The Cars - Panorama [File Under: The Cars]

The Cars - Panorama - 1980

Otherwise known as "what happens when a pop rock band with arty ambitions abandons the pop and much of the rock in favor of the arty?"
Panorama is a mess. The song. The album. It's a droning, muzzled, over controlled mess.
Ocasek seems to be overly concerned with the band having any freedome so the reins have been pulled tight. In fact, there's no semblance of a real group working together until the fourth song, "Don't Tell Me No", where David Robinson sounds like he's actually playing his instrument instead of programming a Casio. That still doesn't redeem the song. And Easton isn't really given much to do until "Getting Through".
No, this is the Ocasek & Hawkes show. And by becoming ever more dependent on the keyboards for the sound tapestry The Cars have actually managed something that seems almost impossible: They went from being the vanguards of the New Wave movement and created something of it's time AND simultaneously timeless to being the representatives of all that was wrong with the movement and created something of it's time, yes but also something that could be shoved in a time machine for 1980. In less than 2 years they did that.
If you take the album for what it is, though, it's not entirely unlistenable. It's just a disappointment. The poppy sheen and pure craft of the last two records gives way to the New Wave Underground.
That said, the hypnotic effect of "Panorama" and the decidedly uber-New Wave-y-ness of "Misfit Kid" represent the era precisely and I can't deny that. And the rocker, "Down Boys" reminds me of what The Tubes were also doing at exactly the same time, in fact, it could be the dirtier, muddier cousin of "Sushi Girl". It's also one of the few places where the band sounds like a...band. But, it's obvious by now that Ocasek's in control.
I really can't imagine that they thought this album sounded good, however. It's so muddy. Compared to the sounds on the previous two.
Oh, and Rik's a bad lyricist here, too. ;)

Grade: C-
ASide: Touch and Go,
BlindSide: Getting Through, Misfit Kid
DownSide: You Wear Those Eyes, Up & Down

The Cars - Candy-O [File Under: The Cars]

The Cars - Candy-O - 1979

When you know how to do one thing and you do can do that thing perfectly, why change your formula?
That seems to be The Cars' motto on this album, following one year after their debut. Now, I've said it many times that if this was a cd that came out 10 years later it would have been one 60 minute record and we would have all been bored earlier.
Instead, it's like a refreshing visit from a cousin that you love to have around. not all the time, but, when he's around, the food is just a bit tastier, the drinks crisper, life is just a little...better. There's the same amount of frustration and heartache, but it's under such a pretty sheen and welcoming style that you don't notice just how lonely you really are.
That's Candy-O. The Cars Part II.
It explodes with "Let's Go", a rallying cry of sorts, but it settles in to what it knows best, mid tempo electro-pop, rather quickly. Tracks like "Double Life", pulsating rhythms and replete with oohs and ahhs we've come to love, beings to wear out its welcome earlier than one would hope based on the last album.
And, I have no idea what "Shoo-Be-Doo" is supposed to be. Some kind of Americanized Kraftwerk, it serves better as the influence for Xex. Thankfully, it doesn't last too long and crashes into the classic "Candy-O". Just what you needed, just in time.
The vacuum sealed soundtrack to a Cafe Fleshian society continues on Side Two, with "Nightspots", a song that truly takes the band's name and makes it aural. It's more soundscape than song at times, and it's great. After the somnabulous, droning of "Lust for Kicks" it's awfully nice for to hear the band kick out the jams with "Got a Lot on My Head".
The album ends on the high note, the classic radio staple, "Dangerous Type" which is also, I think, a harbinger of what's to come.....

Candy-O won't let you down. But it won't make you want to get in your car and drive.

Grade: B
ASide: Let's Go, It's All I Can Do, Got a Lot on My Head, Dangerous Type
BlindSide: Double Life, Nightspots
DownSide: Lust For Kicks

The Cars - The Cars [File Under: The Cars]

