one. Even the U.S. took notice, sending the single into the lower reaches of the Top 40. Sadly, this turned out to be a flash in the pan. The Equals' follow-up single, "Laurel and Hardy" died at number 35, its successor did even worse, while their new album, Sensational Equals, didn't even make the charts. New hope arrived when "Viva Bobby Joe" shot into the Top Ten in the summer of 1969, but its follow-up, "Rub a Dub Dub," just scraped into the Top 35. Understandable, considering the Equals roller coaster of ups and downs, Grant now turned his attention elsewhere.

 

In 1970, he started up his own specialty record label, Torpedo, concentrating on British reggae artists. He also utilized the label as a home for a brief solo career under the alias Little Grant, releasing the single "Let's Do It Together." But the artist hadn't given up on the Equals yet, and good thing too. Later that year, their new 45, "Black Skinned Blue Eyed Boys," slammed the group back into the Top Ten. And then, the unimaginable happened. On New Year's day in 1971, Grant, all of 23 years old, suffered a heart attack and a collapsed lung. If lifestyle played a part, it wasn't because he drank, took drugs, smoked, or ate meat, it was due to Grant's only vice -- a hectic schedule. He quit the group at this point and the Equals soldiered on into the shadows without him. He sold Torpedo as well and with the proceeds opened up his own recording studio, The Coach House, in 1972. Grant continued to produce other artists and release their records through his newly launched Ice label, but his own musical talents were seemingly left behind. It wasn't until 1977 when Grant finally released a record of his own, the Message Man album. It was three years in the making and a stunning about face from his previous pop persona, even if "Black Skinned Blue Eyed Boys" had suggested a change was imminent. Tracks like "Cockney Black," "Race Hate," and "Curfew" were politicized dark masterpieces laced with aggression and anger. But the album also included some lighter moments, including "Hello Africa," which featured a sound that the media hadn't even invented a word for yet. Grant dubbed it "kaisoul," an amalgamation of kaiso (the traditional word for calypso) and soul. Caribbean legend Lord Shorty, the acknowledged inventor of this new crossover hybrid, labeled it solka. Neither term stuck, however, once the Trinidad and Tobago press came up with their own label -- soca. But regardless of what it was called, the style was just one of many hybrids that Grant was entertaining. Message Man may have proved a commercial failure, but that didn't dim the artist's vision for one second.

 

Two more years passed while Grant wrestled with its follow-up in the studio, composing, producing, and performing virtually the entire album himself. The end result was 1979's Walking on Sunshine, one of the greatest albums of the decade. While the B-side featured a clutch of seminal musical hybrids, the centerpiece of the album's A-side was "Living on the Frontline," a dancefloor classic that blended tough lyrics with an electro-sheen, a sense of optimism and a funk-fired sound. Released as a single, the song roared up the British chart, while becoming a cult hit in U.K. clubs. Inexplicably, the album itself didn't chart at all, nor did its follow-up, 1980's Love in Exile. However, in the next year, Grant finally cracked the market wide open with Can't Get Enough, which finally breached the Top 40. His singles' success had continued uninterrupted across "Do You Feel My Love," "Can't Get Enough of You," and "I Love You, Yes I Love You." A phenomenal live album, Live at Notting Hill, was recorded in August 1981 during London's Notting Hill Carnival. The following year's Killer on the Rampage slew its way into both the British chart and the American, where it landed at number ten. The album spun off "I Don't Wanna Dance," which topped the chart in the U.K., while the exhilarating "Electric Avenue," from his next album Going for Broke, landed at number two on both sides of the Atlantic.

 

Nothing else would equal these dizzying heights. Three more singles followed by the end of 1984, but none managed to break into the Top 40. In the U.S., only one, "Romancing the Stone," actually made the chart, charming its way into a respectable berth just outside the Top 25. That was his final showing in the U.S. On both sides of the Atlantic, 1987's Born Tuff and the following year's File Under Rock were passed over by the record buying public. However, the British gave the artist one last Top Ten hit in 1988 with "Gimme Hope Jo'anna," a highlight of his 1990 Barefoot Soldier album. Unfortunately, its 1992 follow-up, Painting of the Soul, went the way of its last few predecessors.

