NINA HAGEN: "Fearless"

Original released on LP CBS 25667

(PORTUGAL, November 1983)

LIONEL RICHIE: "Can't Slow Down"

Original released on LP Motown 6059 ML

(US 1983, October 11)

On "Can't Slow Down", his second solo album, Lionel Richie ran with the sound and success of his eponymous debut, creating an album that was designed to be bigger and better. It's entirely possible that he took a cue from Michael Jackson's "Thriller", which set out to win over listeners of every corner of the mainstream pop audience, because Richie does a similar thing with "Can't Slow Down" - he plays to the MOR adult contemporary audience, to be sure, but he ups the ante on his dance numbers, creating grooves that are funkier, and he even adds a bit of rock with the sleek nocturnal menace of "Running With the Night," one of the best songs here. He doesn't swing for the fences like Michael did in 1982; he makes safe bets, which is more in his character. But safe bets do pay off, and with "Can't Slow Down" Richie reaped enormous dividends, earning not just his biggest hit, but his best album. He has less compunction about appearing as a pop singer this time around, which gives the preponderance of smooth ballads - particularly "Penny Lover," "Hello," and the country-ish "Stuck on You" - conviction, and the dance songs roll smooth and easy, never pushing the beats too hard and relying more on Richie's melodic hooks than the grooves, which is what helped make "All Night Long (All Night)" a massive hit. Indeed, five of these songs (all the aforementioned tunes) were huge hits, and since the record ran only eight songs, that's an astonishing ration. The short running time does suggest the record's main weakness, one that it shares with many early-'80s LPs - the songs themselves run on a bit too long, padding out the running length of the entire album. This is only a problem on album tracks like "Love Will Find a Way," which are pleasant but a little tedious at their length, but since there are only three songs that aren't hits, it's a minor problem. All the hits showcase Lionel Richie at his best, as does "Can't Slow Down" as a whole. (Stephen Erlewine in AllMusic)

THE MOTELS: "Little Robbers"

Original released on LP Capitol ST-12288

(US 1983, September 16)

"Little Robbers", the follow-up to the Motels' commercial breakthrough "All 4 One", is nearly as consistent as its predecessor, finding the perfect balance between mainstream rock conventions and quirky new wave flourishes. Again, the singles are the best parts of the record, with the hazy "Suddenly Last Summer" deservedly reaching the Top Ten and "Remember the Nights" being a fine AOR workout, but the remainder of the album suffers from undistinguished material and a distinct lack of hooks. (Stephen Erlewine in AllMusic)

MARIANNE FAITHFULL: "A Child's Adventure"

Original released on LP Island ILPS 7 90066-1

(US, Fébruary 1983)

Nothing. Nowhere. Lightless, without luminosity. Soundless, without the accent of life. Weightless, without the gravity of the living. There was nothing. Nothing to feel or taste or scream at. If the world was formless, this was now the world. Unreality was populated as silence and hyper-insignificance. My universe was bleak, was eviscerated, was a once-filled cosmic egg drained of essence and meaning. My world was dead. My world had ended. No starlets to turn me on. No warmth of lover's legs or ass. No life around me to nag or cry. The death knights had won, and the light brigade was eternally smothered. Doctor Death has injected me with his singular brand and had conquered my realm. The great timekeeper and gatekeeper of my universe were put to their final rest. The great formerly boundless ardor had been steamrolled and crushed by the Reaper's mechanized, four-wheeled beast. Blood, spit - there were no words for anything, anymore. No sex. No friendship. No emotion. Nothing...that is until Faithfull's "A Child's Adventure".

One minute I was crushed beyond repair by heartache and loss, the next I was listening ad nauseum to "Running for Our Lives". I was happy to be running for my life, for I felt like I had a life once again. "A Child's Adventure" isn't avant-garde jazz, or opalescent psychedelic jams, or hair-whipping metal. It isn't stuffed with horror stories. There's few fingers like frightening shadows skulking to strangle your soul, though a couple of songs (like "Morning Come") with petrify you with gorgon's eyes in their sincerity and mindfulness, which can be as terrifying as a slasher flick for some. I'm not sure there's a Marianne Faithfull record that moves me more or aligns my insights in love, the memory of love and memory of pain, and with those the irresponsiblity of memory's senses. Though C.S. Lewis once wrote in The Problem of Pain that "love may forgive all infirmities and love still in spite of them: but Love cannot cease to will their removal", I think "A Child's Adventure" brings its own specially trained love, and with that special training some sweet exorcism. (in RateYourMusic)

PAUL SIMON: "Hearts And Bones"

Original released on LP Warner Bros 23942-1

(US 1983, October 31)

