The 1985 Listening Post - The Opposition - Empire Days

The Opposition - Empire Days

#103 

1985 Housekeeping

The Opposition

Empire Days

3.5 out of 5

Genre: SynthRock

Highlights:

Five Minutes

So. The U2 meets The Alarm with synths is back. I liked Intimacy. I loved Promises. This one?

It’s damn good. Even though the songs are all a bit long. Even good ones like “Fool for You” (which sound s a LOT like Jack Antonoff’s Bleachers) and “If That Wasn’t Love” feel like they are stretching when the songs clock in a reasonable times. 

I like this album but not as much as the last. It started out promising but soon began to feel like Deja Vu. And it all wearily runs out of steam on the title track which sounds like 1982ish Gary Numan.

 https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLBJ7ztNazTVAGGhJoYobsJP5vWQhMmKhA

The 1985 Listening Post - Killing Joke - Night Time

Killing Joke - Night Time

#102

March 1985

Killing Joke

Night Time

Genre: New Wave/Post Punk

4.5 out of 5

Highlights:

Darkness Before Dawn

Kings and Queens

Eighties

Boy, it’s been a while since I liked anything Killing Joke put out. But this…this is great. Moody, pounding, pulsing, intoxicating. 

It’s goth rock but it’s upbeat and energetic and reminds me of late 70s new Wave bands with the almost tribal drumming. This is a raw hedonistic fever dream of dance rock.

The best Killing Joke album since their debut. 

If you listen to just ONE track, make sure it’s “Eighties”, a song from which Kurt Cobain stole the entire riff for “Come As You Are” and his estate should have to pay royalties. 

https://itunes.apple.com/us/album/night-time/714822155

The 1985 Listening Post - Jason and the Scorchers - Lost and Found

Jason and the Scorchers - Lost and Found

#101

March 1985

Jason and the Scorchers

Lost and Found

Genre: Cowpony

5 out of 5

Highlights:

Last Time Around

White Lies

If Money Talks

Lost Highway

Broken Whiskey Glass

Change the Tune

You know what this has me thinking? That there were a few roads out of punk and, looking for a way out and into the mainstream, X would go big cowpunk on Ain’t Love Grand and I can’t help but wonder how many times they heard this Jason and the Scorchers record and thought, “Yes. That’s what we should do. THAT is a big fucking sound.”

And it is. 

There’s a reason they are called The Scorchers. They came out of the gate with this one loaded for bear.

I would never in my wildest dreams been listening to this in 85. Even though I loved Beat Farmers, this was too “Americana” for young Allen. 

Older Allen?

Easting this with a spoon straight out of the carton, standing over the sink, pouring hershey’s syrup all over it and crumbling up cookies and chocolate bars, while drinking B-52s. 

Side One is relentless. 

Side Two looks at Side One and says, “Hold my beer.”

I feel like there’s a lot of the future in here, from Mojo Nixon to Drive By Truckers to Reverend Horton Heat to Ryan Adams and others. This is the merging of George Thorogood and John Doe. 

And it’s excellent.

https://itunes.apple.com/us/album/fervor-lost-found/714979764

The 1985 Listening Post - The Morlocks - Emerge

The Morlocks - Emerge

#100

1985 Housekeeping

The Morlocks

Emerge

Genre: Garage Rock

4.5 out of 5

Highlights:

Born Loser

There have been a lot of bands who did it better but I don’t know if any have been so slavish to the sound of merging Garage Punk with Horror Rock. I want to hop in a topdown, drive into the desert in black and white and give myself over to Russ Meyer and whatever he and his denizens have in store for me.

This might be the best story we’ve heard about on The Listening Post but it seems that the Lead Singer was presumed dead for a while but actually: “In 1999, Spin Magazine printed an article that claimed that lead singer Leighton Koizumi had died, however this turned out to be untrue. The reason for Koizumi's vanishing act from music-making, involved the "robbing of a dealer" in a Mexican border town in 1990. Although he was just after drugs, Koizumi got ten years in prison on a kidnapping charge, because, as he tells it, the incident involved "tying people up." When he was finally released, he started a new band which he called the Morlocks, with none of the original members.”

And that’s living rock and roll, baby. 

I know I’m being generous with this but I really loved every scuzzy second of it. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f_v8hyvTI_8&list=PLJuMCQgFOzAyEGM3_muhXLdY3HomWmqRL

The 1985 Listening Post - Black Sun Ensemble - Black Sun Ensemble

Black Sun Ensemble - Black Sun Ensemble

#99

March 1985

Black Sun Ensemble

Black Sun Ensemble

0.5 out of 5

I really wish this was an Ensemble as in some kind of fashion statement instead of what I just had to sit through: Meandering Improvisational Psychedelia Jazz Rock fusion. Five of those words are headache inducing for me. 

For every masturbatory guitar solo track (the plodding “Mayan Dance”) there’s a turgid piece of somnambulance (“Blues in B Minor”). Songs like “Red Ocean” are deceiving because they sound like they might actually not be boring and hackish and then they sound…well…like me on guitar. My band took my guitar away for a reason. 

THREE MINUTES OF GUITAR FUZZ NOODLING!! Like they just got a phase pedal or something. 

