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Starland Vocal Band (1976) (Vinyl record album review)

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Record basics

  • Album name: Starland Vocal Band
  • Group name: Starland Vocal Band
  • Year: 1976
  • Number of discs: one
  • Label: Windsong Records
  • Collection: Selman
  • Buy it on Amazon: $3.00

Starland Vocal Band (1976)

My review

Level of familiarity before listening

I had vaguely heard of Starland Vocal Band before, but was not sure where or how. My parents told me three things about it:

  • Starland Vocal Band was responsible for the song Afternoon Delight.
  • John Denver was associated with Starland Vocal Band in some way.
  • Starland Vocal Band was from the Washington DC area (where I grew up and where my parents lived for half a century) and my mother might have seen them perform at the Cellar Door.

And I realized a fourth thing:

What I expected

Soft rock with some country and folk.

What it was actually like

Listening to Afternoon Delight now intentionally for the first time, it was difficult for me to believe that this song was ever popular at all, let alone so wildly popular. It wasn’t bad, either, so I also couldn’t understand why so many people consider it the worst song ever made. I felt the same way about it when I watched PCU (possibly for the first time since the 1990s) a few months ago and the movie used Afternoon Delight as a plot device to torture the baddies, while the goodies got to listen to a P/Funk concert. My assumption at the time was just that it was a low budget movie and they needed to choose a song whose record company would negotiate an inexpensive fee – not that anyone seriously considered it that awful.

Anyway, mostly this record was about vocal harmonies, which was also a recurring theme on Welcome To Fat City.

I liked the harmony a lot on Baby, You Look Good to Me Tonight, a great country song with banjo and some Dylan style vocals. It was also strong on California Day, a soft rock song that sounded very 1960s. Ain’t It the Fall was another song that was all about the vocal harmonies, but was pretty boring otherwise.

A few of the songs started out sounding one way, and then sounded like something pretty different by the end. War Surplus Baby, for example, started as easy listening, but by the time the electric guitar kicked in, it was more of a rock song, and Starting All Over Again was another that started pretty bad, but picked up much more as the energy got more charged.

American Tune reminded me a little bit of a Xmas carol, and I couldn’t quite place the sound of Starland, but it sounded at times like a lullaby, or possibly the theme song of a television program (and I did not like its harmonies very much).

I liked the steel guitar on Boulder to Birmingham, but it didn’t have enough of a country sound to rescue it from easy listening hell.

Hail! Hail! Rock and Roll! was the most unusual song on the record and probably my favorite, a tribute to 1950s rock and roll (and Chuck Berry in particular) in a medley format and in the “fauxldies” style that I coined when reviewing Grease: The Original Soundtrack from the Motion Picture.

Grade

4/5: would listen again

Grease: The Original Soundtrack from the Motion Picture (Vinyl record album review)

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Record basics

  • Album name: Grease: The Original Soundtrack from the Motion Picture
  • Artist name: Various, including Frankie Valli, John Travolta, Olivia Newton-John, Frankie Avalon, Stockard Channing, Jeff Conaway, Cindy Bullens, Sha-Na-Na, Louis St. Louis
  • Year: 1978
  • Number of discs: two
  • Label: RSO Records
  • Collection: Selman
  • Distinguishing characteristics:
    • Scratched into side 1 of LP: K-9967 RS-2-4002 AS GD1
    • Scratched into side 2 of LP: K-9970 RS-2-4002 BS GD2
    • Scratched into side 3 of LP: K-9971 RS-2-4002 CS GD1
    • Scratched into side 4 of LP: K-9974 RS-2-4002 DS GD2
  • Buy it on Amazon: $100.00

Grease: The Original Soundtrack from the Motion Picture

My review

Level of familiarity before listening

I’ve never seen Grease the movie, but I do expect to recognize several of these songs.

What I expected

My first reaction when I saw that this record was next: “Oh. The Grease soundtrack. John Travolta. Great.”

My second reaction was: “Wait a minute, there are actually a lot of Sha Na Na[1] songs on this record. I think it might actually be pretty good.”

My third reaction: “‘Written & Produced by Barry Gibb.’ Oh no.”

What it was actually like

I never really thought of the term “fauxldies” until now to describe Sha Na Na, but a lot of this record was just that. Fortunately, I approve.

