Album 513.
Iron Maiden........................The Number Of The Beast   (1982)










Iron Maiden’s legendary status was cemented with the release of this album in 1982. Replacing the growling vocals of Paul Di'Anno with the soaring “air raid siren” of Bruce Dickinson allowed the band to truly hit its stride.


 "Run To The Hills" and "The Number of the Beast" were both successful singles, and "Hallowed Be Thy Name" is widely regarded as one of the greatest rock songs ever recorded. Few bands in any genre have put three such landmark songs on one album.


 This album inspired legions of young rock bands coming up, both contemporary and in the far future. As Jon Schaffer of Iced Earth said:

"I was really right around the time that I heard Number of the Beast that I got my first guitar… I got that album, and it blew my mind because I had never heard anything like that. I grew up with the old wave of British heavy metal, so we’re talking Sabbath and Deep Purple…Then Maiden comes out, and they have this wild rhythm section. The bass player, Steve Harris, just blew my mind. His compositions, the tempo changes, the guitar harmonies, the subject matter of the lyrical content. The whole thing was the ultimate package."


 To this day, reviewers still call this possibly the best heavy metal album of all time.

That Sulk, the B-side I like better than the A-side, if I had it in vinyl the second set of songs would be getting the airing. However, the opening track, 'Arrogance Gave Him Up', is up to the standard of the best on side two.

Others on the first side are a bit too slow and even downbeat for me, especially the cover song Gloomy Sunday which was a cover of a cover, I'm sure. 

Much of the album has a very dense sound, to me, like they've overdubbed the richness of the keyboards, and because of that it can become a bit monotonous. It suits the better songs, but it's overdone on the others. But The Associates at this point do sound totally unique, can't think of anyone close to that style, and Alan Rankine deserves as much credit for that as Billy Mackenzie.

Finally, I enjoyed that write up, A/C. Didn't know Billy Mackenzie had his own fashion shop, for example.

Album 514.
Duran Duran......................................Rio   (1982)













"Durandemonium" swept the globe with 1982's Rio album: it heralded the arrival of the music video revolution. The flamboyant videos to the title track and "Save A Prayer" (by Russell Mulcahy , who went on to make Highlander) portray the band as sophisticated jet setters, lolling around exotic locales with beautiful women, these clips epitomise the 1980's spirit, as does the albums artwork (Patrick Nagel's cover painting captures the decades graphic style: it's Japanese woodblock look typifying a fascination with the exotic)

A/C, you've not said if 'The Number of the Beast' is getting purchased or not..... 

Album 515.
Violent Femmes..........................................Violent Femmes   (1983)









Violent Femmes is the band’s debut album, released in April 1983 on Slash Records. Lead singer Gordon Gano was only 19 when the record came out – most of the songs were written while he was still in high school. The record thus captures the feeling of high school sexual angst fiercely and accurately, with no filter and no chance for nostalgia to tint it into an ideal it never was.

 The US CD version, released in 1984, adds the songs “Ugly”/“Gimme the Car” previously only available as a single.

 In 2003, a commemorative edition came out with a bunch of rarities, such as demos and live recordings.


"Weird kids," both as performers and audience, are rocks mainstay, few have articulated their world view with such brilliance as Violent Femmes.





"What we're saying is, Here's romanticism thrown back in your face...Here's raw emotion. Can you deal with it?"

Victor De Lorenzo, 1983



Although heard of them but never actually heard them, I'm strangely looking forward to this one.
 

Last edited by arabchanter (09/5/2019 12:30 pm)

I had quite forgot he brought out an album.

Never heard one minute of it.

 

I am going to listen to Mclaren's album right now Pat. Verdict to follow.

P.s. Violent Femmes album is excellent.

Album 514.
Duran Duran......................................Rio   (1982)













This is a fine album, very much of it's time (if you were around at that time, you'd remember the videos) top class synth-pop with special shout out to the bass player, who seemed to stand out on most of the tracks, but once again I have to try and put my dislike of a certain band member to one side and concentrate on the album.


Here's the rub for me, back in '81 when "Planet Earth" was their latest single, me and a few mates went through to Edinburgh to see them, the concert was pretty good and we decided to keep the night going and ended up in a Nightclub/Disco by the name of "Browns" (I think that was what it was called) and were having a good laugh and banter with the locals and concert goers who were arriving in dribs and drabs, we also met quite a few Dundee boys we new fae the toon who had been at the concert as well.


This is where the story turns, we were all having a rare old time, when in walks Duran Duran, at first it wasn't too bad, everybody dancing to various records,but I did notice most of the weemin starting to be drawn to the band and starting to dance in close proximity to them, then Le Bon only goes up to the DJ and starts chatting to him, and wouldn't you know it for the next hour (maybe longer, I couldn't tell you 'cause we fucked off) all you got were Duran Duran songs.


Now you might think that was bad enough, but listen to this, ken when you're fuckin' about and you sing into yer clenched fist as if you've got a microphone in it, well that fanny was doing that dancing around the dance floor, I kid you not, on my bairns lives, what a complete and utter tosspot, but to be fair the gash that was in there that night fuckin lapped it up, so holding my hands up maybe a slight case of sour grapes, but being honest I've always thought of him as a right trumpet.



So to the album, for me it's been very cleverly produced, very slick without being cheesy, Rhodes synth calls out "this is the 80s" but even today I don't feel it's lost much of it's pizazz. Opening up with "Rio" (the best track for me) was a gamble that payed off for this listener, as it got you were they wanted you right from the start, other favourable tracks included,"Hungry Like The Wolf," and "The Chauffeur" I'm afraid I never took to "Save a Prayer" although I know a lot of people did.



So all in all, album wasn't too bad, Le Bon is a Ravi Shanker and my other half has a greatest hits CD so as to facilitate any Duran Duran impulse I should have, so bottom line, this album wont be getting added to my vinyl collection.  But once again, what an album cover!





Bits & Bobs;


What’s the most seminal, classic, 1980s pop song you can think of? What’s the song that perfectly encapsulates the musical trends and styles of the decade? This is a question that will get a multitude of answers from people, but at least a fair number of people would answer “Hungry Like the Wolf”, by Duran Duran from the band’s 1982 album Rio. More than just “Wolf,”


 Rio is a quintessentially 1980s album, an album that helps to define a decade, despite it’s release early in the decade. After all, Rio was released in 1982. It shows just how on-point Duran Duran was that they could release an album that helped to serve as a cornerstone of the decade when the decade had just started.


 More than anything, Rio is fun. This is to be expected–Duran Duran took the band’s name from a Barbarella character, for crying out loud, this is a band that doesn’t take itself too seriously. Songs on Rio are willing to push the envelope, delving into something that’s goofy yet spectacularly well-made. “My Own Way” ends with Simon le Bon shouting phrases over a pulsing guitar melody, in an endearing yet slightly dumb manner.


 The biggest candidate for Duran Duran’s well-polished fun is “Hungry Like the Wolf”, a song that’s equally iconic and equally stupid. “Hungry Like the Wolf” is an amazing song, three minutes of pop perfection with an amazing vocal line, wonderful backing vocals, a beautiful thirty seconds in the final chorus, and the dumbest lyrics known to man. What on Earth does “I smell like I sound” even mean to begin with? The bit before the final chorus, where Simon le Bon whispers “hungry like the wolf” over the sound of heavy breathing is also hilariously silly–and that’s the point. Duran Duran knows it sounds silly, why else would they do this? This is a beautifully silly song that they play 100% straight and that makes it all the better.



