Lord, who designed the cinematography for this snore-fest of a video? I have a soft spot for the lead single from this album, Oh Sherrie, but only because it's exuberantly cheesy. Foolish Heart totally blows.
Gotta admit, this sappy Chicago ballad has been millin' about for days, almost as if to taunt me for skipping it over in the write-up from Friday. I had to include this link to a Peter Cetera solo performance, complete with wacky cell phone-waving revelry, 'cause the only other versions I'm finding on YouTube are from the post-Cetera era with lead singer Jason Scheff. As if this album weren't enough of a shark-jump (ah, the obvious link between massive commercial success and suckage) it was also Cetera's last work with the band before he flew the coup in 1985.
Artist: Chicago (Peter Cetera) Year: 1984 Rating: Lukewarm
I adore the Cars. Though, as it often is with songs in my head, this one isn't the end-all-be-all of awesome songs by an artist I adore. If I had a more refined shuffle feature in my unconscious mind, I would probably mainly be playing songs from their first, fucking brilliant self-titled 1978 album, which evidently has now gone platinum six times over. 1984's Heartbeat City was a decent record, though I will say that Benjamin Orr (may he rest in peace) was best as a bassist and not as the front man. It's not at all that he was a bad singer (Just What I Needed, from the first record, is excellent), it's that Drive veers dangerously close to schmaltzy blue-eyed soul territory. But never mind, "Magic" is a cute enough number, and this album wasn't anything close to the abysmal shark jump that band members Greg Hawkes and Elliot Easton made in forming the New Cars in 2005 with Todd Motherfucking Rundgren replacing Ric Ocasek on lead vocals.
Do not even get me started on how wrong it is to reform the Cars without Ocasek, Orr, and drummer David Robinson. I have a serious axe to grind with any band who reforms decades after their heyday for the payola, particularly when crucial band members don't participate (see Journey sans Steve Perry). For that matter, I'm similarly irked by bands that stay together well passed their relevance for the payola (the quintessential example being the Rolling Stones, who haven't produced a song worth a dime since the late '70s but grossed close to $500 million on their last world tour). Wow, now who's veering dangerously away from the point?
Ugh. This is one of those tunes that makes me cringe and at the same time rubberneckily (you like that word?) nostalgic for my youth in the '80s. As well as nostalgic for Grace Slick and Paul Kantner's youth in the '60s. Be clear that this is a Starship song. No not Jefferson Starship, and not predecessor Jefferson Airplane, but simply Starship. A song written not one, but two shark-jumps away from the band's relevance in the rock canon. The video is pretty hilarious.
Year: 1985 Rating: Lukewarm (cold, with a dash of warming irony.)
Oh, dear readers, if you only knew how many times I've been punished by the infinite-loop that this "we've jumped the shark" Genesis song makes through the corners of my mind. And for some reason, it usually hits me while I'm taking a shower in the morning. Perhaps it has worked its way so deeply into my neural pathways that I will now and forever associate shampooing with the insipid imperatives of Phil Collins's pinnacle-of-the-Cold War anthem.
"This is the world we live in/And these are the hands we're given/Use them and let's start trying/To make it a place worth living in."
Over. And over. And over. Help me Peter Gabriel, you're my only hope.
Not quite the calibur of shark-jump as We Built This City from an even later offshoot of Jefferson Airplane; in fact, a decent single from the Mickey Thomas era of the band, on which Grace Slick played for the first time in several years.
I had to include this link to a Peter Cetera solo performance, complete with wacky cell phone-waving revelry, 'cause the only other versions I'm finding on YouTube are from the post-Cetera era with lead singer Jason Scheff. As if this album weren't enough of a shark-jump (ah, the obvious link between massive commercial success and suckage) it was also Cetera's last work with the band before he flew the coup in 1985.