 

By then, the artist had long ago left the U.K., having emigrated to Barbados a decade earlier. Even as his own career had taken off back in England, Grant was spending much of his time mentoring a new generation of soca talent. He opened a new studio, Blue Wave, and lavished most of his attention on it, which explains the gap in his output between 1984 and 1987. By the time "Jo'anna" had fallen off the chart, Grant was well on the way to creating his own mini-empire. Besides giving new stars-to-be a helping hand, Grant also moved into music publishing, specializing in calypso's legends. Over the years, Ice has thrilled the world by making the back catalog of multitudes of stars available, Lord Kitchener, Roaring Lion, and Mighty Sparrow, to name a few. And almost uniquely amongst Caribbean artists, Grant has maintained control over his own music, and Ice, of course, has kept it available. Across Grant's solo career, the artist has continued to experiment with different styles in ever-changing combinations. Pop, funk, new wave, reggae, Caribbean, African, and even country have all been melded into his sound. 1992's Painting of the Soul was heavy with island influences, while the next year's Soca Baptism is a collection of covers, from hits to obscurities, all dosed with a modern sound.

 

By this time, Grant was hard at work in the evolution of yet another hybrid style -- ringbang. Many of the genre's elements are easily found in the artist's earlier recordings, from African rhythms to military tattoos, alongside soca itself and dancehall rhythms, many of the latter influenced by Grant's own previous work. The new style debuted in 1994 at the Barbados Crop Over festival. Since then, the style has continued to intrigue, but has yet to create the international success that it's always threatened. Much of this can be laid at Grant's own door, through a simmering dispute with other artists and the legal ramifications of the genre's trademark. A vociferous supporter of artists' rights, Grant first ran into trouble in 1996 when he demanded his label's artists receive adequate copyright fees from Trinidad and Tobabgo's Carnival. A heroic stance that infuriated the festival's organizers, this was quickly overshadowed by the public outcry over soca itself. As far as T&T was concerned, the inventor of soca was island native Lord Shorty, who announced its birth in 1978 with the Soca Explosion album. However, Grant insists otherwise, crediting his own "Black Skinned Blue Eyed Boys" as the first-ever soca record. Needless to say, his public proclamations of this fact continue to infuriate T&T and other Shorty supporters. But politics aside, the greater factor may be in ringbang's trademark. Once Grant filed it, the word could no longer be used by other artists without express permission. A perusal of any soca, calypso, or chutney hits collections shows the importance of the use of the genre term to the actual song, and just how many titles feature the term. By preventing artists from using the word ringbang, few outside the Ice stable were willing to explore the genre. Even so, Grant managed to organize the Ringbang Celebration 2000 as part of T&T's millennium festivities. The event, which went off without a hitch, created further ill-will due to its price tag, a whopping 41 million (U.S. $6.5 million). The artist himself performed two songs at the event.

 

In the new year, he recorded a new version of one of them, "East Dry River" while in Jamaica, appropriately enough in a ska style. The previous year, the artist released the Hearts & Diamonds album. Grant continues to make an impact on both sides of the studio, with his music always an intriguing concoction of sound and his studio work equally innovative. Ice itself is equally instrumental in the music world, both in its preservation of past legacies and its attention to new artists

[hitman531ph]

TACO

 

Taco scored his one and only pop hit in 1982 with a faithful rendition of the Irving Berlin chestnut "Puttin' on the Ritz." Born Taco Ockerse in Jakarta, Indonesia on July 21, 1955, he recorded "Ritz" in Germany in 1981; a year later, the song (originally popularized by Fred Astaire) hit the Top 5 of the U.S. pop charts, accompanied by a video depicting the singer decked out in a bow-tie-and-tails ensemble emblematic of the Depression-era movie musicals his image strived to emulate. Taco's debut LP, After Eight, contained other recreations of 1930s hits, as well as original material in the same vein; however, the market for such stuff was clearly limited, and after a 1984 follow-up, Let's Face the Music, he disappeared from the charts for good

[hitman531ph]

GREG KIHN

 