Rio is an album full of amazingly well-crafted and well-produced songs that are actually quite long. A good number of the songs on the album are over four minutes, eschewing the traditional pop radio time constraints. And yet, they don’t feel like they’re over four minutes. “The Chauffeur” pushes five minutes and yet sounds shorter and longer at the same time. The song is haunting, le Bon’s vocals flitting over a minimal score, the synth dropping in like raindrops before swapping to a flowing, lilty overplay, bringing so much atmospheric power to the piece. Those moments where le Bon sings the phrase “Sing Blue Silver” are downright transcendent, a musical oddity that somehow sets itself apart from the other songs but fits the tone of the album perfectly.


 At least for me, the true highlight of the album is the title track. “Rio” is such a beautifully composed song. There’s no weak moments, there aren’t any obvious faults, it’s just a bright, beautiful poppy with an amazing sax riff near the end. From those opening synths to the pounding guitars, it’s an amazing opening that just drops you right into pop perfection. Do the lyrics make sense? Not entirely! But again, it doesn’t matter. The lyrics are a perfect fit for the moment, only falling apart if I’m also just so happy to see a synthpop song dealing with the American Southwest. So often that area’s just relegated to country/western but nope, here’s a ridiculous synthpop masterpiece that namechecks the Rio Grande River.


 There’s a reason Rio’s made plenty of ‘top albums of the 1980s’ lists and that’s simply because it’s a good album. Rio is a beautiful piece of synthpop perfection, with each song intricately written. It’s an amazingly silly and amazingly polished pop masterpiece that deserves all the praise it gets.


 HISTORYIt was at a Siouxsie and the Banshees gig in 1978 at Birmingham’s Mayfair Ballroom in the Bullring shopping centre, that a young John Taylor and Nick Rhodes had their Damascene moment. The support act that night was The Human League, who performed without any drummer or guitars just three synthesizers and a drum machine, leaving the two awestruck. A few months later, equipped with a Wasp synthesiser (the first on sale in Birmingham) brought for him by his Mum along with a rhythm box, Taylor left Dada, the band he had joined before enrolling at Birmingham Polytechnic’s College of Art and along with Rhodes and Stephen Duffy, a fellow student at BPCA, formed the first incarnation of what was to become Duran Duran.


 Taking inspiration from Barbarella’s, one of the city’s hotspots which was named after a French sc-fi film, the trio adopted the name of Duran Duran based on the film’s villain Dr Durand Durand. Duffey brought in his friend Simon Colley to play bass and with some electric drums they were ready to play live. The band’s first official gig was in Duffey’s college lecture hall in 1979 before they played at Canon Hill Arts Centre (now the MAC) with a ticket price of 50p. They squeezed out another gig at Barbarella’s before Colley and Duffey left to join local band TV Eye. Andy Taylor joined on guitar and after a chance meeting at a party, Roger Taylor was enlisted as the band’s official drummer. After hearing Chic’s ‘Everybody Dance’ one night, John Taylor was inspired to pick up the bass guitar and switched from playing keyboards. With a new singer Andy Wickett and a new guitarist Alan Curtis brought on board the band were ready to head into the studio to record some demoes. Though Wickett left after only a few gigs he had a big influence on the band, co-writing an early version of ‘Girls On Film’ and ‘Stevie’s Radio Station’ which later became ‘Rio’. He was replaced by Jeff Thomas.

 Wanting to eschew the normal gig circuit by playing in more unconventional venues Rhodes and Taylor set about looking for their next performance space and spied a poster advertising a Bowie night at the Rum Runner club on Broad St. They met with the owners, brothers Paul and Michael Berrow and handed them a demo tape. Liking what they heard they offered them a slot supporting a band called Fashion on 12th March 1980. From here on in the Rum Runner became an indelible part of the band’s rise to fame. The Berrow brothers became their management and along with the band formed the Tritec Music company, named after the club’s triangular themed bar. But they soon fell out with Thomas which led to his departure, leaving the band on the hunt for a new singer. Curtis followed suit claiming that he didn’t like the scene anymore and headed back to London. An advert was put in Melody Maker for a new guitarist and Andy Taylor made the trip down from Newcastle to answer the call. Now all they needed was a singer.


 A student who worked part-time at the club suggested that they meet her room-mate Simon Le Bon who armed with his blue book of lyrics fitted in perfectly and on 16th July the band played their first gig at the Rum Runner with this classic lineup. At the end of 1980, with a handful of gigs in Brum and London under their belts and financed by Michael Berrow mortgaging his house, the band set off on tour with Hazel O’Connor. They attracted the attention of both EMI and Phonogram who started a bidding war to sign them up. It was a sense of patriotism towards The Beatles that saw EMI win through and they were signed in December. They released their debut album Duran Duran in June 1981, with the first single from it ‘Planet Earth’, reaching #12 in the UK charts. The follow up ‘Careless Memories’ didn’t fare so well only reaching #37. Their third single, ‘Girls on Film’, however, lit the touch paper that saw the band explode in the US. With a raunchy video produced by Godley and Creme hitting just days after MTV had launched in the US, the band’s domination of their visual identity had begun. Beamed widescreen in clubs the song propelled the album to the #3 spot in the UK and led to their first of many successful tours of the US. Their UK tour saw them play on the back of civil unrest and rioting, including a show in Birmingham the day after the Handsworth Riots.


 They released their follow-up album Rio the next year, which saw a clutch of singles – ‘Hungry Like The Wolf’, ‘Save A Prayer’ and title track ‘Rio’  – land in the top 20 and jettison them to world wide fame. A world tour followed including a support slot on Blondie’s US tour with the British press labelling them the “Fab 5”. They also received a royal seal of approval as Diana Princess of Wales declared them to be her favourite band.  The album did not immediately take off in the US mainly in part because it was promoted as a New Romantic album, a scene that was both unfamiliar and therefore unpopular over the pond. The album was remixed and re-released as a dance album prompting an appearance on US TV show “Dancin’ On Air” which gave it the boost it needed to climb the charts. With MTV constantly playing their videos for tracks like ‘Hungry Like The Wolf’ they were able to sustain an influence on the top 20 with the album peaking at #6. Rolling Stone magazine alluded to this when they wrote in 1983, “They may be the first rock group to ride in on a video wave”. With the US now firmly on side, they re-released their debut album with the addition of new track ‘Is There Something I Should Know’ which hit the top spot in the UK charts. What followed was a sense of hysteria as this “Second Invasion” took the US by storm.


 1983 proved to be a successful year for Nick Rhodes. producing Kajagoogoo’s chart-topping single ‘Too Shy’ after meeting Limahl in London’s Embassy Club where he was a waiter.  The following year they holed up as tax exiles in a French chateau in the south of France, before hopping between Monserrat and Sydney to record their third album Seven and The Ragged Tiger. These were heady times of money and excess with the band combining a highly stylised and fashion conscious image with the trappings of success. Designer suits and flashy yachts became de rigeur as egos clashed and insecurities were brought into hard focus propelled by the pressure to follow up and maintain past glories. The album was released at the end of 1984 with the band making the unprecedented move of releasing the video for the first single from it – ‘Union of the Snake’ – to MTV a week earlier than the single. ‘New Moon On Monday’ followed which peaked at #9 in the UK before ‘The Reflex’, produced by Nile Rodgers which kick-started a very successfully relationship with the band, hit the top spot in both the UK and US achieving global success. It was also their last UK #1. 1984 saw the band really hit their commercial peak playing to packed out stadia in the US and creating a live album Arena charting the experience. ‘Wild Boys’, again produced by Rodgers, was released in October which went to #2 on both sides of the Atlantic. The band appeared on the front cover of Rolling Stone and picked up two Grammy awards. They topped off the year as part of the legendary Band Aid charity single lineup whilst simultaneously gracing the front pages of multiple teen magazines as pop pinups.


