Tom Tom Club - Tom Tom Club

Sire/Island Records: 1981/2009

I have to assume everyone reading this blog knows the story of Tom Tom Club by now. How the rhythm section of Talking Heads were encouraged to make a record of their own while the band was on hiatus, and instead of pulling a Peter Criss, they debuted with one of the funkiest disco reggae-dub records of the era. One that's endured to this day, with hit singles sampled in perpetuity.

Yes, everyone knows that story. Or so I thought, until just the other day. I mean, the timing of the following anecdote couldn't be more perfect, so I must share it.

I was playing Tom Tom Club's album at work, mentally making notes for whatever angle I might come up with for this review. Genius Of Love comes on, and as that extended groove at the end plays out, one of our younger staff strolls by and mentions, “Oh, hey, Mark Morrison's Return Of The Mack.”

Now, I know he's mentioning this to me as a way of showing off his music knowledge, that someone his age would be familiar with hits of the '90s or something. And I smile, because I'm about to blow his mind.

“Oh, no, this is the original version of that beat.”

“There's an original?”

“Oh yeah, it's been sampled lots. Originally came out in 1981.”

“Nineteen eighty-one!?”

“Nineteen eighty-one.”

“...geez, nineteen eighty-one...”

That, my friends, just goes to show how timeless this record is. Sure, you could quip some of the rapping in Wordy Rappinghood comes off corny, or Booming And Zooming is too weird to be any good, and lord knows this deluxe re-issue didn't need all those pointless remixes added. Damn though, Genius Of Love's irresistible beat. The peppy L'Elephant. The dreamy Lorelei (always loved that name). The charming cover of Under The Boardwalk. Plus an entire bonus disc holding the rarer follow-up Close To The Bone? How can anyone not vibe on this release?

Okay, maybe that last one isn't as great. I mean, it's nice to have it included at all, this 2009 release the first time appearing on CD, and Pleasure Of Love is a worthy single. Unfortunately, I can hear why Tina and Chris weren't as pleased with the album. After the serendipitous recording sessions of their debut (not to mention the fun Bahamas trip included with it), they hoped to repeat the experience in their follow-up. Unfortunately, things failed to click a second time (political revolutions outside the studio didn't help), the resulting album sounding stiffer and forced compared to its predecessor. Measure Up at least recaptures some of the original's magic, and The Man With The 4-Way Hip comes close, if not for the incessantly repetitive lyrics.

Whatever, it's the self-titled debut that remains the star attraction. If you still haven't heard it (*cough* younger generation *cough*), get on it and hear the roots of many a hit rap and R'n'B single.

Harold Budd - The Serpent (In Quicksilver)

Cantil/All Saints: 1981/2018

Harold Budd had made his proper debut with the well-received The Pavilion Of Dreams, which Brian Eno produced. Following that, they teamed up for the second entry into Eno's seminal Ambient series, The Plateaux Of Mirror. Being such a prominent figure of ambient's early years surely yielded many opportunities for the Buddian one, if not for the fact that scene was barely existent yet. Sure, you had the synth noodlings of the Berlin-Schoolers, and the electronic experimenting of the soundtrackers, but Eno and Budd's brand of abstract art music remained a super-niche side of ambient's emergent sound, especially Harold's classical approach to playing the ol' ivories.

Basically, despite having his name associated with a trendy tastemaker, Budd was still left without any sort of record deal for his own musical explorations. He thus did what many a genre-niche artist is forced to do: create his own print to self-release his albums. Eh, why didn't Eno just help Budd along with on his label? If I was to hazard a guess, it was either because Eno was between labels himself (Obscure, where Pavilion Of Dreams had come out on, folded before the '80s), or Budd wanted to release something without Eno's ambient treatments prominently involved, letting his own muse speak for itself. Neither would surprise me.

Whatever the case, Cantil was the result of Budd going into label business for himself, with The Serpent (In Quicksilver) being its first release. Um, out of three, according to Lord Discogs. Guess becoming a record mogul just wasn't in Budd's blood, but at least he got his records out.

And if setting up your own print to release your own music in the early '80s doesn't sound like a punk enterprise to you, then the production of The Serpent (In Quicksilver) sure will. If there was anything Budd took from his time working with Eno, it was realizing he could accomplish more making use of a studio than just recording some piano pieces and calling it a day. Unfortunately, ol' Harold didn't have the greatest connections in California at that point in his career, so he wandered from studio to studio, recording bits and pieces wherever he could, whenever he could. The almost renegade approach to crafting this album helps explain why it's so short, a mere six tracks long, half of which hover around the two-minute mark. Heck, the longest is a shade over five minutes, which may as well be a radio jingle where either ambient or modern classical is concerned.

