#95/1262
March 17 1986
Joe Jackson
Big World
Genre: Rock
4.5 out of 5
Highlights:
The Wild West
The Wild West
Right and Wrong
Precious Time
Fifty Dollar Love Affair
Forty Years
Home Town
A lot of hay was made at the time of this album, most notably that it was recorded live and the audience was asked to hold applause between songs. The audio fidelity was paramount to Jackson cuz this was his first album made for CD. And that makes it weird as hell cuz it’s all new music but it’s recorded like a live album and it sounds like it. But it also sounds fan-fucking-tastic. It’s alive and immediate.
And the songs…
3 vinyl sides (the 4th side left blank cuz it was CD length) that are really a trip into the world as an American, ugliness and all. And boy does he think we are ugly (See “The Jet Set”). This is another angry aging musician who is pissed off at what he sees from governments and hypocrites and, dammit, I’m here for it.
I’ve heard this album in 3 forms at 3 different times in my life:
First on CD when my brother, the audiophile early adopter of CD tech, had it and lent it to me and I listened to the crap out of it.
Secondly, when I bought it on vinyl at Amoeba and then burned it to CD to play it in my car and listened to the crap out of it.
Third, today, as a streaming record from Apple Music.
The first 1/3 is straight up rock, the second side…much more flabby, more middle aged. I don’t mean that in a bad way. It’s more like he’s dabbling in writing a Broadway score and while he’s mining the same French bistro territory that Elvis did on Punch the Clock, Joe is angrier and letting more blood (or just as much).
Once we get past the more solemn and melancholy odes to the post-war alliances, we get back to resurgent energy cuz our trip is coming to an end and Joe knows you can’t just peter out. You need to bring the audience home and THEN hit them with the coda.
Let’s face it, this didn’t need to be an hour. But we are going to be saying that a LOT when CDs really start to proliferate.
That said, I can’t be objective about this record. I really love it. And I always have.
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