The Cars - The Cars - 1978

Thirty plus years after it was one of the most spun records of my youth I'm struck by something listening to The Cars' eponymous debut again: "Let the Good Times Roll" is a weird opener, a near laconic, stoner rocker. The kind of song that would and should play on the beach during a weekend beer fest. The "Good Times" are lazy. But also tightly controlled. There's little air and you don't want it, you don't miss it. The airless, nothing left to chance, hyper controlled arrangement of the classic doo wop by way of New Wave "My Best Friend's Girl" is just what the doctor ordered during an era of endless jams and classic rock tropes that included bloat like drum solos.
No room for that here. The Cars are economical at best. But it's that economy that really wins the listener over.
One of the most stellar debuts in history, Ocasek, Orr, Hawkes, Easton & Robinson rewrite the rules on rock by taking it wayyyyy back to it's roots and moving wayyyy forward at the same time. The result is something timeless.
Can anyone NOT air drum to ""Just What I Needed"? Can anyone resist the herky jerky vocal nervosa of Ocasek that calls to mind Elvis Costello, Roy Orbison & seasickness at the same time?
Hawkes' synth keys, the American version of Gary Numan's early stuff (which happened at the same time, believe it or not), never sound dated. Which is really incredible. And Easton's guitar is like a laser. Precise when applied.
Queen's over the top producer Roy Thomas Baker fleshes out the sound, which, without him, might have come off weak as just about every instrument and voice is fighting for prominence but, because of him, each one shines. He puts Ocasek's vocals way back on "I'm in Touch With Your World" and pushes the drums right up front on the side one rave up, "Don't Cha Stop". And the elixir is delicious.
The real hero of The Cars isn't any one individual but, lost in the hoopla of Ocasek's voice/songs, Orr's looks & Hawkes' futuristic keys is the brilliant guitar work of Easton. I can not praise him enough. His solos are worthy of any band of the era and yet, while he could have been the star, he's satisfied with just laying in what's needed.
The closest the album gets to a ballad is the slow tempo, spacey, sci fi, "Moving in Stereo", which works as a new wave, geek sex romp backing track. It's hard not to picture images from Fast Times at Ridgemont High when it's on, although there's I wonder if it's the images that enhance the song or vice versa. I go with the latter.

The Cars is one of the 1000 albums you need to hear before you die.

Grade: A
ASide: Good Times Roll, My Best Friend's Girl, Just What I Needed, Don't Cha Stop
BlindSide: I'm in Touch with Your World, You're All I've Got Tonight, Bye Bye Love
DownSide: Nothing. A great debut.

Reflecting Pool - Green Day - Uno! Dos! Tre!

From their big label smash release, Dookie, in 1994, to 2003, Green Day released an goodly amount of music, most of it excellent.
Dookie in 94, Insomniac in 95, Nimrod in 97, Warning in 2000, plus the b-side album Shenanigans in 2002, not to mention The Network's Money Money 2020 in 2003.
From 2004 to 2013 they raised the stakes, releasing less music but growing as artists from punk upstarts to stadium rockers ascending to the throne left vacant by The Who.
American Idiot in 2004, Foxboro Hot Tubs in 2008 & 21st Century Breakdown in 2009 were varied and spectacular and each different than the other.
It's been 3 years since the band put out any music and, in the interim, they went on to even more mainstream success with a Broadway show based on their music. Which is sort of ridiculous.

Now, just taking a look at that output over 15 years I am struck by something. That's roughly 125 songs written by one guy. Yes, he doesn't write everyone's parts, otherwise they would be The Cars. But, he writes the melodies, structures and lyrics. For the most part. That's a crazy amount of music for one guy. And if you click on those links you'll find that most of them are, well, great.

How many rock groups were doing that after 15 years of being in the business? The Beatles? Not one guy and by 1978 few were buying the individual members' music. I'm not comparing the two in any way except to illustrate the longevity and difficulty in putting out that amount of good, sellable music by any one group, let alone one person.
Queen? 4 guys wrote songs and including them on the albums. And by 1989 they were toast in the big markets.
Kiss? The less said the better. But, really, they haven't written anything for mass appeal in decades.
Nobody sticks around this long.

So, this fall Green Day decided to move forward by moving backward. Tight punk songs, about love and rebellion and, well, killing a DJ near as I can figure, and offering them on 3 groupings in the span of 3 months. It was a disaster of sorts and a success of other sorts.

Uno came out first and if you waited a month you could've bought it for the steep discount to $5 on Amazon. In fact, I paid $5 for the next one and $6 for the third. So, for $16, less than the cost of new CD in the 90s and 00s, I got 37 new songs by Green Day.