 But things changed the following year with the band experiencing an unofficial split as members went off in search of different musical pursuits. There was the rock element consisting of John and Andy Taylor who collaborated with Robert Palmer and Tony Thompson to form the Power Station and had a few top ten singles. And there was Le Bon and Rhodes who stuck with the Duran Duran sound channeling it into a band called Arcadia. They released an album – So Red the Rose – that enlisted the likes of Sting, Herbie Hancock and Pink Floyd’s David Gilmour. Drummer Roger Taylor straddled his allegiance to both camps. The band reunited and released ‘A View To A Kill’ in May 1985, which became the first James Bond theme to top the US charts, peaking at #2 in the UK. On July 13th and following on from the success of Band Aid, the band performed at Philadelphia’s John F Kennedy stadium to 90,000 people and an estimated TV audience of 1.5 billion. This was the last time the original five piece played together for 20 years.


 The tide changed in 1986 when Roger Taylor, burnt out and exhausted after five years of constant touring, writing and recording, left seeking rural retreat. Guitarist Andy Taylor followed soon after due to legal wrangles. He had signed a solo recording contract in LA but was forced back into the studio to record the next Duran Duran album. Numerous delays caused the recording to stall and the band eventually let him go. The album Notorious was released in November and featured Nile Rodgers and Missing Persons’ Warren Cuccurullo on guitar. The eponymous single went to #2 in the US and #7 in the UK and though album sales were strong, their halcyon days were far behind them. They tried to shed their teen idol, manufactured pop image for a more sophisticated one but critics believed that in doing so they were loosing their identity. They were sailing through choppy waters, sacking their Berrow brothers management over a financial dispute and combined with a lack of promotion from their record label EMI, the band ran aground.


 They released a new experimental album Big Thing in 1988 which spawned a couple of top ten hits both sides of the Atlantic. They toured it the following year and made Cuccurullo a fully fledged member along with session drummer Sterling Campbell. A greatest hits album – Decade- followed before 1990’s Liberty which slid quickly out of the top ten. For the first time in the band’s history they didn’t tour the album, instead choosing to play a handful of club gigs coupled with some TV appearances. Campbell left in 1991 and they had to wait two more years for a new album entitled Duran Duran and nicknamed the “wedding album” referring to the cover art of wedding photos of the band members’ families. This also distinguished it from their 1981 debut of the same name. The single ‘Ordinary World’ hit #3 in the US and #6 in the UK and earned the band an Ivor Novello award. This success took the band by surprise and they organised a world tour which had to be postponed seven months in because Le Bon had strained his vocal cords. After six weeks recuperation he was able to sing again and they completed the tour. They released Thank You in 1995, a covers album that featured versions of Led Zeppelin’s ‘Thank You’, Lou Reed’s ‘Perfect Day’ (which he stated in interview was the best ever cover of his song) and Melle Mel’s ‘White Lines’. It also saw drummer Roger Taylor return from the wilderness.


 With one Taylor returning to the fold, another left. John Taylor left the band to concentrate on the launch of his B5 record label as well as to mop up his very public divorce to Amanda De Cadenet. The remaining members headed back into the studio and re-wrote many of the songs featured on their next album Medazzaland. Single ‘Out of My Mind’ was used as the theme to The Saint film and another pioneering move was made in that ‘Electric Barbarella’ which harked back to their 70’s Brum origins was the first single ever to be sold online. The album was released in Oct 1997 in the US but due to poor sales it wasn’t ever released in the UK. In the summer of 1998 they headlined the Princess Diana Memorial Concert. In 1999 they left EMI and signed with Disney’s Hollywood Records for what was supposed to be a three year deal. But the album Pop Trash steered away from their established sound, which meant that it crashed and burned along with the record contract after only a year. In 2000, Le Bon approached John Taylor with a proposal to reform the classic Duran Duran lineup. Taylor agreed and they let Cuccurullo go, who went back to Missing Persons, with Roger and Andy Taylor rejoining. Contract free and back to the original lineup they again headed for the balmy shores of the Cote D’Azur for some inspiration.


 After spending the first few years of the noughties writing new material, they returned to London in search of a new record deal. But they found many closed doors as people didn’t want to gamble on orchestrating the band’s comeback. Undeterred, they decided to go on tour and the subsequent 2003 25th Anniversary dates sold out stadia in Japan as well as some smaller venues at home and in the US. In August they presented the MTV Video Music awards and received a surprise lifetime achievement award. This was echoed by Q magazine in October and they picked up an Outstanding Contribution to Music award at The Brits in February of the following year. A string of successful Antipodean dates followed with prime time spots in the US at the Super Bowl where their performance of ‘Wild Boys’ was watched by millions. Sell out homecoming gigs greeted them on their return in April 2004 including five nights at Wembley Arena. They again become darlings of the press with a la mode bands like Scissor Sisters and Goldfrapp alternating support slots. They signed with Epic records in June and released their 11th studio album Astronaut in October hitting #3 in UK charts and #7 in the US. The first single released ‘(Reach Up For The) Sunrise’ reached top spot in the US Billboard Dance Chart and #5 in the UK top ten, making it the highest for the band since ‘View To A Kill’.


 In 2006, Andy Taylor left the band again at the end of the year with the band citing that an “unworkable gulf” had developed between them and Taylor due to personal and financial reasons. Dom Brown who had played with them on tour took up permanent residency.


 After Taylor’s departure, the planned album Reportage was scrapped and a new album Red Carpet Massacre was released featuring some Timbaland produced tracks. Two huge Wembley gigs mapped out their summer – the Concert for Diana and Live Earth – and the year was topped off with nine dates at the Ethel Barrymore Theatre on Broadway and shows in London and Dublin in support of their latest album release. In June the following year the band became sophisticates playing a special event at La Louvre in Paris as part of a fundraising event to restore the Louis XV drawing room. A first of its kind for the band to play such a high brow venue and for the 18th century venue itself that had never played host to a rock band!


 Le Bon was a guest vocalist on Mark Ronson’s Versions album that same year. The band left Epic in 2009 and in early 2010 contributed a cover of Bowie’s ‘Boys Keep Swinging’ towards a charity album We Were So Turned On with all profits going to War Child. In November that year All You Need Is Now became the 13th studio album released by the band. Produced by Mark Ronson and from the band’s own Tapemodern label it went straight to #1 in 15 countries on the iTunes albums charts. A world tour followed which was blighted in May 2011 by Le Bon catching laryngitis and led to cancellation and rescheduling of many European dates. They headlined the Summer Olympics Opening Ceremony Concert on July 2012 in Hyde Park, London and were forced to cut short the leg of their North American tour as Rhodes was struck down with illness. In 2014 they went back into the studio writing what would be Paper Gods which was released in September 2015 and featured a collaboration with Red Hot Chilli Peppers guitarist John Frusciante. Single ‘Pressure Off’ was released on Microsoft’s X box Music and the album peaked at #5 in the UK with a debut spot of #10 in the US Billboard 200, the highest debut for the band for 22 years.


