The 1981 Listening Post - City Boy - It's Personal

 City Boy - It's Personal

#165

1981 Housekeeping 

City Boy

It’s Personal

Genre: Rock

4 out of 5

Highlights:

No Ordinary Life

Lovers

Exit the Heavyweight

The last album for a Power Pop band stuck in the 70s. I’m kind of surprised they never appeared on my radar. I have a soft spot for Bay City Rollers ever since my mother gave me and my brother BCR records for Christmas in 1977. I do not know why she did that. Maybe she saw me watching their Saturday Morning show. 

City Boy didn’t get the message. They are still trying to compete in the New Wave arena which includes the requisite while guys doing reggae (“The Blind Leading the Blind”) which just comes across as a naked attempt to bite on The Police’s apple. Remarkable how much “Who Killed Delores” sounds like The Tubes. 

The best thing I can say about this perfectly acceptable record by a fading Power Pop band is that it’s a perfectly acceptable record by a fading Power Pop band who sometimes wishes they were Styx. 

https://music.apple.com/us/album/its-personal/415160304

The 1980 Listening Post - City Boy - Heads Are Rolling

City Boy - Heads Are Rolling

#123

1980 Housekeeping

City Boy

Heads Are Rolling

Genre: Synthy Power Glam Pop

2.75 out of 5

Highlights:

Mr. Shoes

Need a Little Loving

Lowlight:

Speechless

With vocals that suggest Sweet but songs that are a cross between The Knack and Styx, or sometimes come across as a Richard O’Brien side project, City Boy tries hard. Like a less sinister Slade. But what makes Slade so great is that they are sinister. They are like a biker gang as glam pop outfit. City Boy wants to be your best friend. 

I’ve had much much worse best friends than ones that come over with excellent harmonies, power glam keyboards and tambourines. 

It’s in “Domino” that I can hear who will take this weird prog-glam sound and make it spectacular 20 years later. They are called Foxy Shazam. Check them out. Instead of this bizarro Styx/Kansas/Slade thing. 

https://music.apple.com/us/album/heads-are-rolling/416411195