I don't really know how to review them so I'll take a look at eat record. The sad thing is I've been listening to the entire album while writing this and I haven't been compelled to stop and listen, nor have I been compelled to move to the next song. "(I even find "Kill The DJ" catchy. Sure it sounds like Franz Ferdinand, but FF opened for Green Day when I saw them and I think that's the best way to pay homage. It's not great, but it's catchy). And there

Uno is a punk record. It's fast and it delivers. It all sounds like Green Day, but it should. What else would it sound like? You don't read Jonathan Franzen hoping he'll suddenly have changed his style to be more like Dave Eggers. You don't watch Aaron Sorkin pieces and complain that everyone talks like they are in an Aaron Sorkin piece. That's crazy. Artists have a certain cadence, certain rhythms and you either like it or you don't.

Billie Joe Armstrong, for better or worse, is an amazing filter for everything he's ever heard. And he's apparently heard a LOT. I don't know how he would have the time to listen to everything that seems to influence him, from Queen to the Kinks, to The Zombies, to The Who to Franz Ferdinand and on and on, but it's all there.

Sure, songs like "Oh Love" sound familiar, hell, "Nuclear Family" calls to ming Modern English, for god's sake. Troublemaker feels like a leftover from the excellent Foxboro Hot Tubs record. You could do worse. Sweet 16 could be a Fieger/Averre track but they never could quite get it as right as Billie Joe.

All musicians and artists take what they love and recraft them into their own voices. So, I'm done defending Bille Joe and Green Day. You either love them or you don't. They do what they do very well and there it is.

Those who know me know that I love to look for patterns and clues, raison d'etres, if you will. Like Paul's bare feet on Abbey Road.

The third album isn't called "Tres". That would be three in Spanish. It's called Tre. And Tre Cool is on the cover.

Uno features Billie. Why not? He's the driving force behind the music. Makes sense. And Dirnt is...well, Dirnt is the second guy. BJ's wing man. His buddy since they were teens. The boys could call it a day after this release and go out proud.

It's difficult to review these one album at a time. They aren't three different records. They are a collection. And that's how they should be heard.

UNO!



Grade: A
ASide: Nuclear Family, Oh Love, Let Yourself Go, Sweet 16, Rusty James
BSide: Stay the Night, Carpe Diem, Troublemaker, Angel Blue
DownSide: It's just a good ol, Green Day rekkid.

DOS!

Dos is a bit of a different animal. Opening with the faux 70s acoustic bit, "See You Tonight" it moves into one of their catchier tracks with the laziest lyrics ever. I really wish "Fuck Time" was better written. It had a lot of potential. It's hooky as hell rockabilly snark and the music is dynamite, but the lyrics leave a lot to be desired. Oh, what the hell, I'll listen again. (Update: After more research I've learned that Fuck Time was originally called, "It's Fuck Time" and the Foxboro Hot Tubs played it in concert as recently as 2010. No wonder it sounds like a FHT song.) "Lazy Bones" could easily be a song by The Network but I'm pretty sure Billie Joe is beyond the prankish fun of creating a fake band and writing an entire record for them. So, if we're never getting a FHT album or a Network record, this'll do. "Stray Heart" is his "Beat Surrender". Good thing we get that, too.

The whole album isn't retro tropes, though. Well, they are but punk tropes so that's the band's natural idiom. "Ashley" and "Stop When the Red Lights Flash", "Baby Eyes" & "Makeout Party" fit that bill and fit it just fine.

Where the album falls down and falls hard is the atrocious "Nightlife". Rap? Really? What decade is this? It barely worked on Springsteen's "Rocky Ground" but there it was sparse, this is...bad Missy Elliot wanna be rapping. I'm sure they wrestled with it. I wish that someone else had won that wrestling match.

Billie Joe's self-transformation into Paul Weller is on the tacked on final track, "Amy", a paean to the late Amy Winehouse. It's a simple, single guitar, acoustic bit, the way "Time of Your Life" stood out on Nimrod, but this time it sounds less like The Jam and more like The Style Council.

Billie, your influences are showing.

Grade: B
ASide: Fuck Time, Lazy Bones, Stray Heart,
BlindSide:  Ashley, Baby Eyes, Amy
DownSide: Nightlife

TRE!



"Brutal Love" is the real honorary Foxboro Hot Tubs track. It's dripping with Lieber & Stoller and latter day Elvis. The slutty Vegas by N'Orleans horns give it even more weight and gravitas. I love it.

From there the album decides it's time to be epic and fill the stadiums. "Missing You" is a classic downstroke rocker. and followed by 8th Avenue Serenade, a song that reminds me a lot of what Armstrong was trying to do on Warning, push forward, stay true to the band's roots (it hints at Insomniac) but moves along with assuredness, echoing some of the songs on American Idiot. It would have fit on either of those albums.