"Hearts and Bones" was a commercial disaster, the lowest-charting new studio album of Paul Simon's career. It is also his most personal collection of songs, one of his most ambitious, and one of his best. It retains a personal vision, one largely devoted to the challenges of middle-aged life, among them a renewed commitment to love; the title song was a notable testament to new romance, while "Train in the Distance" reflected on romantic discord. Elsewhere, "The Late Great Johnny Ace" was his meditation on John Lennon's murder and how it related to the mythology of pop music. Musically, Simon moved forward and backward simultaneously, taking off from the jazz fusion style of his last two albums into his old loves of doo wop and rock & roll while also incorporating current sounds with such new collaborators as dance music producer Nile Rodgers and minimalist composer Philip Glass. The result was Simon's most impressive collection in a decade and the most underrated album in his catalog. (William Ruhlmann in AllMusic)

Rockin' With Neil & The Shocking Pinks

Original released on LP Geffen GHS 4013

(US 1983, July 26)

By following the hi-tech "Trans" after only seven months with a rockabilly album, Neil Young baffled his audience. Just as he had followed the sales peak of "Harvest" in 1972 with a series of challenging, uncommercial albums, Young had now dissipated the commercial and critical acceptance he had enjoyed with 1979's "Rust Never Sleeps" with a series of mediocre albums and inexplicable genre exercises. "Everybody's Rockin'", credited to "Neil & the Shocking Pinks," represented the nadir of this attempted career suicide. Running less than 25 minutes, it found Young covering early rock evergreens like "Betty Lou's Got a New Pair of Shoes" and writing a few songs in the same vein ("Kinda Fonda Wanda"). If he had presented this as a mini-album at a discount price, it would have been easier to enjoy the joke Young seemed to intend. As it was, fans who already had their doubts about Young dropped off the radar screen; "Everybody's Rockin'" was his lowest-charting album since his 1969 solo debut, and he didn't release another album for two years (his longest break ever between records). (William Ruhlmann in AllMusic)

ROXY MUSIC: The High Road Live EP

Original released on Live EP EG Polydor EGMLP1

(UK, March 1983) 

"The High Road" is an excellent sounding live EP. It includes two Roxy songs:  "Can't Let Go" which was debuted on the EP and "My Only Love" from "Flesh + Blood".  It also includes two well-done covers: Neil Young's "Like A Hurricane" and John Lennon's "Jealous Guy".  I recall wanting to pick up the EP when I heard the live version of "My Only Love" on the radio.  It is still an enjoyable listen, though perhaps not essential.  There is also a "The High Road" tour DVD available which contains fourteen selections (including the four mentioned above) and may give fans a better feel for what an early 1980's Roxy Music show was like. (in RateYourMusic)

"Girls Just Want To Have Fun" By CYNDI LAUPER

ERIC CLAPTON: The Turning Point

Original released on LP Warner Bros 9 23773

(US, February 1983)

"Money and Cigarettes" marked several important turning points in Eric Clapton's recording career. It was his debut release on his own Duck imprint within Warner Bros.'Reprise Records subsidiary. It was also the first album he made after coming to terms with his drinking problem by giving up alcohol. Newly focused and having written a batch of new songs, he became dissatisfied with his longtime band and fired them, with the exception of second guitarist Albert Lee. In their place, he hired session pros like Stax Records veteran bassist Donald "Duck" Dunn and Muscle Shoals drummer Roger Hawkins, also bringing in guest guitarist Ry Cooder. His new songs reflected on his changed condition, with "Ain't Going Down," a thinly veiled musical rewrite of the Jimi Hendrix arrangement of "All Along the Watchtower," serving as a statement of purpose that declared, «I've still got something left to say.» "The Shape You're In" was a criticism of his wife for her alcoholism that concluded, «I'm just telling you baby 'cause I've been there myself,» while the lengthy acoustic ballad "Pretty Girl" and "Man in Love" reaffirmed his feelings for her. The album's single was the relatively slight pop tune "I've Got a Rock n' Roll Heart," but Clapton's many blues fans must have been most pleased with the covers of Sleepy John Estes' "Everybody Oughta Make a Change" (significantly placed as the album's leadoff track), Albert King's "Crosscut Saw," and Johnny Otis' "Crazy Country Hop." For all the changes and the high-powered sidemen, though, "Money and Cigarettes" ended up being just an average effort from Clapton, which his audience seems to have sensed since, despite the Top 20 placement for the single, it became his first album in more than six years to miss the Top Ten and fail to go gold. (William Ruhkmann in AllMusic)

A HERANÇA MUSICAL DE JOSÉ AFONSO

STEVIE NICKS: The First 2 Albums

Famed for her mystical chanteuse image, singer/songwriter Stevie Nicks enjoyed phenomenal success not only as a solo artist but also as a key member of Fleetwood Mac. Stephanie Lynn Nicks was born May 26, 1948, in Phoenix, Arizona; the granddaughter of a frustrated country singer, she began performing at the age of four, and occasionally sang at the tavern owned by her parents. Nicks started writing songs in her midteens, and joined her first group, the Changing Times, while attending high school in California. During her senior year, Nicks met fellow student Lindsey Buckingham, with whom she formed the band Fritz along with friends Javier Pacheco and Calvin Roper. Between 1968 and 1971, the group became a popular attraction on the West Coast music scene, opening for Jimi Hendrix, Janis Joplin, and Creedence Clearwater Revival.