Greg Kihn began his career in his hometown of Baltimore, MD, working in the singer/songwriter mold, but switched to straightforward rock & roll when he moved to San Francisco in 1974. The following year, he became one of the first artists signed to Matthew Kaufman's now-legendary Beserkley Records. Along with Jonathan Richman, Earthquake, and the Rubinoos, Kihn helped to carve the label's sound -- melodic pop with a strong '60s pop sensibility -- a refreshing alternative to the bloated prog rock of the time. In 1976, after his debut on the compilation Beserkley Chartbusters, he recorded his first album with his own band consisting of Ronnie Dunbar (guitar), Steve Wright (bass), and Larry Lynch (drums). Through the '70s, he released an album each year and built a strong cult following through constant touring, becoming Beserkley's biggest seller. In 1981, he earned his first bonafide hit with the Top 20 single, "The Breakup Song (They Don't Write 'Em)," from the Rockihnroll album. He continued in a more commercial vein through the '80s with a series of pun-titled albums: Kihntinued (1982), Kihnspiracy (1983), Kihntageous (1984), and Citizen Kihn (1985).

 

He scored his biggest hit with 1983's "Jeopardy" (number two) from the Kihnspiracy album. One more single broke the Top 40, 1985's "Lucky," but by the time Love and Rock and Roll was released in 1986, the puns had run out and so had the hits. Kihn kept a relatively low profile throughout the '90s, releasing Mutiny in 1994 and Horror Show in 1996. All the Right Reasons followed in mid-2000

[hitman531ph]

NIRVANA

 

Nirvana released its first album in 1989 called "Bleach"

 

Prior to Nirvana, alternative music was consigned to specialty sections of record stores and major labels considered it to be, at the very most, a tax write-off. After the band's second album, 1991's Nevermind, nothing was ever quite the same, for better and for worse. Nirvana popularized punk, post-punk, and indie rock, unintentionally bringing it into the American mainstream like no other band before it. While its sound was equal parts Black Sabbath (as learned by fellow Washington underground rockers the Melvins) and Cheap Trick, Nirvana's aesthetics were strictly indie rock. They covered Vaselines songs, they revived new wave cuts by Devo, and leader Kurt Cobain relentlessly pushed his favorite bands -- whether it was the art punk of the Raincoats or the country-fried hardcore of the Meat Puppets -- as if his favorite records were always more important than his own music. While Nirvana's ideology was indie rock and melodies were pop, the sonic rush of their records and live shows merged the post-industrial white noise with heavy metal grind. And that's what made the group an unprecedented multi-platinum sensation. Jane's Addiction and Soundgarden may have proven to the vast American heavy metal audience that alternative could rock, and the Pixies may have merged pop sensibilities with indie rock white noise, but Nirvana pulled at all together, creating a sound that was both fiery and melodic. Since Nirvana was rooted in the indie aesthetic, but loved pop music, they fought their stardom while courting it, becoming some of the most notorious anti-rock stars in history. The result was a conscious attempt to shed their audience with the abrasive In Utero, which only partially fulfilled the band's goal. But by that point, the fate of the band and Kurt Cobain had been sealed. Suffering from drug addiction and manic depression, Cobain had become destructive and suicidal, though his management and label were able to hide the extent of his problems from the public until April 8, 1994, when he was found dead of a self-inflicted shotgun wound. Cobain may not have been able to weather Nirvana's success, but the band's legacy stands as one of the most influential in rock & roll history.

 

Kurt Cobain (vocals, guitar) met Chris Novoselic (born Krist Novoselic) (bass) in 1985 in Aberdeen, WA, a small logging town 100 miles away from Seattle. While Novoselic came from a relatively stable background, Cobain's childhood had been thrown into turmoil when his parents divorced when he was eight. Following the divorce, he lived at the homes of various relatives, developing a love for the Beatles and then heavy metal in the process. Eventually, American hardcore punk worked its way into dominating his listening habits and he met the Melvins, an Olympia-based underground heavy punk band. Cobain began playing in punk bands like Fecal Matter, often with the Melvins' bassist Dale Crover. Through the Melvins' leader Buzz Osborne, Cobain met Novoselic, who also had an intense interest in punk, which meant that he, like Cobain, felt alienated from the macho, redneck population of Aberdeen. The duo decided to form a band called the Stiff Woodies, with Cobain on drums, Novoselic on bass, and a rotating cast of guitarists and vocalists. The group went through name changes as quickly as guitarists, before deciding that Cobain would play guitar and sing. Renamed Skid Row, the new trio featured drummer Aaron Burkhart, who left the band by the end of 1986 and was replaced by Chad Channing. By 1987, the band was called Nirvana.