It's "Drama Queen" that is this album's trainwreck. "Everyone's drama queen is old enough to bleed now". It's sort of nauseating. And amateurish.

Fortunately, we get back to early era stylings with the 1-2 punch of "X-Kid" and "Sex, Drugs & Violence", catchy, angry, hooky and deserving.

Surely the weirdest track on the album is "Dirty Rotten Bastards". Stealing from The Marines Hymn, as well as other familiar pieces, it's reworked into the "Jesus of Suburbia" template. A mini-opera. I like it. But it's weird, man.

I'd've been happy if the album found a way to end after "99 Revolutions", but I guess somewhere, someone wants a Green Day Ballad. I think that's always been satisfied by the heartbreaking ode to his father "Wake me When September Ends". "The Forgotten" is just that. Forgettable.

Tre is the album they didn't need to put out. It's a collection of leftovers. In fact I think there's a dynamite 15-17 track record in this three album set. Stick to that.

Tre
Grade: C+
ASide: Brutal Love, Missing You, Sex Drugs & Violence
BlindSide: 8th Ave Serenade, X-Kid, Dirty Rotten Bastards, 99 Revolutions
DownSide: Drama Queen, A Boy Named Train, Amanda, The Forgotten

Listening Post - The Knack - Normal as the Next Guy

Every Knack song starts off with a bang. "Let Me Out". "Pop is Dead".
So, why does the final Fieger/Averre album start off sounding like a rejected track from a Squeeze album?
Sure the song picks up after a bit, but it's lazy, beachcomber atitude and dumb lyrics make me wonder why they even bothered.
Fieger is older. And his particular brand of rock is driven by adolescent frustration. He's never once suggested he could be an elder statesman, all his songs are basically love songs. In fact, it doesn't seem like much of a stretch to think that he would have been a much in demand songwriter during the 50s. The Brill Building would have loved him.

But, in 2001, that kind of music is basically niche at best. The Knack of that era would be The Strokes (and even they would burn out after 2 albums).

They guys try to address their older status with songs like "Disillusioned Town", but, it doesn't really get you there, save as a piece of nostalgic remembrance. The same with "Girl I Never Lied to You", which, to me is the weirdest song on the album. It sounds nothing like a Knack song and that's because it's written by Monty Byron and John Corey the latter of whom was Fieger's first songwriting partner. They started the band, Sky, together. But, remembrance is sort of the theme of the record now, isn't it? They are very old and very done and the music of their youth, when they were relevant, has passed them by comepletely.

I don't know why the band didn't open with the title track, which is a fairly percussive piece (all the best Knack songs are, you know.) and snarky while at the same time defensive as hell. All the stuff I expect from Fieger. And I'm not sure why the world needed a redux of "One Day at a Time", but I actually prefer this version. And I can totally hear Robbie Rist or Lowen/Navarro covering it.

By the time you get deep into the album, and you realize that, well, this isn't the Knack of old, it's a collection of songs by a group of guys who make music and they aren't half bad, the album sort of grows. I am hardpressed to find a truly awful track in here, "Dance of Romance" being the exception.. Sure, much of it could've been written in the guys' sleep. But, you know what? I wish i could do that. At the time this record came out, Fieger was pushing 50 and he'd been recording music for 30 years. (His first band, Sky, will eventually be a part of this listening post, they have two albums that I was able to get). If he doesn't sound like he did 23 years earlier, isn't that to be expected?

In its own way, Normal as the Next Guy is the perfect Coda to The Knack. It's not really a classic Knack album, and they know it. It's a swan song of sorts, although I'm not sure Fieger knew he'd be dead in 6 years. It's an album by guys who don't need to make it. They made it. They get fat royalty checks from their big, era defining hit, "My Sharona". They just like to make music.

And that's the most important thing.

Grade: B+ (While the rating is higher then for Zoom, I do not consider this a Knack album proper. It's a Coda. Outside of their oeuvre in a way.)
ASide: Normal as the Next Guy, It's Not Me, Reason to Live
BlindSide: Spiritual Pursuit, One Day at a Time, Seven Days of Heaven, A World of My Own
DownSide: Dance of Romance

Listening Post - The Knack - Zoom

The Knack - Zoom - 1998

Let's get this out there. I love love love the opening track, "Pop is Dead", an infectious, snarky, reflective commentary on the state of pop culture wrapped up in a perfect 3:48 confection.
Terry Bozzio's drums emulate Bruce Gary's flourishy fills that I adored on that first record so much.