The Sha Na Na set was from the end of side two through the end of side three, and here are their songs in order of excellence:

  1. Hound Dog
  2. Blue Moon, which has come up twice recently (The Rodgers and Hart Songbook by Ella Fitzgerald and The Muppet Show)
  3. Rock n’ Roll Is Here to Stay
  4. Those Magic Changes
  5. Born to Hand Jive, which was way too long
  6. Tears on My Pillow

The end of side three and beginning of side four also had more of these “fauxldies,” though generally not as good as Sha Na Na’s. Of them, I liked Mooning, Freddy, My Love and Rock n’ Roll Party Queen the best. We Go Together was also great: kind of pure sugar, and it made me wonder why there is not more music like that. And in a very small way, it reminded me of Shama Lama Ding Dong (which I just learned was covered by John “Cougar” Mellencamp; listen at your own risk).

The disco part of the record was not as extensive as I worried: just the title track Grease and the closing track Grease (Reprise), which were terrible, and You’re the One That I Want, which I recognized, which was nowhere near as bad as it could have been.

The record’s worst song, There Are Worse Things I Could Do, wasn’t disco at al. It was just boring and had an awful saxophone part.

The other two that I recognized were Summer Nights, a sappy duet, and Greased Lightnin’ – another one that I knew and that played with a retro sound – though I appreciated the electric guitar.

Sometimes the “fauxldies” style got really boring and could not be saved by doo wop, such as with Beauty School Dropout and It’s Raining on Prom Night.

And given that it was the late 1970s, of course there was some bad easy listening included as well: Hopelessly Devoted to You and Sandy.

Grade

3/5: interesting, but not for me

References

References
↑1 Stylized as “Sha-Na-Na”

Fumble (1972) (Vinyl record album review)

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Record basics

  • Album name: Fumble
  • Group name: Fumble
  • Year: 1972
  • Number of discs: one
  • Label: Capitol Records
  • Collection: Selman
  • Distinguishing characteristics:
    • Hole punched through top right of album
    • Scratched into side one of LP: ST – 1 – 11125 – F2
    • Scratched into side tow of LP: ST – 2 – 11125 – F2
  • Buy it on Ebay: $9.99

Fumble (1972)

My review

Level of familiarity before listening

I’ve never heard of “Fumble” and, like Full Moon yesterday, it’s not entirely clear who or what Fumble is, or whether Fumble is the name of the record.

What I expected

Judging by the names of the songs and the album art, this appears to be covers of oldies. I’m particularly drawn to Hello Mary Lou, which has come up twice before in my reviews: on New Riders of the Purple Sage’s Powerglide and Home, Home on the Road.

What it was actually like

In general, these songs were all extremely faithful to the original versions (or popular versions), basically reproducing those sounds but updating them to be richer, though also more produced and sometimes flatter.

Their Hello Mary Lou was great, but undeniably the NRPS version is still the best.

The two Elvis Presley songs, One Night and (Let Me Be Your) Teddy Bear, stood out because it’s not easy to do an impression of Elvis’s very distinct vocal style, and it’s not something that I hear very often, and I also don’t think it came out particularly well. The latter was also a bit slow for my taste.

Nut Rocker was one that I definitely had never heard before, basically a rock version of the theme to the Nutcracker ballet, which was pretty weird, but not bad at all.

Let It Rock was a Chuck Berry song, sometimes called Rockin’ on the Railroad, that a lot of groups have covered. This version was solid and I liked the guitar solo, but why would anyone want to try it when it’s already this good?

Breaking Up Is Hard To Do, the Neil Sedaka song, was satisfactory, but the original was fantastic, and I was so relieved that this was not a cover of his vomit-inducing 1970s version. The other Sedaka song, Oh Carol, was good, but didn’t stand out.

I thought that The Girl Can’t Help It was quite good, sounding at times like an early Beatles song, and reminding me again how great rock was as dance music.

Rave On, the Buddy Holly song, did not have anything like his energy, but it was a totally fine and serviceable cover.

The one that I did not much enjoy was Ebony Eyes. I was not familiar with the original and the cover was prety slow.