 

Nirvana began playing parties in Olympia, gaining a cult following. During 1987, the band made ten demos with producer Jack Endino, who played the recordings to Jonathan Poneman, one of the founders of the Seattle-based indie label Sub Pop. Poneman signed Nirvana, and in December of 1988, the band released their first single, a cover of Shocking Blue's "Love Buzz." Sub Pop orchestrated an effective marketing scheme, which painted the band as backwoods, logging-town hicks, which irritated Cobain and Novoselic. While "Love Buzz" was fairly well-received, the band's debut album, Bleach, was what began the ball rolling. Recorded for just over 600 dollars and released in the spring of 1989, Bleach slowly became a hit on college radio, due to the group's consistent touring. Though Jason Everman was credited as a second guitarist on the sleeve of Bleach, he didn't appear on the record; he only toured in support of the album before leaving the band at the end of the year to join Soundgarden and then Mindfunk. Bleach sold 35,000 copies and Nirvana became favorites of college radio, the British weekly music press, and Sonic Youth, Mudhoney, and Dinosaur Jr., which was enough to attract the attention of major labels.

 

During the summer, Nirvana released "Sliver"/"Dive," which was recorded with Mudhoney's Dan Peters on drums and produced by Butch Vig. The band also made a six-song demo with Vig, which was shopped to major labels, who soon began competing to sign the group. By the end of the summer, Dave Grohl, formerly of the D.C.-based hardcore band Scream, had become Nirvana's drummer and the band signed with DGC for $287,000. Nirvana recorded their second album with Vig, completing the record in the summer. Following a European tour supporting Sonic Youth in the late summer, Nevermind was released in September, supported by a quick American tour. While DGC was expecting a moderately successful release, in the neighborhood of 100,000 copies, Nevermind immediately became a smash hit, quickly selling out its initial shipment of 50,000 copies and creating a shortage across America. What helped the record become a success was "Smells Like Teen Spirit," a blistering four-chord rocker that was accompanied by a video that shot into heavy MTV rotation. By the beginning of 1992, "Smells Like Teen Spirit" had climbed into the American Top Ten and Nevermind bumped Michael Jackson's much-touted comeback album Dangerous off the top of the album charts; it reached the British Top Ten shortly afterward. By February, the album had been certified triple platinum.

 

Nirvana's success took the music industry by surprise, Nirvana included. It soon become apparent that the band wasn't quite sure how to handle their success. Around the time of Nevermind's release, the band was into baiting their audience -- Cobain appeared on MTV's Headbanger's Ball in drag, the group mocked the tradition of miming on the BBC's Top of the Pops by Novoselic constantly throwing his bass into the air and Cobain singing his live vocals in the style of Ian Curtis, and their traditional live destruction of instruments was immortalized on a Saturday Night Live performance that ended with Novoselic and Grohl sharing a kiss -- but by the spring, questions had begun to arise about the band's stability. Cobain married Courtney Love, the leader of the indie rock/foxcore band Hole, in February of 1992, announcing that the couple was expecting a child in the fall. Shortly after the marriage, rumors that the couple were heavy heroin users began to circulate and the strength of the rumors only increased when Nirvana canceled several summer concerts and refused to mount a full-scale American tour during the summer. Cobain complained that he was suffering from chronic stomach troubles, which seemed to be confirmed when he was admitted to a Belfast hospital after a June concert. But, heroin rumors continued to surface, especially in the form of a late-summer Vanity Fair article which implied that Love was using during her pregnancy. Both Love and Cobain denied the article's allegations, and publicly harassed and threatened the article's author. Love delivered Frances Bean Cobain, a healthy baby girl, on August 18, 1992, but the couple soon battled with Los Angeles' children's services, who claimed they were unfit parents on the basis of the Vanity Fair article. The couple was granted custody of their child by the beginning of 1993.