So, how's the rest?

LiveBlog time.

1. Pop Is Dead - Perfect.
2. Can I Borrow a Kiss? - A catchy knock off of "Needles & Pins", sublime Power Pop
3. Smilin' - Bozzio seems to have affected everyone here. And elevated everything at once. This song could've been a single.
4. Ambition - Co-Written by Stan Lynch (Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers), a weaker affair. As most of the stuff Fieger doesn't write with Averre tends to be. But it doesn't suck. Probably better acoustic.
5. Mister Magazine - Reminds me of Cheap Trick, a lot. That's not bad. They could've been cousins.
6. Everything I Do  - Another Co-write. This time with Suzi Quatro writer Melissa Connell. It's a ballad. A very Beatles-y one. And not that great.
7. Love is All There Is - Every 21st Century Power Pop band sounds like this song. Sparklejets UK, Andersons, Jellyfish, everyone on the IPO roster.
8. Terry & Julie Step Out - From the opening riff this sounds more like an old-school Knack song than any other. A treat. (With the haunting chants of "No. 9", the band just isn't hiding their Beatles love anymore)
9. Harder on You - No Knack album is complete without a Buddy Holly/Roy Orbison style track. That's this one. It's not bad, but it's nothing special. Written by Averre with, hey! Prescott Niles, the bassist! Good for you, Prescott!
10. You Gotta Be There - A Fieger Ballad. Actually, I don't think I've heard as earnest a one in the band's catalog yet. Have I? Not like this. I kind of like it.
11. Good Enough - A promising percussive-soul-rocker that wants to be better than it is. And it's too long, to boot. :(
12. In Blue Tonight - A melancholy nostalgia trip that builds into a Nick Lowe-esque rocker. Someone's getting older....One of the most mature pieces Fieger's ever written.
13. Tomorrow - Niles gets back in on the action with F&A for a straight ahead rocker. A rave-up, actually.
14. (All in the) All in All - Okay, I get it! You wanna be the Beatles! Jeez, porpoise song much? But it's fine. It's to be expected. That's who Fieger really wanted to be anyway. He gets a pass.

Zoom isn't bad. Not by a long shot. It's easily the 3rd best Knack album. And if it had been trimmed, it would give Round Trip a run for it's money. The band never stood a chance. Their time had come and gone. But, what're ya gonna do? Quit?

Didn't think so.

Grade: B
ASide: Pop Is Dead, Can I Borrow a Kiss
BlindSide: In Blue Tonight, Smilin', Tomorrow
DownSide: Good Enough, Everything I Do

Listening Post - The Knack - Serious Fun

The Knack - Serious Fun - 1991

The first thing you notice about the reunion album by The Knack, recorded 10 years after they broke up, is just how...generic it sounds.
With Don Was's hands on the dials the album has a certain crunch to it but that doesn't help, it doesn't make it better, in fact, it just makes the whole proceedings sound anonymous.

The cheekiness of the last 3 albums is non-existent. Somewhere in there are the spines of classic Fieger/Averre songs, but they are so muddied by production, production which sounds like...omg....like The Tubes' Love Bomb. I mean, just listen to "I'll be Your Mau Mau".

That's what it reminds me of. The band is there, I think. The songs were written by the same guys. But, the sound has been so updated for the 90s that everything we fell in love with is missing.

If a track shows promise, like "Serious Fun", the lyrics kick in and they are as trite as the weakest Power Pop you've ever heard. Like latter days Rubinoos trite. Like "Pulling Rabbits Out of a Hat" era Sparks trite.

Whereas some of the songs on earlier albums barely crossed the 2 minute mark, just about every song here hovers around 4 minutes and, you know what? That's too much. It's like "how many songs are too many Ramones songs for one listen?" (Answer...about 18) I mean, come on, "River of Sighs" is over 5 minutes long! For a Knack song!!! And that one sounds like the band is trying to be...um...Poison of all things. The same for "Shine", which tries so hard to be Anthemic! that the band gets lost.

I've spent too much time writing about this record. It's not great. It's forgettable and at times boring. It could have been better. Maybe next time.