 Stephen Duffy was the original vocalistFellow Brummie, Stephen Duffy, was a founding member of Duran Duran, along with Nick Rhodes and John Taylor. Although, he left the band as he was convinced they were going nowhere.

 Stephen Duffy, regretting leaving Duran Duran


As well as singing, he also played the bass guitar with John Taylor playing the lead guitar.  Stephen and John met whilst studying at the School of Foundation Studies and Experimental Workshop at Birmingham Polytechnic.



Nick and John were childhood friends and so introduced one another, later forming the band.  Stephen left the band in 1979, going on to form the band Tin Tin.


He enjoyed mediocre success as part of a band as well as recording solo music. In 1985, he re-released the song ‘Kiss Me’ which peaked at number 4 in the UK.



 John Taylor is the brains behind the band
Being the lead vocalist and the face at the front of the band, it may be easy to assume that Simon was always the brains behind the band, but that is not actually the case.


As well as being a founding member and deciding on the Duran Duran name and style of music, John was instrumental in getting Duran Duran to the height of the success which they enjoyed.


For example, John ran into James Bond producer Chubby Broccoli at a party and cheekily asked him when he was going to ask someone decent to perform a James Bond theme song.


The rest is history as John got the band a foot in the door and they went on to write and perform the most successful James Bond theme song of all time for the 1985 movie ‘A View to a Kill’, reaching number 1 on the US Billboard Hot 100.

 "Rio"
 
On the VH1 show True Spin, Duran Duran explained that Rio is a metaphor for America, and the song expressed their desire to succeed there, which they did. The wordplay is interesting, as Rio is sung as if it's a girl's name, and the word conjures images of the popular and glamorous Brazilian city, which goes with the exotic image the band was cultivating. The lyrics clearly state, however, "from mountains in the North down to the Rio Grande," which is the span of America. The Rio Grande river separates the US from Mexico.


 
A few studio tricks were employed to get a distinctive sound for this song. The synthesizer was hooked up to an arpeggiator, which is a tool that creates an arpeggio effect by automatically stepping through a sequence of notes. Also, keyboard player Nick Rhodes made the sound at the beginning of the song by placing some metal rods on the strings of a grand piano, playing the instrument, then recording the sound backward.


 
The girl who laughs in the song was the girlfriend of Nick Rhodes.


 
The video did a great deal to frame the image of Duran Duran as international superstars. Shot off the coast of Antigua while the band were vacationing there (they got along so well at the time they even vacationed together), they appeared wearing expensive suits while riding a yacht. The character Rio appears as an exotic-looking woman (sometimes wearing body paint) that is the object of their affections. The colorful video stood out on MTV, which didn't have many videos at the time and played it often.



The clip was directed by Russell Mulcahy, who did most of the band's videos around this time. He wrote the script around the yacht scenes because one of Duran Duran's managers decided he wanted to yachting in Antigua, and since the band was already vacationing there, they went to them to shoot the video.


 
In an interview with Q magazine (February 2008) the band were asked to respond to the criticism that their videos "sold a lifestyle." Singer Simon Le Bon replied: "No! Rio wasn't a lifestyle, it was total fantasy. You don't wear a silk Anthony Price suit on a boat with some painted chick running around. It was a comedy video. None of us had boats. It was a greedy reaction to the hard times that had gone before."



 Nick Rhodes recalled the filming of the song's video to Observer Music Monthly November 2008: "We were on holiday in Antigua, staying next to each other, like the Monkees. We were rung up and told, 'Stay there, we're bringing a film crew.' I only like boats when they're tied up, and you can have a cocktail without spilling it. We were initially going to shoot the video for 'Rio' indoors and we'd had Antony Price make these beautiful suits for us. I remember thinking: 'Oh my God, that sea water, it's going to ruin all this silk.'


 
With a sail boat, you're off into the distance and it takes a while to turn round. I was glad to get off. Simon Le Bon loved it, climbing as far as he possibly could along the prow. He always had an action man side.
John Taylor threw Andy Taylor off the side - a bit of a premonition, that, because Andy would leave the band in 1985 - and there was a real moment of horror later when the director Russell Mulcahy was filming with Reema, the girl in the video, and a gust of wind shattered a giant mirror next to her. She only had a couple of scratches."


 
The song at one point had the title "Amy A-Go-Go." When Simon Le Bon and John Taylor were on the UK show Songbook, Le Bon explained: "When we went in to make the second album, when we were starting thinking about it, you (Taylor) came up with the title 'Rio' and said, 'I think this sort of says it all in kind of a Roxy Music cool sort of way.' And we were like, 'Yeah!' It absolutely, does. And we'd been to America and it had a lot of references to America in it. And I'd seen this girl working as a waitress in a cocktail bar. And I just started writing on the back of a napkin about how she was, and that's what turned into the verse."



Bassist John Taylor told the A V Club that for the song's complicated arrangement, which "shifts gears several times," the band "were thinking along the lines of" Sly and The Family Stone's 1969 tune, "I Wanna Take You Higher."



"Hungry Like The Wolf"

This was the band's breakthrough hit in the US. It's success originated from MTV, which had only just come on air, showing their video of the band in the Sri Lanka jungle (they also shot the clips for "Lonely in Your Nightmare" and "Save a Prayer" on this trip). It was an early sensation particularly in the Deep South where the channel was being trialled. In a pre-MTV world where Duran Duran could be heard but not seen, it is unlikely that they would have broken through in America.



Duran Duran were asked in an interview with Q magazine (February 2008) for their memories of the video. Drummer Roger Taylor recalled: "We'd go to Alabama or Texas and the girls would be screaming and the guys in cowboy hats would be looking at us with clenched fists. I don't suppose they'd seen so many guys in make-up pouting before." Singer Simon Le Bon added: "It worked for us though. Video made it possible to create a cult of personality across the globe. You arrive on a tour bus and they'd already seen us on a yacht in a video."


 
In 1982, new synthesizers and sequencers were coming on the market that changed the landscape of Pop music, as groups like The Eurythmics and The Human League coaxed new sounds out of them. Duran Duran guitarist Andy Taylor was able to take advantage of the technology on this song, creating the distinctive track by linking a Roland 808 drum machine with a sequencer and a Roland Jupiter 8 keyboard. In an interview with Blender magazine, guitarist Taylor explained that the track "came from fiddling with the new technology that was starting to come in."


 
According to the band's Blender interview, lead singer Simon Le Bon's lyrics were inspired by the fairy tale Little Red Riding Hood, which features the Big Bad Wolf.


 
The first Grammy Award for Best Short Form Video was given at the 1984 ceremony, and it was given to Duran Duran as a joint award for "Hungry Like The Wolf" together with "Girls On Film."


 
The video was loosely based on the movie Apocalypse Now, with the rest of the band searching for Simon Le Bon in an exotic locale. It was shot in the Sri Lanka city of Galle, with scenes of Simon running through a market. The night before the shoot, Le Bon went to a stylist to get blond highlights in his hair, but she botched the job and his hair turned orange. That's why he's wearing a hat in the video.


 
Russell Mulcahy, who was Duran Duran's go-to director, did the video. If you were watching MTV in the early '80s, there's a good chance you would see his work - he even did the very first video the network aired: "Video Killed The Radio Star" by The Buggles.