 

Since Cobain was going through such well-documented personal problems, Nirvana was unable to record a follow-up to Nevermind until the spring of 1993. In the meantime, DGC released the odds-and-ends compilation Incesticide late in 1992; the album reached number 39 in the U.S. and number 14 U.K. As the group prepared to make their third album, they released "Oh, the Guilt" as a split-single with the Jesus Lizard on Touch & Go Records. Choosing Steve Albini (Pixies, the Breeders, Big Black, the Jesus Lizard) as their producer, Nirvana recorded their third album, In Utero, in two weeks during the spring of 1993. Following its completion, controversy began to surround Nirvana again. Cobain suffered a heroin overdose on May 2, but the event was hidden from the press. The following month, Love called police to their Seattle home after Cobain locked himself in the bathroom, threatening suicide. Prior to debuting In Utero material during the New Music Seminar at New York's Roseland Ballroom in July, Cobain had another covered-up overdose. By that time, reports began to circulate, including an article in Newsweek, that DGC was unhappy with the forthcoming album, accusing that the band deliberately made an uncommercial record. Both the band and the label denied such allegations. Deciding that Albini's production was too flat, Nirvana decided to remaster the album with R.E.M.'s producer, Scott Litt.

 

In Utero was released in September of 1993 to positive reviews and strong initial sales, debuting at the top of the U.S. and U.K. charts. Nirvana supported it with a fall American tour, hiring former Germs member Pat Smear as an auxiliary guitarist. While the album and the tour were both successful, sales weren't quite as strong as expected, with several shows not selling out until the week of the concert. As a result, the group agreed to play MTV's acoustic Unplugged show at the end of the year, and sales of In Utero picked up after its December airing. After wrapping up the U.S. tour on January 8, 1994, with a show at Center Arena in Seattle, Nirvana embarked on a European tour in February. Following a concert in Munich on February 29, Cobain stayed in Rome to vacation with Love. On March 4, she awakened to find that Cobain had attempted suicide by overdosing on the tranquilizer Rohypnol and drinking champagne. While the attempt was initially reported as an accidental overdose, it was known within the Nirvana camp that the vocalist had left behind a suicide note.

 

Cobain returned to Seattle within a week of his hospitalization and his mental illness began to grow. On March 18, the police had to again talk the singer out of suicide after he locked himself in a room threatening to k*ll himself. Love and Nirvana's management organized an intervention program that resulted in Cobain's admission to the Exodus Recovery Center in L.A. on March 30, but he escaped from the clinic on April 1, returning to Seattle. His mother filed a missing persons report on April 4. The following day, Cobain shot himself in the head at his Seattle home. His body wasn't discovered until April 8, when an electrician contracted to install an alarm system at the Cobain house stumbled upon the body. After his death, Kurt Cobain was quickly anointed as a spokesman for Generation X, as well as a symbol of its tortured angst.

 

Novoselic and Grohl planned to release a double-disc live album at the end of 1994, but sorting through the tapes proved to be too painful, so MTV Unplugged in New York appeared in its place. The album debuted at the top of the British and American charts, as a home video comprised of live performances and interviews from the band's Nevermind-era, titled Live! Tonight! Sold Out!, was issued at the same time (the project began prior to Cobain's passing and was completed by surviving bandmembers).

 

In 1996, its electric counterpart, From the Muddy Banks of the Wishkah, was released, debuting at the top of the U.S. charts. Following Cobain's death, Grohl formed the Foo Fighters (early rumors that Novoselic would also be a member of the band ultimately proved to be false) -- releasing their self-titled debut album in 1995, followed by The Colour and the Shape in 1997 and There Is Nothing Left to Lose in 1999. Novoselic formed the trio Sweet 75, releasing their debut in the spring of 1997, and also appeared along with former Dead Kennedys' frontman Jello Biafra and former Soundgarden guitarist Kim Thayil on the 2000 live set Live From the Battle in Seattle under the name the No W.T.O. Combo.