Grade: C-
ASide: Rocket O' Love, Serious Fun, Doing the Dog
BlindSide: One Day at a Time, I'll be Your Mau Mau
DownSide: River of Sighs, Let's Get Lost

Listening Post - The Knack - Round Trip

After falling on their face with their follow up to their smash debut, Fieger, Averre and the band picked themselves off the self-congratulatory floor, tossed Mike Chapman out for Jack Douglas and pumped out Round Trip, their 3rd album and the last before they would break up for a while.

Too bad, really. Everything that was wrong with ...But The Little Girls Understand is right with Round Trip. Rather than harkening back and aping every influencer the band ever heard (Beatles, Stones, Rockabilly, Orbison, Specter, etc) the group fully embraces their Power Pop status and stand on the shoulders of the greats. The Raspberries, Big Star, Bay City Rollers and others have NOTHING on The Knack. Ironically, and sadly, Power Pop never really had a heyday. It was never truly embraced by anyone save the musicians who loved it. Weirdly, it has never really gone away, there are a gazillion Power Pop bands carrying on to this day. And they all owe a debt of gratitude to The Knack for breaking through so hard with the sound and paving...some way for them.

Much has been written about this record, about how it was unfairly maligned and very underrated and all of that is true. I'm not going to rehash it. The band is at it's muscly best on tracks like "Radiating Love" and "Soul Kissin'", thanks in no small part to the genius of Douglas who brings a lot of Cheap Trick and bit of Aerosmith to the proceedings. He really gives the band it's heft and credibility. I swear "Africa" owes as much to Steve Miller Band as it does to anything else. But, rather than rip the sound off, it just sounds borrowed and fresh. And "She Likes the Beat" has as much in common with late 70s Joe Jackson as it does Nick Gilder, and I could hear it playing well on early 80s radio. That it didn't is a shame. And the hits just keep coming.
"Just Wait and See" is super Power Pop.
"We Are Waiting" is Magical Mystery Tour redux, more Monkees than Beatles but I mean that in a very good way.
End Side One

So, what happens on the flip side?

The quintessential Fieger/Knack track, "Boys Go Crazy", that's what. A revved up cousin to "Good Girls Don't" (in theme and spirit, at least). Followed by the story song, "Lil Cal's Big Mistake", as self assured urban rocker if I've ever heard one which blends into the haunting "Sweet Dreams", an experimental prog rocker that is surely unexpected.

But, "Another Lousy Day in Paradise" is the perfect Knack song if I ever heard one. One that blends Big Star, The Beatles, The Kinks, The Cars and wraps them all up in one taut rocker. And one of the best tracks on the album, hell, in the band's entire catalog is the only Berton Averre solo-penned "Pay the Devil (Ooo, Baby, Ooo)", a giant, anthemic psychedelic piece of Lennon-esque pop.

If that's not enough, the album ends on the biggest, highest note of a track. A snarky, angry, punky, messy piece of social commentary called, "Art War". Considering that The Knack were basically a piece of Pop Art themselves, it's a perfect biting of the hand that feeds.

Round Trip is a treat. An unearthed, should have been, classic. Huh. I guess I did have something to say, after all.

Grade: A
ASide: Radiating Love, Boys Go Crazy, Another Lousy Day in Paradise, Pay the Devil (Ooo, Baby, Ooo)
BlindSide: Soul Kissin', Africa, She Likes the Beat, Just Wait and See, Lil Cal's Big Mistake, Art War

Listening Post - The Knack - ...But the Little Girls Understand.

The Knack - ...But the Little Girls Understand. - 1980

Hey! That's THE Sharona on the cover of the follow up to their massive debut album! I wonder if this album will have anything near as good as that track!!

The first half of that sentence I'm pretty sure no one said when they reached for this platter in 1980. But I am positive that second part is what people were thinking when this album came out.

And Fieger and Averre try hard to give the people what they want. That opening track, "Baby Talks Dirty" sounds like it was the son-of-Sharona and the next track, "I Want Ya" attempts to out do the previous record by ramping up the crash and sturm and drang. Those drums are giGANtic. For me, even though it's Get The Knack Pt. II, I'm okay with it.
The first real stumble on the record occurs on the third track, the Buddy Holly influenced (read: ripoff/pander), "Tell Me You're Mine" where Fieger inexplicably twists his voice into a quasi-Orbison baritone and fails miserably. We sort of right ourselves on the bright "Mr. Handelman", which is...well...it's not awful. It's just a song that wasn't good enough for the first album and is the kind of thing you expect deeper on a sophomore record. It's also the first song Fieger and Averre wrote together. So, there's that.