 
The band's girlfriends contributed makeup that helped shape their look, and keyboard player Nick Rhodes' girlfriend appeared on this song, providing the laugh at the beginning and the moaning at the end, possibly the sounds of the wolf sating his hunger.


 
Speaking with the A V Club in a 2012 interview, John Taylor said the song was "written very quickly." He recalled: "It was a Saturday afternoon, we were in EMI's demo studio, a studio they had up in Manchester Square HQ, and I think Nick [Rhodes] and Andy [Taylor] were kind of messing around. Andy had the riff, Nick developed this sequence, Simon had a thing, Roger [Taylor] came in and played 'cause he'd just bought some Simmons drums, so that was where he got those big fills from. I came in, and they'd been working for maybe two hours, and I just knew exactly what to play. The song was probably written by cocktail hour. [Laughs.]"


 
The outfit bassist John Taylor wore in the video was used as the basis for styling the character Sonny Crockett, played by Don Johnson on 1980s TV show Miami Vice.



"Save A Prayer"



Vocalist Simon le Bon penned this song's words whilst on tour. They revolve around a chance meeting between two people that flares into a one-off sexual encounter. Le Bon described the lyrics as "realistic, and not romantic."


 
According to Le Bon, the song's chorus structure is based on Gordon Lightfoot's "If You Could Read My Mind."


 
The video was filmed by frequent Duran Duran, Australian director Russell Mulcahy, in Sri Lanka. The visual earned plenty of airplay on MTV with its shots of the ancient rock fortress of Sigiriya and the ruins of a Buddhist temple at Polonnaruwas as well as the island's southern coastline.


 
The song was sampled for British hip-hop house duo Shut Up and Dance's "Save It 'Til The Mourning After," which reached #25 on the UK singles chart in 1995.


 
The Arctic Monkeys' 2007 single, "Teddy Picker" contains the lyric, alluding to a line in this song's chorus: "I don't want your prayer, save it for the morning after."



The Sheffield band's debut single "I Bet You Look Good On The Dancefloor" had previously apparently nodded to another Duran Duran song with "Your name isn't Rio, but I don't care for sand", referring to a line in the Rio title track. Speaking to XFM, Arctics frontman Alex Turner said that he actually had little knowledge of Duran Duran music apart from a concert DVD he'd seen and the references must have come from his subconscious. 
 
Duran Duran guitarist Andy Taylor fell into water used as an animal latrine during the filming of the video and ended up being hospitalized with dysentery. At 3 minutes, 40 seconds into the clip, you can see him perched on a branch looking a tad dazed, immediately before his unscheduled splash. Taylor recalled in his biography Wild Boy: "I suppose there's a lesson there somewhere: if you smoke dope and drink Jack Daniel's in the tropical heat, don't fall into a lagoon full of elephant's urine."



Just a wee snippet from the wonderful Retro Dundee;


  DURAN DURAN IN DUNDEE - 1982





October 1982 saw Duran Duran arrive in town to play a gig at the Caird Hall.
Although I was well familiar with their chart hits, I didn't get round to going to the show.
I do, however, actually have an unofficial recording of this very concert which reveals that not only did they have a good quality sound live on stage, the recording, needless to say, also has lots of screaming girls on it.
Dundee lassies were not the only ones in the crowd though because interestingly, the Caird Hall gig was the first date that kick-started this particular tour off, and Simon Le Bon says during the recording "Thanks to all the Londoners who came to see us" -  so this was obviously a group of devoted fans who had travelled all the way up to Dundee eager to catch the band on their opening night!
The ad above with the tour dates is from a music paper.

 

PatReilly wrote:

Tek wrote:

I had quite forgot he brought out an album.

Never heard one minute of it.

 

You must have, subconsciously even. A couple of great singles on it, which would have been on the radio when you were wee, Tek.

I bought this, still probably have it somewhere, on tape. Cassettes were the future in 1983, cannae get scratched (although plenty scratching on Duck Rock), and easier to store than vinyl.

Which makes me wonder, vinyl has made a massive comeback, it'll be tapes next, eh?
 

Listened to it. Genuinely never recognised anything from it.

Think you are misinterpreting how old (or young) I am Pat.

P.s. liked the track 'World Famous'. Though not sure how much (if anything) McLaren had to do with it.
 

Album 515.
Violent Femmes..........................................Violent Femmes   (1983)












Well fuck me, that was some listen, this album has now become the best album by a band I've never heard before, Teenage Head by Flamin Groovies was way, way out in front of anything else in that department, but Violent Femmes album has unbelievably knocked that into second place and by quite a margin as well.


I must have played this record two to three times a day over the last few days, and I've almost got all the lyrics committed to memory, it makes me happy the same way Joy Division did,in that the vocals and delivery of the angsty/sad /happy/angry lyrics (which I'm sure will hit home whatever generation you are from) were in stark contrast to the bouncy, fun musical arrangements which shouldn't work, but for this listener at least it had the perfect amount of ying to yang ratio, giving it a beautiful balance.


This album in my humbles reminds me of The Libertines, whether they were influenced by "The Femmes" in anyway I can't say, but lyrically and acoustically there does seem to be a likeness that will always win my vote.
I've read people saying this acoustic punk which is right but for me only tells half the story, there's also a bit of rockabilly especially with the extensive usage of the snare drum, and the odd lapse into close harmonies, with an absolute cornucopia of terrific tracks.The lead singer (Gordon Gano) has certainly not got a classically trained voice, but lets be honest who the fuck wants to listen to that? I can't put my finger on who he reminds me of, there is deffo a touch of Libertines, a bit of Lou Reed and sometimes a touch of Jagger, but bottom line Gano has a great distinctive voice, he also wrote most of the songs on the album when he was at high school, which he narrates with gusto, this really is a great album, I think most of us can relate to quite a lot of the songs, which draws you into a familiarity and gains you membership into the "Violent Femmes"club.


"Blister In The Sun" is the outstanding opener, it's probably the best known track on the album and certainly sets the tone, I can "wax hysterically" about all the other tracks, but why don't you give it a spin yourselves, for me there is no poor track and certainly no "Phyllis Dillers," just that fine mixture of upbeat/happy music accompanying some pretty heartfelt lyrics, the track "Good Feelings" kinda hit a spot, I don't know why? but it made me think of my old Mum (god bless her) one of those bitter/sweet moments, but saved by the next track musically at least more upbeat.


Anyways, this is for me is a great (and most other superlatives you can think of) album, please give this a listen folks, I'm sure you wont leave disappointed, and please let me know what you think, as obviously this is only my humble opinion and would love to hear others, whether you liked it or not.


This album will be going into my vinyl collection and all other formats that I can find.





Bits & Bobs;


The Violent Femmes were a folk punk band with a sound that is an eclectic combination of gospel, punk rock, folk music, and the blues. The three-person band originally included Gordon Gano on lead vocals and guitar, and as primary songwriter; Brian Ritchie on bass; and Victor DeLorenzo as percussionist. One of the ways the Violent Femmes created their signature sound was from DeLorenzo's drum kit, which often consisted of no more than a set of steel brushes, a tranceaphone, and a snare drum.


 
Ritchie and DeLorenzo first met in a Milwaukee bar called Harps. Ritchie thought DeLorenzo's goofy yet punk style was a fresh take on the sullen grunge punk on the scene. The two started playing gigs, and were later introduced to Gano by the owner of the Metropole Theater, Robert Soffian; Soffian called Gano "a pint sized Lou Reed imitator." Guy Hoffman, who was a founding member of the Oil Tasters, replaced DeLorenzo in 1993, when DeLorenzo decided to go solo and record music. However, in 2003, DeLorenzo returned to the group to reinstate the original lineup and perform live as the band released a 20th anniversary album of their self-titled debut album.