So the short running time may be a turnoff for some, but let's be honest: the moment you hear that sliding pedal guitar opening in Afar, there's really almost no where else to go but down; or up, to a higher state of peace. Like, I'm not saying The KLF nicked the idea of a pedal guitar making perfect sense in the context of ambient music, but I'd like to hear of an earlier example of it than The Serpent.

Kitaro - Ki

Canyon Records/KuckKuck: 1981/1982

Ah, good ol' Kitaro, the Japanese composer often credited with creating New Age music many moons ago. I doubt it was his intention to do so, his musical upbringing well off the beaten path of your traditional mystic synth wibbler. Hell, the guy was practically banned from learning music while growing up, his parents intent on gearing him to take over the family business. Kitaro said nuts to that, essentially bailing on his home to make his own way in the world, working small jobs while writing music on his spare time. Damn, this is sounding like an old-fashioned 'hippie goes West to start folk rock band' story.

It gets even better! After joining the Far East Family Band, their touring eventually took them to Germany, where Kitaro met krautrock synth legend Klaus Schulze, and started studying his mastery of many of the latest and greatest keyboards around. Already fond of the sounds created by synthesizers, Kitaro adopted any that he could afford into his repertoire, and left Far East Family Band to start a solo career. Before doing that, however, he travelled throughout eastern Asia, picking up musical styles along the way.

Point is, mock the New Age scene if you must, but Kitaro himself definitely earned his stripes (to say nothing of his plaudits in the ensuing years). Between original compositions, tons of score work, collaborations with unexpected chaps (a guy from Megadeth, really?), and plenty of awards and nominations, he has very little left to prove to the world of music. Or maybe this is just a big ol' ramble justifying why I picked up a couple Kitaro CDs from a used shop a couple months back. Hey, even the store clerk raved about Kitaro as I was buying them, so clearly he's got fans lurking everywhere, right? So it goes.

Thus, let us go way back in time, more than three decades past and when Mr. Kitaro was building a name for himself. Ki was his fourth album, but he’d also released two soundtrack albums for the Silk Road television series, plus a live album too. Later that year, he’d release a Best Of collection too, which is utterly bonkers for such a short time span. Ki is essentially the cap on the earliest stage of his career, where his synthesizer melodies and shimmering, pulsing sequencers defined his sound. Later he’d start incorporating more traditional instruments into his compositions, so if you fancy way ancient synth music, this period is a good starting point in dipping your toes into Kitaro’s tones.

Or maybe not. I cannot deny this music is very calm, soothing, folksy, and charming – New Age, yes, though often with more orchestral punch. Plus, if you don’t care much for Far East melodies and harmonies, Ki won’t do much for you either. Dammit though, there’s something captivating about Kitaro’s use of pads, minimoogs, and spacey synths, like exploring mysterious, strange lands through the use of sound. Ain’t that what great music do?

Neil Young & Crazy Horse - re-ac-tor

Reprise Records: 1981/2003

Just how sloppy and loose can a band go before it turns unacceptable? For that authentic scrappy, bar-blues rock played out of downtown dive garage feeling (or something), folks often gives a little on the technical side. Where Mr. Young and his band-of-brothers Crazy Horse are concerned, listeners wouldn’t have it any other way, their freewheeling approach to music making part and partial of their charm. It’s given them the leeway to go into albums with barely any prep and only the most tenuous of themes: Everybody Knows This Is Nowhere is about capturing fresh band synergy at its source of inspiration; Ragged Glory is about re-capturing that same spark long after it should have expired; Psychedelic Pill is about re-re-capturing that spark even as grandpas.

Those are just the albums I’ve thus far reviewed though (wow, what a weird thematic coincidence), and the group’s done other material with a different focus. In the case of re-ac-tor, Neil had to fulfill his album obligation to Reprise Records before getting a sweet deal from Geffen, and slapped out a sloppy collection of Crazy Horse jams to do so. Okay, that’s not entirely accurate, but given the utter lack of finesse in many of these songs, it makes for a juicy bit of suppositional gossip taking that stance.

The truth is a little more nuanced, Neil’s personal life growing incredibly stressful and in need of some changes. That he’d miss some creative fire or not have time for proper rehearsals with Crazy Horse is understandable in that context, but one must ask why force an album if he’s not quite feeling it? Songs like Get Back On It, Motor City, and Rapid Transit are some of the goofiest, simplest examples of southern rock I’ve ever heard, while T-Bone is nothing more a drunken three-chord jam that lasts nine minutes! Still, if you’re a fan of Young and Horse, it’s an awesome drunken three-chord jam session, but you’d hardly want to show it off to others as the group at their best.