Ultimately, tensions arose over the amount of attention paid by fans to Nicks' pouty allure, and after three years Fritz disbanded; Buckingham remained her partner, however, and soon became her lover as well. After moving to Los Angeles, the duo recorded its 1973 debut LP, "Buckingham Nicks". Despite a cover that featured the couple nude, the album flopped; however, it caught the attention of the members of Fleetwood Mac, who invited Buckingham and Nicks to join their ranks in 1974. In quick time, the revitalized group achieved unparalleled success: after the LP "Fleetwood Mac" topped the charts in 1975, the band recorded 1977's "Rumours", which sold over 17 million copies and stood for several years as the best-selling album of all time. (Jason Akeny in AllMusic)

BELLA DONNA

(Original released on LP Modern 38139-1)

(US 1981, July 27)

Stevie Nicks' solo career was off to an impressive, if overdue, start with "Bella Donna", which left no doubt that she could function quite well without the input of her colleagues in Fleetwood Mac. The album yielded a number of hits that seemed omnipresent in the '80s, including the moving "Leather and Lace" (which unites Nicks with Don Henley), the poetic "Edge of Seventeen," and her rootsy duet with Tom Petty, "Stop Draggin' My Heart Around." But equally engaging are less exposed tracks like the haunting "After the Glitter Fades." Hit producer Jimmy Iovine wisely avoids over-producing, and keeps things sounding organic on this striking debut. (Alex Henderson in AllMusic)

THE WILD HEART

(Original released on LP Modern 90084-1)

(US 1983, June 10)

Stevie Nicks was following both her debut solo album, "Bella Donna" (1981), which had topped the charts, sold over a million copies (now over four million), and spawned four Top 40 hits, and Fleetwood Mac's "Mirage" (1982), which had topped the charts, sold over a million copies (now over two million), and spawned three Top 40 hits (including her "Gypsy"), when she released her second solo album, "The Wild Heart". She was the most successful American female pop singer of the time. Not surprisingly, she played it safe: "The Wild Heart" contained nothing that would disturb fans of her previous work and much that echoed it. As on "Bella Donna", producer Jimmy Iovine took a simpler, more conventional pop/rock approach to the arrangements than Fleetwood Mac's inventive Lindsey Buckingham did on Nicks's songs, which meant the music was more straightforward than her typically elliptical lyrics.

Iovine did get a Mac-like sound on "Nightbird," in which Nicks repeated her invocation to "the white winged dove" from "Bella Donna"'s "Edge of Seventeen," and on "Sable on Blond," a "Gypsy" soundalike. His most daring effort was the album's leadoff single, "Stand Back," which boasted a disco tempo. Elsewhere, the songs were largely interchangeable with those on "Bella Donna", even down to the obligatory duet with Tom Petty. Nicks seemed to know what she was up to - one song was called "Nothing Ever Changes." As a result, "The Wild Heart" sold to the faithful - it made the Top Ten, sold over a million copies, and spawned three Top 40 hits ("Stand Back," "Nightbird," and "If Anyone Falls"). And that was appropriate: if you loved "Bella Donna", you would like "The Wild Heart" very much. (William Ruhlmann in AllMusic)

SRV: "Texas Flood"

Original released on LP Epic BFE 38734

(US 1983, June 13)

It's hard to overestimate the impact Stevie Ray Vaughan's debut, "Texas Flood", had upon its release in 1983. At that point, blues was no longer hip, the way it was in the '60s. "Texas Flood" changed all that, climbing into the Top 40 and spending over half a year on the charts, which was practically unheard of for a blues recording. Vaughan became a genuine star and, in doing so, sparked a revitalization of the blues. This was a monumental impact, but his critics claimed that, no matter how prodigious Vaughan's instrumental talents were, he didn't forge a distinctive voice; instead, he wore his influences on his sleeve, whether it was Albert King's pinched yet muscular soloing or Larry Davis' emotive singing. There's a certain element of truth in that, but that was sort of the point of "Texas Flood". Vaughan didn't hide his influences; he celebrated them, pumping fresh blood into a familiar genre. 

When Vaughan and Double Trouble cut the album over the course of three days in 1982, he had already played his set lists countless times; he knew how to turn this material inside out or goose it up for maximum impact. The album is paced like a club show, kicking off with Vaughan's two best self-penned songs, "Love Struck Baby" and "Pride and Joy," then settling into a pair of covers, the slow-burning title track and an exciting reading of Howlin' Wolf's "Tell Me," before building to the climax of "Dirty Pool" and "I'm Crying." Vaughan caps the entire thing with "Lenny," a lyrical, jazzy tribute to his wife. It becomes clear that Vaughan's true achievement was finding something personal and emotional by fusing different elements of his idols. Sometimes the borrowing was overt, and other times subtle, but it all blended together into a style that recalled the past while seizing the excitement and essence of the present. (Stephen Erlewine in AllMusic)