 
The band's name was an impromptu idea. Ritchie came up with the title when a friend asked him to describe his straight-laced insurance salesman brother. Ritchie lied and said, "He's exactly like me, he's a punk and he has his own band!" When asked what the band's name was, Ritchie uttered "Uh….Violent Femmes." After sharing the story with fellow bandmate, DeLorenzo, they elected to use the name for themselves.


 
While the Violent Femmes cult fan base is far from mainstream, their music has achieved considerable success. Their debut album, Violent Femmes, financed with $10,000 borrowed from DeLorenzo's father, was their best-selling album; it was certified platinum eight years after its release. The album features some of the most played Violent Femmes songs: "Blister In The Sun," "Gone Daddy Gone," "Add It Up," and "Kiss Off." Other albums released by the Violent Femmes are Hallowed Ground, The Blind Leading the Naked, 3, Why Do Birds Sing?, New Times, Rock!!!!!, and their final album Freak Magnet, which was released in 2000.


 
One of the most interesting people to play with the Violent Femmes was the NBA basketball star Dennis Rodman. During a benefit concert orchestrated by Rodman, he joined in on vocals, drums, and bass. Rodman ended up getting raucous, pushing audience members on stage in a wheelchair and nearly exposing himself. Before he was removed from the stage, he poured beer over Gano's head.


 
In 2006 the duo Gnarls Barkley covered "Gone Daddy Gone," and released it on their debut album St. Elsewhere. Then in 2008, the Violent Femmes recorded a cover of the hit Gnarls Barkley song, "Crazy." The following year, the Violent Femmes disbanded due to a lawsuit against Gordon Gano. Gano had sold the advertising rights to the song "Blister in the Sun" to the fast food chain Wendy's in 2007. While Gano had the creative rights to the song as the primary songwriter, the band was disgusted at Gano for selling out and capitalizing on the band's music.


 
Ritchie and his wife, scientist Varuni Kulasekera, are in the tea business; their company is called Chado the Way of Tea. Ritchie is also a professional Japanese bamboo flute teacher who lives in Hobart, Tasmania. He owns more than 100 different musical instruments including a nose flute, didgeridoo, and xylophone; all of the instruments he owns were used during recordings of the Violent Femmes songs at one time or another. DeLorenzo currently plays with Nineteen Thirteen, a chamber rock group, while Gano is a songwriter and producer for a couple of acts including Gordon Gano & The Ryans.


 
Part of Audrey Niffenegger's novel, The Time Traveler's Wife, takes place at a Violent Femmes concert: "Gordon Gano stands at the microphone glaring at us all and menacing chords ring out and he leans forward and intones the opening lines of 'Blister in the Sun' and we're off and running..."

THE POP LIFE By ROBERT PALMER   AUG. 11, 1982


 New groups come and new groups go, but groups with a really fresh sound and approach are a rarity. The Violent Femmes, who made their New York debut opening for Richard Hell at the Bottom Line and CBGB last weekend, are fresh.


 Gordon Gano, the group's 19-year-old lead singer, songwriter and guitarist, sings about relationships and sex and inner turmoil and smoking pot with his mom as if all these experiences had only recently conspired to overwhelm him, and perhaps they have. Some of his songs have the discursive, rambling structures of folk-era Dylan, some of them have the ruthless self-immolating bite of the best Lou Reed, but they manage to be catchy, too, with repeating pop choruses one goes away humming after just one hearing.


 Mr. Gano is a find, but the Violent Femmes are a band, not a star backed by two sidemen. One suspects they would not be as interesting, and they certainly would not be as fresh, without the bassist Brian Ritchie and the drummer Victor DeLorenzo.


 Mr. Ritchie handles a conventional electric bass with aplomb, but he does most of his playing on the mariachi bass, an instrument that looks like an abnormally swollen four-stringed guitar and is used primarily in Mexican mariachi bands. With this unusual instrument, Mr. Ritchie can improvise in what amounts to a guitar's lower range, and he does so consistently, often taking melodic leads while Mr. Gano strums jagged insistent rhythms. Mr. DeLorenzo stands behind a snare drum and something that looks like an inverted garbage can and plays them with an only barely suppressed manic energy, but with a keen sense of dynamics, too.


 The sound that results from this unlikely concatenation echoes all sorts of antecedents, from skiffle music to Dylan to early Velvet Underground to Jonathan Richman to punk rock without the amplification. But most of all, the sound is genuinely new. If the major record labels were less financially strapped and more adventurous, this young and extraordinarily talented band would be some artist-development department's dream-come-true. And they might be anyway, given their catchy material and riveting stage presence.




 Brian Ritchie spoke with Karen Leng about five tracks that influenced the first Violent Femmes album. 



 The Velvet Underground – 'Waiting For The Man' (The Velvet Underground & Nico, 1967)



The Velvet Underground was the biggest influence on our first album. Gordon's voice resembles Lou Reed's, especially the young Lou, and although they went off in different directions you can hear that similarity. The way Gordon and Lou write is not phony, it is very matter of fact and quite unflattering. In some cases songwriters put themselves in a good light, but Gordon and Lou Reed didn't mind making themselves look undesirable or vulnerable or strange.


 Also the fact that the Velvet Underground improvised a fair bit. It wasn't that common then and it is still not common for bands to do group improvising. Either the band plays the song the same way every single time or you just get the guitarist improvising on top of a static groove. But the Velvet Underground and the Violent Femmes would group improvise. Any member could influence the direction of the song at any time.


 A song like ‘Kiss Off', we play it differently every time and this happens in our shows. ‘Black Girls', too. I don't think the band could have survived for over three decades if that wasn't built into the music.


 Gene Vincent and the Blue Caps – 'Be Bop A Lula' (1956)


Gene Vincent and The Blue Caps was our other main influence. What we wanted to do was play the Velvet Underground style of music but strip back the instrumentation to sound like early rock'n'roll.


 We couldn't get gigs in the early days, promoters would say ‘we're not a folk club, we're a rock club'. But people are ignorant about rock history. They don't know that if they listen to the early Sun sessions of Elvis Presley or Gene Vincent or early Little Richard and Jerry Lee Lewis they are mainly acoustic. That is how rock started and we thought that had been lost. We weren't trying to be retro, or like the Stray Cats or be revivalist but we wanted to get some of that attitude back into the music.


 We became famous in the beginning because we had been ejected from a nightclub in Milwakee. We went with our instruments and tried to audition live and the booker said ‘get out of here, leave a tape, we're not a folk club we don't wanna hear you'. We were so despondent because this guy wouldn't even listen to us.


 So we set up outside on the street to busk and make some money and along comes The Pretenders who stood around and watched for a while. Then invited us to open up the show for them. It was an incredible boost. We went from persona non grata to being on stage with a famous band. It told us we were on the right track.


 Oscar Pettiford – 'Blues In The Closet' (First Bass, 1953)



Oscar Pettiford was a cellist and bass player and one of the guys in the '40s and '50s that defined bebop.


 This song, if you listen the riff, is remarkably similar to ‘Blister In The Sun'. Gordon didn't know that at the time, but I was a fan of this song and had been playing it in jazz bands for several years. So I found the coincidence amusing. I think they called it ‘convergent evolution' when different people have the same idea.