And hey, Young always finds ways of crafting catchy, compelling music even on his off years. Southern Pacific is a charming ode to the once-mighty rail industry, with a suitably chugging rhythm and, dare I say, picturesque lyrics (plus was packaged as a bizarre triangular gatefold 7” single). Shots is also vivid, though with such ugly and messy manner with blown chords, out-of-sync rhythm, and nasty distortion, the sloppy production of re-ac-tor actually makes sense in this case. Finally, Opera Star and Surfer Joe And Moe The Sleaze are fun little bar rock tunes, probably also performed while intoxicated.

That’s about the strongest endorsement for this album I can give: best enjoyed drunk. Neil And His Wacky Horses have stronger LPs in their discography, some dynamic, others somber - this one’s about as half-assed as you’ll ever hear the group, but perhaps one of the funnest too. Screw you, SpellCheck, I cans sloopy grammar alls I wants to for re-ac-tor.

Various - The Music Of Cosmos

Cosmos Studios: 1981/2000

How fortunate. I can talk about The Music Of Cosmos at a time when interest in Carl Sagan’s excellent series is part of the public discourse again, thanks to nu-Cosmos currently airing on TV. The Neil DeGrasse Tyson hosted series is pretty good so far, though tends to lack the gravitas the original held, too often bypassing the philosophical notions Sagan brought forth while explaining the wonders around us. The Alan Silvestri score sadly doesn’t help, missing those iconic musical cues that flourished throughout the original series. C’mon, mang, you did Back To The Future, you can do memorable themes. Only thing sticking so far is that bit of piano diddle in the opening credits, and only because it reminds me of the Contact score.

Right, right, this is an unfair comparison, but let’s be honest here: along with everything else, Cosmos stands peerless as a documentary because of its music. Not only did it include synth wizards of the era (Vangelis, Tomita, Synergy), but also works from classical composers (Mozart, Vivaldi, Bach, Pachelbel, Holst, Stravinsky), and even contemporary music like blues and prog-rock (Louis Armstrong, Roy Buchanan, Pink Floyd). No way could Silvestri compete with such a range of music, and one wonders why they didn’t try licensing music out like before. Surely nu-Cosmos has a bigger budget than the original. Did all the money go into those spiffy atom animations?

Whatever. Let’s focus on The Music Of Cosmos, proper original-like. The most famous pieces were the Vangelis compositions. In fact, you can’t hear the gentle piano of Heaven & Hell or synthy bell tones of Alpha without thinking Cosmos, the two completely intertwined in the public consciousness to this day. Folks probably figure Vangelis specifically wrote all these works for Cosmos, but were actually plucked from older albums. There are a couple exclusive synth works here though, both by an anonymous chap named Boydstun, whom even the mighty Lord Discogs knows nothing about. Hell, he never even made the cut on the original ’81 vinyl, though neither did several other works. Thank goodness for twenty year anniversary double-CD editions, eh?

One of the clever things about The Music Of Cosmos is how the tracks are arranged to tell a narrative of sorts, specifically of the cosmos as humanity’s come to understand it, and perhaps foresee our possible fates. Helping the tale along are sound effects bridging the music together. For instance, just before Vangelis’ Alpha starts, a massive explosion erupts from the desolate calm of Shostakovich’s Symphony No. 11. A supernova creating the heavier elements? I’d say so. Meanwhile on CD2, where technology’s run rampant, chainsaws mercilessly cut down old growth forest before the melancholy Prayer of St. Gegory emerges.

Not the most subtle of messages, that, but Sagan’s gift was presenting such messages as a means to inspire ourselves to become better than we are. The rich diversity of music presented in The Music Of Cosmos only proves humanity’s ability to do so.

The Police - Ghost In The Machine

A & M Records: 1981

2 Unlimited was incredibly influential in developing my musical tastes – it’s possible I might not even be writing electronic music reviews were it not for them (what would this blog be instead? Rap Music Critic? Grunge Music Critic? Country Music Cri- oh, God no!). There is a group, however, that I heavily enjoyed well before that, predating even the obligatory Raffi stage we all go through as children. Well, two, but no point in getting into Boney M right now, as this review’s already in danger of getting lost down Anecdote Alley.