 

By the late '90s, research began by Novoselic for a proposed box set of previously unreleased songs from throughout Nirvana's career. The project was supposed to surface in the fall of 2001 (to coincide with the tenth anniversary release of Nevermind), but legal problems began to surface. In 1997, Grohl and Novoselic formed the Nirvana L.L.C. partnership with Courtney Love (who manages Cobain's estate) -- a company that required a unanimous vote by all three regarding future albums, photos, and anything else Nirvana-related. When all three couldn't agree on the songs to be included on the box set, the matter was taken to court as Love attempted to dissolve the partnership. The project was ultimately shelved indefinitely as any legal decision was tied up in court

[hitman531ph]

BOOK OF LOVE

 

The synth pop group Book of Love were dance club staples in the '80s. Book of Love formed in Philadelphia, PA, by former art school students Susan Ottaviano (vocals), Ted Ottaviano (keyboards, vocals), Jade Lee (keyboards, vocals), and Lauren Roselli (keyboards, vocals) in 1984. (Although they share the same last name, Susan and Ted are not related nor are they married to one another.) Susan, Ted, and Lee had initially collaborated in a band called Head Cheese. Book of Love's first dance hit was entitled "Book of Love." In 1985, Book of Love recorded "Boy," a toe-tapping tale of teen-girl angst. The song was given to DJ Ivan Ivan, who then forwarded it to Sire Records president Seymour Stein. Impressed, Stein signed Book of Love to the label. "Boy" became a hit on the college and dance charts, with "I Touch Roses" subsequently hitting number one on the latter. Book of Love's self-titled debut LP was released in 1986, and the uplifting "You Make Me Feel So Good" crossed over onto Top 40 radio. Most of the electronic groups in the mid-'80s were led by men; Book of Love brought a feminine perspective that was lacking in synthesizer-based music. The band toured with Depeche Mode and Lullaby appeared afterward in 1988. A remix of Mike Oldfield's "Tubular Bells (Theme From the Exorcist)" was another number one smash on the dance charts, while "Pretty Boys and Pretty Girls" courageously addressed the then-taboo subject of AIDS. The group recorded two more albums before splitting up in 1993. A retrospective, I Touch Roses: The Best of Book of Love, was released in 2001

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SHRIEKBACK

 

Shriekback is not an easy band to classify. They borrowed heavily from funk but had a very different agenda; their music was more suited for contemplation than for parties. They combined synthesizers and drum machines with throbbing bass lines and unorthodox vocals to evoke a primordial world where the line between human and animal was blurred. The title of their fourth album, Big Night Music, might be the most succinct summation of their work: Shriekback's music was always an appropriate soundtrack for life in the dark, but with the emphasis on the possibilities rather than the dangers. Though often haunting, it was not gothic and harbored strains of pop and dance that rose to the surface from time to time. Still, however accessible they became, Shriekback cultivated an air of mystery that made them hard to pin down. Further complicating any evaluation of their career is the fact that they never made a single, brilliant album that concentrated all their strengths in one place; their best material is spread out across a decade during which they underwent a great deal of evolution.

Shriekback came together in 1982 as a loose association based around the trio of Dave Allen (bass), Barry Andrews (keyboards/vocals), and Carl Marsh (vocals/guitar). Allen and Andrews had previously been members of Gang of Four and XTC, respectively; Marsh had played with the more obscure Out on Blue Six. They quickly developed a trademark sound that had little to do with the members' previous credits. The bedrock of that sound was Allen's muscular yet liquid bass playing, which was a quantum leap beyond his relatively crude work with Gang of Four. On top of this Shriekback deployed creative and intricate drum programs; Andrews' multifaceted synthesizer shadings; strategically placed, mostly rhythm guitar from Marsh; and whispered vocals from Andrews along with Marsh's more melodic singing. Both vocalists were technically limited, but this was more than compensated for by the band's tight playing and evocative, intelligent lyrics.