UGH!

This has no business being on this list. This just makes me angry. 

My rating for this is purely biased. 

I hated this. Every second of it. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s5ZmZd6fRRQ&t=1889s

The 1985 Listening Post - The Connells - Darker Days

The Connells - Darker Days

#98

1985 Housekeeping

The Connells

Darker Days

Genre: Jangle Pop/Dream Rock

4.25 out of 5

Highlights:

Hats Off

Seven

When I moved to LA The Connells had a big hit (to us) called “Scotty’s Lament”. My roommate and I loved that. He had the cassette. But I never really investigated the band beyond that song.

I certainly didn’t know they had a first album. I don’t know if this is “Jangle Pop” or “Alternative” or how to classify it but it’s definitely the sound of a changing decade. Whatever we thought was “80s” is, more and more, defined by 1979ish -1984. As the sound morphs into the decade of REM I really hear the 90s on the horizon. 

Before Green Day I’d never heard an American lead singer try SO hard to sound English. Still don’t mind that a bit.

It’s like a folk album influenced by The Byrds and a whole host of 80s British bands. 

I love it. 

 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WyQOWS4NaJo&list=PL6voaEZdRMBLS-GwQyXQIW7S4u8TvGKIt

The 1985 Listening Post - Yeah Yeah Noh - Cutting the Heavenly Lawn of Greatness...Last Rites for the God of Love

Yeah Yeah Noh - Cutting the Heavenly Lawn of Greatness...Last Rites for the God of Love

#97

March 1985

Yeah Yeah Noh

Cutting The Heavenly Lawn of Greatness...Last Rites For The God Of Love

Genre: Psychedelic Rock

3.5 out of 5

Highlights:

Crimplene Seed Lifestyle

The vocals are that goth-y mid range that comes across to me as “important” or sad, less singing than imploring. But it’s set against a backdrop of psychedelic rock that harkens to the Strawberry Alarm Clock era and I’d really thought that sound was done. This is an interesting hybridization that ultimately has me wondering what they were like live since the album didn’t really move me beyond saying, “The Yeah Yeah Noh? Yeah, I’ve heard them”.

Their cover of The Beatles “She Said” is appropriately haunting and might be the best track here.

 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nrmMAvtYIQg&list=PLFtXhl189dSZRYkQ9GVdJJL8-fi7RX6Je

The 1985 Listening Post - The Farmers Boys - With These Hands

The Farmers Boys - With These Hands

#96

March 1985

The Farmers Boys

With These Hands

Genre: Jangle pop

3.25 out of 5

Highlights:

Phew Wow

If you forced The Lettermen to become a jangle pop band I bet the opening track is what they would sound like. Effervescent, poppy, sunny, happy, sweet. 

And the gentle pop just continues throughout. It’s a bit thin gruel, however, so it becomes somewhat forgettable. On “Sport of All” I get the distinct sense of what Morrissey would sound like if he sang actual, you know, songs. 

The trouble here is that they lead off with their best track, “In The Country” and that’s a Cliff Richard song and their best song, “Phew Wow” is actually better, just as bubbly and should’ve been a hit. 

Otherwise they are Pop Smiths. But not popsmiths. Knowdamean?

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLBJ7ztNazTVChziDJueAXjdiGeXRZl6eF

The 1985 Listening Post - Dark Angel - We Have Arrived

Dark Angel - We Have Arrived

#95

March 1985

Dark Angel

We Have Arrived

Genre: Speed Metal

2 out of 5

Highlights:

No Tomorrow

You know what? Just cuz you wanna be a speed metal band doesn’t mean you can be that speed metal hero you hope to be. 

And if you announce that you “have arrived” with your album title, you better live up that declaration. 

Dark Angel HAS, indeed, arrived.

In the bargain bin. 

Well, that’s not entirely fair. I did quite enjoy the thrash of “No Tomorrow” and was somewhat surprised at the relatively competent acoustic part of “Hell’s On It’s Knees”. It does a completely expected pivot to thrash, how could they not? It’s not like they could sustain anything close to traditional song construction out side staccato lyric spitting and shrieking. But the opening was a nice diversion.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8pPsR1MW_9A

The 1985 Listening Post - Michael Bolton - Everybody's Crazy

Michael Bolton - Everybody's Crazy

#94

March 1984

Michael Bolton

Everybody’s Crazy

Genre: Rock?

3 out of 5

Highlights:

Everybody’s Crazy

Ok. This garbage man is back. 

That’s not fair. Maybe this is amazing. 

I’ll let you know in 40 minutes

Boy, that Foreigner sound…it’s really a thing, huh? 

(In preparation for what I was expecting I made a big batch of mudslides. Turns out I’m drinking them for all the wrong reasons now. This is not what thought it would be)

Listen to that title track. This doesn’t sound ANYTHING like the last Boltons. This is…Kiss as fronted by Bolton trying to sound like David Coverdale. And he almost pulls it off. But it’s a band. He doesn’t sound like a vocalist. I wonder what the story is here. 

Hey! Bruce Kulick played lead guitar on this! Now a LOT of it makes sense!

https://itunes.apple.com/us/album/everybodys-crazy/581666353