The 1981 Listening Post - Wihsbone Ash - Number the Brave

Wishbone Ash - Number the Brave 

#146

April 1981

Wishbone Ash

Number the Brave

Genre: Classic Rock

4 out of 5

Highlights:

Where is the Love

Open Road

Requisite 80s cover: Smokey Robinson’s “Get Ready”. You ever want to know what a classic Motown song would sound like if sung by The Hudson Brothers on a track produced for the Guitar Hero video game franchise. Here you go. 

Without really knowing much about Wishbone Ash prior to the 80s, amidst a sea of really unimpressive music during the first quarter of this year, I gotta say, I’m not hating this. Is it great? No. Does it fill that groove boogie rock hunger that I have when ZZ Top isn’t around? Yep. 

Lyrically it’s not that great, but that’s not what I look for in riff-rock. I want the guitars to blaze and I want the production to bounce around in my head, making my toes tap and have me reaching for my invisible Stratocaster. 

That’s what’s going on here. 

Did anyone know that John “Asia” Whetton was in Wishbone Ash? No? Me neither. He wrote track 8, “That’s That”. A perfectly fine locomotive of a tune that’s really just an excuse for dueling double guitars to battle it out on the breaks. 

How does this band have a guy named Laurie but it’s the other singer who sounds like a woman? Wishbone Ash…you imps. 

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=umQWS6krLaU&list=PLdSsAj-Nxz3VfwdZXISlheLcJVMJQLITy

The 1980 Listening Post - Wishbone Ash - Just Testing

Wishbone Ash - Just Testing

#9

January 18 1980

Wishbone Ash

Just Testing

Genre: Who came first, Thin Lizzy or Wishbone Ash?

3 out of 5

Highlights:

Pay the Price

Lowlights:

“Insomnia” actually lulled me back to sleep.

It’s a shame that this is the way it is. Whatever Ash might have been like is represented now by a swath of dialed by numbers rockers. 

None of this is terrible, mind you. It just feels like an era is ending and they are pretty exhausted just trying to keep up. 

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-I5MxUFrlow&list=PLdSsAj-Nxz3U0-eWRFJJdsAmeeM3AT1mX

The 1985 Listening Post - Wishbone Ash - Raw to the Bone

Wishbone Ash - Raw to the Bone

#259/893

July 5 1985

Wishbone Ash

Raw to the Bone

Genre: Hard Rock

2.75 out of 5

This is the 13th album by Wishbone Ash and my first. It’s weird that they never came up during this retrospective but, I’m pretty sure in that alternate universe I have taken a sabbatical from moving forward and gone back to listen to everything I’ve missed (It’s over 275 records at this point). 

This is as middling as mid-80s stadium rock gets. It’s serviceable but also forgettable. Take Rainbow or UFO or Triumph or Scorpions or Billy Squier or ________ and listen to that instead. 

In a way this reminds me of Queen’s mid-80s offerings. “Love is Blue” sounds like something Brian May would write and the band would put if Paul Rodgers was fronting them at the time. It’s got just the right amount of lack of inspiration + competence. 

Boy is this dull.

https://music.apple.com/us/album/raw-to-the-bone/1341837099