Grade

4/5: would listen again

An Innocent Man by Billy Joel (Vinyl record album review)

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Record basics

  • Album name: An Innocent Man
  • Artist name: Billy Joel
  • Year: 1983
  • Number of discs: one
  • Label: CBS
  • Collection: Selman
  • Buy it on Amazon: $7.50

An Innocent Man by Billy Joel

My review

Level of familiarity before listening

I don’t think I’ve ever heard this record, and have never listened to Billy Joel intentionally (and have always gotten him confused with Bruce Springsteen), but I do recognize at least two of the songs, Uptown Girl and The Longest Time.

What I expected

Soft rock.

What it was actually like

This was a really unusual record. I was prepared to mock Billy Joel relentlessly for trying to look “punk,” but actually, though none of this music was punk at all, there were certain things about it that were aligned with the punk ethos, which is highly reactionary: most of An Innocent Man sounded like it was explicitly meant to evoke earlier musical eras, particularly 1950s and 1960s American music, which is more or less consistent with groups like the Ramones.

The title track An Innocent Man was everything about why I’ve never listened to a Billy Joel record before: weird vocals, weird rhythm, too much piano, too slow, no energy, and it went on far too long.

Easy Money was a soul song and, not to compare, but it kind of evoked Sam Cooke’s Twistin’ the Night Away, though it was nowhere near as good.

Similarly, Christie Lee reminded me of one of my favorite scenes from one of my favorite movies, but could not seriously be compared to Little Richard (or John Goodman).

The Longest Time was played on the radio when I was growing up, and I think I always assumed that it was an actual oldie (ie, a doo wop song from when doo wop was actually popular), but I guess it was not! And it’s pretty song solid! Nicely done, Billy Joel!

This Night also had an oldie sound, but with much more rock instrumentation and much less of a great melody, and the saxophone was terrible.

Uptown Girl was another that I heard on the radio when I was growing up, and I think it’s a good song. I wouldn’t want to listen to it more than one or two times in a year, though.

Tell Her About It was another that I recognized, but not as well, and it had a soul sound, too. The other soul songs were Leave a Tender Moment Alone and Careless Talk, the latter of which also had some doo wop elements.

Keeping the Faith weirdly tried a reggae-type beat and was not successful.

Grade

4/5: would listen again

The Rockin’ Originals by Various Artists (Vinyl record album review)

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Record basics

  • Album name: The Rockin’ Originals
  • Group name: Various Artists (including The Dixie Cups, The Jelly Beans, Carl Perkins, The Shangri-Las, Jerry Lee Lewis, Bill Justis, The Ad Libs)
  • Year: 1972
  • Number of discs: one
  • Label: Pickwick
  • Collection: Brenner / Gessner
  • Buy it on Amazon: $4.95

The Rockin' Originals by Various Artists

My review

Level of familiarity before listening

I know almost all of these songs, and I’m a big Shangri-Las fan.

What I expected

Oldies (and some not-quite-as-oldies)!

What it was actually like

I completely understand what it is about Leader of the Pack that makes people consider it the Shangri-Las’ best song and why it gets included in every compilation, but it’s not really one of my favorites! I love Remember (Walking in the Sand), though – it’s like two songs in one, and some years ago, the “Oh, no, no, no, no, no” line from it must have gotten sampled in a pop song, because I suddenly started hearing it all the time in office lobbies and public transportation. If I were going to include that and another song by the Shangri-Las, I’d probably make it Give Him a Great Big Kiss (“When I say I’m in love, you best believe I’m in love, L-U-V”).

Every part of this record was wonderful and it reminds me so much of when I was young and my father used to listen to the oldies station on the car radio. I wonder what that station was, and whether it still even exists, with such a diminished population of oldies fans. And what is the thematic connection between the nine songs that got included here? And perhaps even more importantly, what exactly is “raunchy” about Raunchy, the instrumental eighth track by Bill Justis, which is the only one that I didn’t recognize? It didn’t strike me as particularly raunchy, but who am I to say?

Finally, though Lightnin’ Strikes by Lou Christie and It’s My Party by Lesley Gore are really his favorites, I can definitely envision my father blasting Chapel of Love and singing along to it, so that makes it the best song on the record for me.

Grade

5/5: love it