Right, The Police. I’m surprised how ingrained memories of playing Ghost In The Machine are. Fiddling through my father’s record collection, always looking for that distinct black cover with the weird LCD markings (it's the band's faces, Toddler Sykonee). Putting it on the turntable, instantly being mesmerized by the opening synth stabs of Spirits In The Material World, feeling giddy over the pop-romp of Every Little Thing She Does Is Magic, and eagerly anticipating that haunting, emergent pulse of Invisible Sun. I don’t recall listening to much beyond that. I was only ever after the opening salvo, the rest of the tunes going way over my young head.

I could also point to this album as planting seeds for my fascination for things electronic based, but that's stupid, exposure to themes of technology overtaking humanity an inevitability growing up in the '80s (well, where such technology existed anyway). Maybe it was the recession of the time souring moods, but Ghost In The Machine finds The Police (re: Sting, mostly) far more contemplative than they'd been in the years prior. Sure, they still have time for uptempo rock numbers like Rehumanize Yourself, reggae jam One World and the like, but aside from Hungry For You (a sort of sister track to Everything...), the themes of fear for the future and where mankind's heading persist. End the album with a melancholy track titled Darkness? Yeah, definitely far more mature topics than I could have hoped to understand.

Significantly older now, I've not only come to appreciate the themes of this album (if somewhat snicker with the benefit of hindsight), but the musicianship as well. The Police have long been one of those remarkable bands where their talents were often overshadowed by their hit-making ability. Four albums deep now, and they've started experimenting with jazz fusion (oh, Sting loves to honk on that sax throughout) and prog rock (Secret Journey has lovely guitar effects in play); and yes, more synthesizers than ever used before. And damn, that bassline in Spirits In A Material World is bonkers, utterly remarkable how such a screwy hook gels with the rest of the song. I got to catch their reunion tour, and Sting couldn't get it right, causing a muddled rendition of the song.

Ack, that's yet another anecdote. Too many, gotta abort this review now. Check out Ghost In The Machine if you haven't already, it's easily the darkest of The Police's efforts.

Kraftwerk - Computer World

Elektra: 1981

Computer World was the last album of Kraftwerk’s Fabulous Five (or second to last of the Sensational Six if you include Electric Café). What else is left to say about it? How about, of those seminal mid-career albums Kraftwerk put out, this is my least favorite.

Of course I still enjoy it, but compared to the albums that came before, it’s a muted joy, a nodding appreciation rather than giddy fulfillment. Problem is by the time I got around to hearing it in full, I’d heard it so bloody much that its potential luster had worn away long ago.

I’m not even talking about the actual songs themselves. Without a doubt, Computer World is the most influential Kraftwerk album within EDM’s sphere. These songs have been sampled, interpolated, pilfered, recontextualized, ripped-off, and paid tribute to so often, it’d be neigh impossible to make a reliable list of where they’ve cropped up. Trans-Europe Express may have been an inspiring catalyst for the Soul Sonic Force, but Numbers and Home Computer pretty much formed the backbone of electro (and by extension, freestyle and bass music). Also, much of the synth-pop world had caught up to the group’s sonic tricks by this point so all those weird, wonderful robotic sounds they produced weren’t as cutting-edge as before. Though few could match their attention to rhythmic detail and knack for charming melody, Kraftwerk no longer stood alone as the 80s took form.

This may be why Computer World always feels short to me. As Kraftwerk’s computer futurism would go on to be thoroughly explored in the ensuing decade by other artists, what’s offered here comes off as little more than a glimpse. It's unfortunate, considering their other albums provided far more compelling ‘journeys.’

Three types of songs are featured: the Theme, the Pop, and the Robotic. The latter is explored in the two I’ve already mentioned, plus closer It’s More Fun To Compute. Given their straight-forward rhythms and weird sound effects, it’s easy to see why they were so heavily sampled. Still, even in their original context, they’re solid tunes, plus anytime Kraftwerk breaks out the voice boxes is a win. Less effective are the two Pop ditties, Pocket Calculator and Computer Love, both too cute for my taste though the latter does feature pleasant synth melodies. Finally, the overriding Theme of this album stems from titular opener Computer World, which has a reprise midway through, and something of a return in the closer. As Kraftwerk list off government watch dogs, you get the sense the intent of this album is to convey a world where Big Brother’s always watching. Why yes, 1984 was just around the corner, why do you ask?

It’d be highly remiss of me to not recommend this album, but anyone breaking out from their early electronic music exploration should know Kraftwerk is essential listening. Just don’t be surprised if, like me, you’ll find an overwhelming sense of familiarity with Computer World.