 Myself and Victor De Lorenzo both played jazz before the Femmes so it was a big influence on us and our desire to improvise and play acoustic music. Even though Violent Femmes never played jazz it is a huge part of our mentality.


 Roxy Music – 'Remake/Remodel' (Roxy Music, 1972)



This song was a specific influence on ‘Gone Daddy Gone'. The chord structure is basically the same and there is a part where they do these trades between various instruments and we kind of copied that with our song. But not many people would pick that as an influence, because we just did it in our own way. But it was actually an imitation of what they were doing. So, time to fess up 35 years later!


 Roxy Music are a great example of a very unusual group of people. I think the best rock bands are people who would never usually get together unless they needed each other. People gravitate together and most of the great bands have too much talent. You can see that with Roxy Music. They all went off in their own directions. Talking Heads had too much talent as well and split up and of course groups like the Kinks and The Beatles were the same.


 Richard Hell and the Heartbreakers – 'Chinese Rocks' (Live at Max’s Kansas City, 1978)



I really love this as an example of punk music because we were all music fans in the early '70s. It was a time when the '60s allure had bottomed out, Hendrix and Morrison had died and we were left with bands like The Eagles. When punk came along, we felt it was music just for us. Made by people our age. We could play it and do our own variation on it.




 We ended up doing a cover of ‘Chinese Rocks', which was co-written by Dee Dee Ramone. We've covered lots of punk songs from the Ramones to The Saints' ‘(I'm) Stranded' but in our own way.




 During the punk era we considered anybody who was weird and doing something in opposition to the commercial music world to be punk. It is revisionist history that has reduced punk to a musical style rather than an attitudinal framework for creating all kinds of different things. Back then, it was not just straight eighth notes and a sneering vocalist, it could be a lot of different things.
 



Gordon Gano was not a founding member of the Femmes.


 Bassist Brian Ritchie and drummer Victor DeLorenzo met more or less as a result of Ritchie playing for a band that had formerly featured DeLorenzo as its drummer, and when the two musicians actually chatted for the first time, they discovered how much they had in common. In turn, they started playing together, using a name which – in case you’ve ever wondered – was a spontaneous utterance offered by Ritchie when he told someone that his insurance-salesman brother was in a punk band and was pressed about the name of said band.


 As the opportunities for a two-piece drum-and-bass combo were pretty limited in the Milwaukee area, Ritchie and DeLorenzo were open to the idea of bringing someone else into the fold, namely a frontman. According to Diffuser, “Ritchie caught a set by local high schooler Gordon Gano and was impressed enough to go over to the kid’s parents’ house and jam. The bassist discovered that Gano wasn’t only a singer and guitarist but also a pretty good songwriter: that night Gano played Ritchie ‘Country Death Song,’ which later became the opening track on 1984’s Hallowed Ground.”



The Femmes got their big break courtesy of The Pretenders.



 The tale is the stuff of legend in the Milwaukee music community, kind of a rock 'n' roll equivalent of the Lana Turner Schwab's story...which didn't really happen at Schwab's, but that's a tale for another time. Here's what happened: on August 23, 1981, the Femmes decided to try and make a few bucks by busking outside the Oriental Theater, and after James Honeyman-Scott caught their performance, he trumpeted it to his bandmates, which led to Chrissie Hynde inviting the Femmes to play a set after the Pretenders finished up. Hello, instant street cred.


 Somewhat less often discussed, however, is Honeyman-Scott's initial remark to the band: "You blokes sound just like this band in the UK called the Stray Cats." Or at least that's what DeLorenzo said in an interview anyway. "Not only did we not know who the Stray Cats were, we didn't know who the Pretenders were," claimed DeLorenzo.



The band's self-titled album achieved the highly rare - and possibly even unique - feat of going gold before ever making it onto Billboard's Top 200 Albums chart.


There are bands that are cult successes, and then there's the Femmes, who managed to earn a gold record for their first album four years after its 1983 release, saw it go platinum at the eight-year mark, and when it finally did hit the Top 200 in 1991, it topped out at #171. Oh, well: it was a little anticlimactic by that point, anyway.




Before the Violent Femmes, few rock music fans had had the opportunity to see how much the use of acoustic instruments and a stripped-down approach could convey urgency and raw emotion. After the beloved cult band's emergence, no one even tried to imitate the legendary post-punk/college rock genius of the group, perhaps knowing fully that such a response would be futile given the originality on display




"Blister In The Sun"



 Although it could be said that this song has become a bit overrated and overplayed through the years (including some disconcerting forays into TV advertising), its infectious, jittery brilliance simply cannot be denied. As the opening track on the Violent Femmes' eponymous 1983 debut, this tune introduced the band's famous minimalism but also its uncontrollable sense of urgency and immediacy. Very few songs from the '80s or any other era sport as many intensely recognizable sound clips as are found here, from the acoustic guitar opening riff to the double-barreled, repeated drum beat immediately following it. The whispered section near the end is also a highlight, and ultimately the total package is a crystallization of the band's embrace of acoustic chaos.




A classic song with a classic riff
 

The lyrics are about heroin abuse and getting rejected by girls. You know, a normal teenage frustration tune from Violent Femmes.

 In 2007, Ritchie filed a law suit against Gano for band earnings and ownership rights stemming from Gano’s approval for their song “Blister in the Sun” to be used in a Wendy’s commercial. Once again, the band broke up.


 
Written by Violent Femmes lead singer Gordan Gano, this song sure sounds like an ode to masturbation:



Body and beats
I stain my sheets
I don't even know why
My girlfriend, she's at the end
She is starting to cry



Gano says it isn't, and that he didn't hear that interpretation until years later. "I don't think there's a whole lot to understand with the lyrics," he told the Village Voice. "But I can see where people could get that idea."



Gano is coy in discussing the song, but he has explained that it's about the strung out feeling that comes from drug abuse. The girlfriend is at her wit's end because he keeps staining the sheets, as he lacks sexual control.


 
This is the first song on the first Violent Femmes album, introducing the band with the famous guitar riff and snare hits. The band made inroads with songs like this one about adolescent insecurities delivered in a deprecating tone. Gordon Gano was just 19 when the album was released.


 
The song had a cult following and was favorite on American college radio in the '80s. In the early '90s, as "alternative" and "modern rock" radio stations went on the air, it got a lot of airplay because it was considered a classic of the genre. The album gradually sold over one million copies and earned the Violent Femmes a formidable fan base.


 
The line, "Big hands I know you're the one" is in the song because Gano has small hands. In the song, he's in a self-loathing state where he knows the girl is just going to take up with some big-handed guy.


 
In 2007, this was used in commercials for the fast food purveyor Wendy's. Gordon Gano authorized its use, which triggered a lawsuit by the group's bass player Brian Ritchie, who stated: "I don't like having my sound misappropriated to sell harmful products, such as fast food… that's not why we made the music. It should not be hijacked." Ritchie cited misappropriation of jointly owned intellectual property as the basis for his suit.




Ritchie also blasted Gano in the publication OnMilwaukee, where he wrote, "When you see dubious or in this case disgusting uses of our music you can thank the greed, insensitivity and poor taste of Gordon Gano, it is his karma that he lost his songwriting ability many years ago, probably due to his own lack of self-respect as his willingness to prostitute our songs demonstrates. Neither Gordon (vegetarian) nor me (gourmet) eat garbage like Wendy's burgers."