What's most intriguing to me is the direction the band takes on the second single, "Can't Put a Price on Love". The track sounds way more like a descendent of latter day Stones versus The Beatles, whom Fieger was trying to be on that first record. "Price" is the sort of song Southside Johnny and The Asbury Jukes should have recorded. Thankfully, Side One recovers with a flourish. The supershort, "Hold on Tight and Don't Let Go" is an inspired piece of pop rock. In and out in a flash, leave a good looking corpse.

Including the Ray Davies penned, "The Hard Way" is odd, it could almost make a case that Fieger is a better songwriter, since it's not up to the band's snuff. But it's gone so fast and replaced by the frenetic pairing of, "It's You" and "End of the Game" that you don't care. The second side is so lickety split that I have to wonder just how much Colombian Marching Powder might have been flying around the studio.
At least the band is having fun as evidenced by the Phil Spector homage "The Feeling I Get". Trouble is, it's SO on the nose accurate that it's hard to believe that it's not a cover. But they don't sound original at all here. "Havin' a Rave Up" sounds toooooo much like any rockabilly band of the 50s. And "How Can Love Hurt So Much" has John Barry and Shirley Bassey all over it. (I hope I got the right reference there. Maybe I meant Nancy Sinatra....)

Little Girls...is such a schizoid record that offers fans nothing more than what we already got the last time, rendering it sort of redundant. At the same time, there's nothing on the record so fantastic and hookalicious that it should encourage any new fans to flock to the band.

Grade: B+
ASide: Baby Talks Dirty, Havin' a Rave Up
BlindSide: I Want Ya, Hold on Tight and Don't Let Go, It's You
DownSide: Tell Me You're Mine

Listening Post - The Knack - Get the Knack

I love just about every Knack track I've ever heard. But, truly, that isn't that many. Never did a band soar so high so fast and crash that much faster than this Power Pop quartet. Let's go back and listen shall we?



The Knack - Get The Knack - 1979

Yeah, yeah. I know. "I've heard 'My Sharona'. I know THAT band.

Are you sure?

The opening track, "Let Me Out", really sets the tone for the whole experience that is The Knack's debut record. The pure energy of that 2:22 song is enough to draw you in and lets the listener know that this group is tighter than....well...think about something that's really tight and this group is about that snug.
Falling right into "Your Number or Your Name", a track that straddles the balance between The Beatles and Glam rock, the pure power doesn't let up. It's melodic as hell and a real showcase for Bruce Gary's drum fills.
In truth, "My Sharona" is maybe the 3rd or 4th best track on this record. Sure, it was the monster hit, but, next to "Good Girls Don't", "Let Me Out", "Oh Tara" or what, with the Joe Jackson-sounding "She's so Selfish, the latter days Beatles sounding (Or is that Cheap Trick I'm hearing in there?) "Maybe Tonight" and "Your Number...", we just call "Side One".

Side Two opens with the era-defining Sharona. And if that was all it had to offer, dayenu. But, it follows with a Buddy Holly cover, "Heartbeat", a perfect harkening to the roots of rock and roll, establishing The Knack as heir apparents. If that wasn't enough, the weird-o, New Wave deep track, "Siamese Twins (The Monkey and Me), solidifies the album as not just a series of hook laden singles. It's an album of hook laden SONGS.

The requisite ballad, "Lucinda" is buried so deep into this album that its easy to forgive because the album picks right up with "That's What the Little Girls Do", which, with the lyrics in "Sharon" and the sexual content of "Good Girls Don't" and the general content of "Frustrated, speak directly to the 14 year old listening to this album...yeah...it's the soundtrack to male-adolescent frustration/puberty.

I have a special affection for this record for many reasons. One of them is that it was produced by one of the architects of Glam Rock. Mike Chapman was one half of the svengali writing duo of Chinn/Chapman who gave us all of the early Sweet hits. His finger is all over the great tracks of the 70s and this is only the second greatest offerings of his from that decade, the other being Blondie's Parallel Lines.

I love this record. I love the immediacy. I love the frustration. The sex. The calamity. The pent-upness.
It's sublime.


Grade: A+
ASide: My Sharona, Good Girls Don't
BlindSide: Let Me Out, Oh Tara, She's So Selfish, That's What the Little Girls Do, Frustrated.