 

The first Shriekback release was the six-song EP Tench, which appeared on the English Y label in 1982. It was followed in 1983 by the LP Care, also on Y, which featured the quasi-hit "Lined Up," the song that put Shriekback on the map for many people. Care was picked up and released in the U.S. by Warner Brothers, with an altered running order and two different tracks, including the polyrhythmic "My Spine (Is the Bass Line)."

 

Although Care was critically acclaimed and garnered a fair amount of airplay from both college radio and fledgling modern rock radio, that was not enough for Warner Brothers, who dropped Shriekback and deleted Care shortly after its release. As a result, the follow-up, 1984's Jam Science, was released only in Europe (this time on Arista). Slicker, less murky, and more focused on electronics than its predecessor, Jam Science contained the dub-influenced single "Hand on My Heart."

 

Much of Shriekback's music from this early period is most readily available on two mistitled, poorly packaged, but indispensable CDs from Kaz Records. The Best of Shriekback: The Infinite is made up of seven songs from Care, three from Tench, and the single "Working on the Ground." The Best of Shriekback Volume Two: Evolution offers one more song from Care and five from Jam Science, along with a nice assortment of remixes and B-sides.

 

Toward the end of the Jam Science sessions, Shriekback became a quartet with the addition of drummer Martyn Barker; however, they quickly became a trio again when Carl Marsh departed midway through the recording of their third album. Andrews took over as sole vocalist and the addition of Lu Edmonds on guitar brought a more aggressive sound to Oil and Gold, which was released in 1985. Songs like "Malaria" and "Nemesis" rocked harder than anything Shriekback had recorded before, bringing them a far wider audience than they had previously enjoyed. Oil and Gold sold well in its U.S. release on Island Records.

 

Shriekback released two more albums on Island in the '80s. 1986's Big Night Music featured a core trio of Allen, Andrews, and Barker augmented by hired hands like Mike Cozzi (guitar), Steve Halliwell (keyboards), and Wendy and Sarah Partridge (backing vocals). Continuing Oil and Gold's move toward accessibility, Big Night Music had a more organic sound with an emphasis on live percussion. Shriekback seemed poised on the brink of unlikely stardom, but Allen departed before the recording of Go Bang! (1988), which was poorly received by both critics and fans. Perhaps they were put off by the absence of Allen's signature low end, or maybe it was the inconsistent material, including an ill-advised cover of KC and the Sunshine Band's "Get Down Tonight."

 

That appeared to be the end of Shriekback, who dropped out of sight in the late '80s and early '90s. Their only release during that period was the pointless and exploitative 1990 compilation The Dancing Years. But Allen, Andrews, and Barker reunited in 1992 to record the excellent Sacred City, which essentially picked up where Big Night Music left off. There was another long silence after that, but as of 2000 some form of Shriekback was apparently still in existence; an album called Naked Apes and Pond Life, featuring Andrews, Barker, Edmonds, and two new members, was released that year by the Australian Mushroom label

[Cain N Moko]

Excerpts of the TOP 100 ALBUMS of the 1980s

 

DURAN DURAN

RIO

 

Includes Save A Prayer, Rio, Hungry Like The Wolf, New Religion

[Cain N Moko]

THE POLICE

Ghost in the Machine

 

Includes Spirits in the Material World, Every Little Thing She Does Is Magic, Invisible Sun

 

#86

 

(Duran Duran's Rio came in at #95)

[Cain N Moko]

THE SMITHS

Strangeways, Here We Come

 

Includes Girlfriend in a Coma

 

#77

[Cain N Moko]

GUNS N' ROSES

Appetite For Destruction

 

Includes Sweet Child O' Mine

 

#59

[Cain N Moko]

THE POLICE

Synchronicity

 

Includes Every Breath You Take, O My God, King Pain, Wrapped Around Your Finger, Synchronicity II

 

#55

[Cain N Moko]

REM

Document

 

Includes It's The End of the World (As We Know It), The One I Love

 

#48

[Cain N Moko]

BEASTIE BOYS

Licensed To Ill

 

Includes Fight For Your Right (To Party)

 

#41

[Cain N Moko]

THE CURE

Disintegration

 

Includes Fascination Street, Picture Of You

 

#38