The band was still touring when this went down, but they broke up soon after. They didn't return to action until 2013, when they played the Coachella festival.


 
This was featured in the 1997 John Cusack film Grosse Pointe Blank. The soundtrack includes two versions of the song, the original 1982 release and a remake entitled "Blister 2000." The remake is slower and has kind of a funky instrumental sax solo in the middle.


 
A multi-instrumental cover of the song was used in a 2012 television commercial for the Hewlett-Packard DV6T notebook. In the ad, the song in played in various styles, including gospel, Mariachi and metal.

 
The barefoot child peeking into an old building on the album cover is three-year-old Billie Jo Campbell, who photographer Ron Hugo spotted walking with her mother in Los Angeles. Speaking to MTV News in 2007, Campbell recalled: "I remember looking into that building, and they kept telling me there are animals in there. I had no idea there were photographers there. I was pissed off that I couldn't see the animals."



"Kiss Off"



Perhaps the best (if not the most famous) of the Violent Femmes' legendary angst-ridden anthems, this song also etched some unforgettable lyrics into the '80s pantheon, particularly this nugget, perfectly and unsettlingly delivered by frontman Gordon Gano: "I hope you know... that this will go down on your permanent record." Unlike "Blister in the Sun," this tune is about something very specific and easily understood by the band's target audience, and unfortunately the mirror of reality has transformed the concept into something even darker in an age of concentrated bullying. With the arrival of the Femmes, alienation was not just for geeks anymore. Still, the popular crowd could never fully embody this kind of earnest suffering.



“Kiss Off” is the second song on the Violent Femmes' self-titled debut album.

 It’s about the narrator’s frustration with the world around him and his own feelings of alienation, loneliness, the emptiness of the world around him, his suicidal depression, his anxieties, etc. Essentially, he is telling his problems and the people in his life who he feels don’t appreciate him enough to “kiss off”.



"Add It Up"



Of the band's holy trinity of signature tunes, this one usually generates the most attention, probably mostly because of its thick sexual tension that builds up to repeated usage of the cardinal profanity known affectionately as the mighty F bomb. But there's so much more going on here than the mere shattering of language taboos on record. For one thing - musically speaking - the trio of Gano on guitar, Brian Ritchie on bass and Victor DeLorenzo on drums absolutely scorches its way through a very memorable and powerful rhythmic workout. But in addition, the song's less famous middle section seems to foretell of Columbine-like events with a highly affecting, creepy vibe. Once again, the Femmes simultaneously see in fine detail the future as well as the past.




“I was in my bedroom – that’s where I wrote it – feeling frustrated. I had nowhere to go and nothing to do. It just happened to feel good lyrically … and it still does”


- Gordan Gano


 



"Confessions"



This song definitely starts out very reminiscent of Bob Dylan’s “Ballad of a Thin Man.”




"Gone Daddy Gone"


Where else within the otherwise wide, varied spectrum of '80s music could an arrangement of xylophone music be found than in the catalogue of the Violent Femmes? In fact, how many of us have even seen a xylophone in person since grade school? Anyway, none of this matters in the face of this great American band's limitless sense of daring. Behind all this loopy majesty, of course, lurks another of Gano's deeply cutting lyrics, this time of a highly personal nature. The "Beautiful girl, love the dress, high school smile, oh yes" opening perfectly conveys the duality and confusion of sexual awakening, especially in light of American culture's occasional and oddly puritanical flashes.


Written by Violent Femmes lead singer/guitarist Gordon Gano, this quirky song from their first album has become one of their most popular. Their bassist/multi-instrumentalist Brian Ritchie played the xylophone on this song, which features two xylophone solos.


 
The lyrics, "I can Tell by the way you that you switch and walk, I can see by the way that you baby talk, I can know by the way you treat your man, I can love you baby it's a cryin' shame" are originally from the song "I Just Want To Make Love To You" by Muddy Waters, which was written by Blues great Willie Dixon. Dixon gets a composer credit on "Gone Daddy Gone" as a result, and the song is occasionally referred to as "Gone Daddy Gone/I Just Want to Make Love to You," as on Permanent Record: The Very Best of Violent Femmes.


 
Musical duo Gnarls Barkley covered this song on their debut album St. Elsewhere. This cover was used in a 2008 commercial for the movie Igor and in the 2006 game Tony Hawk's Project 8.



"Good Feeling"



Here's one of the Femmes' few songs that actually acknowledges something positive, even if it does so merely to spotlight the fleeting nature of happiness in Gano's typical worldview. More than that, the song forces the listener to appreciate in an appropriate measure the unique, heartbreaking and beautiful nature of Gano's vocal timbre. For Gano, it's rarely about pitch or technical prowess, but the richness of his baritone coupled with the emotion he conveys in higher tones simply has no peer in '80s music.
 

 

Last edited by arabchanter (17/5/2019 6:24 am)

That tranceaphone is like a bin right enough. Read that the drummer invented that drum instrument.

Some review that, A/C: thought the singer was a bit 'Pete Shelley-ish'. But overall, although I wanted to like the album, it wasn't really my cup of tea. Favourite track was maybe 'Add it up'.

Album 517.
Def Leppard.....................................Pyromania   (1983)










Pyromania is Def Leppard’s third studio album, the first to feature guitarist Phil Collen and second produced by Robert John “Mutt” Lange.

 The album was a shift away from the band’s ‘riff metal’ roots towards more radio-friendly glam/hard rock. Lange was ‘a perfectionist’ who insisted on ‘so many takes that the tape is falling apart’ and contributed so much to the songs he was given songwriting credit:



"We gave Mutt songwriting credits because this time he actually helped us structure the songs. They weren’t written songs that he changed. He sat down with us as a sixth member of the band and participated in the whole thing."

 The band struggled to keep up with Lange’s ambition. Frontman Joe Elliot’s voice ‘was in shreds’ after two songs and founding member Pete Willis was fired for being so drunk he couldn’t play the songs. Plus the band was six figures in debt. The album took a year to write, record and mix.


 Released in early 1983, seven of its ten songs got strong US rock radio play that year, with three of them crossing over to pop and reaching the top 30. This helped propel Pyromania to #2 (held from the top spot by Michael Jackson’s Thriller) and achieve 6x platinum certification in less than two years. Pyromania went on to sell over ten million copies in the US, thus being certified diamond by the RIAA.

 Its success was also impressive in Canada (#4 album/two top 30 singles) but only modest in the UK (#18 album/three minor hits).

 A final note of trivia, synthesizers on the album are credited to Booker T. Boffin – a nickname Lange was calling keyboardist Thomas ‘She Blinded Me With Science’ Dolby at the time.



 Joe Elliot explained the origin of the album’s title in 1992:

"Pyromania got titled Pyromania because a guy called Craig Thomson, an engineer on it, accused us of being pyromaniacs because we were having such a bad time trying to get the Marshall (guitar amplifiers) to sound good…At one stage (guitarist) Steve and (producer) Mutt suggested we should take them into the garden and burn them. Craig piped up in a brilliant broad Scottish accent, “Arck, you’re awl just a bunch of Pyromaniacs!” – and hence it became Pyromania. That is where that album name came from, pure accident.

Tek wrote:

Glad you liked the Violent Femmes album Mr C.

Was anxious you would slate it.

Superb album, wish I'd listened to them before now. Had you listened to them before?