Bradley's Buzz

The Bubbatunes Vaults 7

Here we are again, going through the Bubbatunes Vaults to see what kind of great tunage we can dust off and play - today we continue the Album Reissue part of our series which includes some classic albums redone and remade for the oh so very 2000's..

bub 37 Rachel Sweet - ...AND THEN HE KISSED ME (2004; 1981)
Rachel's 3rd album ..And Then He Kissed Me, was just re-released about a year ago on a double disc with her 4th album Blame It On Love (1982) and I recommend everyone checking it out and buying it for themselves, the Bubbatunes version of ..And Then came out about a year before they re-released the album and as much as I love the double albums on a CD, I still like to have the album on its own with artwork reflecting the actual vinyl release and all that. So I still play this version when I want to hear the album. This album is probably Rachel's biggest in terms of mainstream rock/pop, containing her version of "Shadows Of The Night" and her top 40 duet with Rex (ugh!) Smith "Everlasting Love", it's the only top 40 this poor woman ever scored though I have it on high authority (the internet) that she was just as mortified to find out it was Rex (ugh!) Smith that the record company had decided to team her with, she wanted some one more cool and not quite so vanilla, but what can you do. The rest of the album is just as great as at least "Shadows", including the next single a mix of two old 60's songs done together "Then He Kissed Me/Be My Baby" which is an awesome little track, and pretty cleverly put together. From there we go to the haunting and fabulous "Billy & The Gun", which you know Swivek redid for the Army Fatigue album last year, and Rachel's "Party Girl", an awesome ode of big sister giving little sister advice rock; "Two Hearts Full Of Love" is a rocking little gem written by the man behind Pat Benatar's "Hit Me With Your Best Shot", "Little Darlin'" is another rock ballad type that shows off Rachel's powerful vocals, and though Spyder, a band which featured my fav song writer from the 80's Holly Knight, recorded the song in 1980, I much prefer Rachel's version. The original album ends with "Streetheart" another pop rocker that is so 1981 it's thrilling, a little story of some gang hoodlum or something who runs out in the night leaving poor Rach all alone, it's the melodrama Streets Of Fire 80's in all its glory. The Bubbatunes version of ..And Then He Kissed Me ends with a remix that came out around 2003 of "Shadows Of The Night" which meshes together Rachel's version with some of the Pat Benatar version over a dance beat. As Pat had changed lyrics to match her own personality, it's very interesting to hear the two come together though personally I probably would've used more of Benatar than the anonymous (I can't find any remixer responsible) remixer of Sweet vs. Benatar.

Track List:
01. Shadows Of The Night 02. Then He Kissed Me/Be My Baby 03. Billy And The Gun 04. Party Girl 05. Two Hearts Full Of Love 06. Little Darlin' 07. Fool's Story 08. Everlasting Love (with Rex Smith) 09. Streetheart
Bonus Track:
10. Shadows Of The Night Remix (Sweet vs. Benatar)

bub 38 Jimmy Destri - HEART ON A WALL (2004; 1982)
The only other member of Blondie to record a solo album (umm Debbie Harry would be the other), Jimmy Destri, keyboardist uber coolness and my favorite lyricist of Blondie, recorded this album in the interim between Blondie's Autoamerican and The Hunter album, the same time Deb did her KooKoo album. For some reason, Jimmy's didn't do anything at all chart wise or on the radar. In fact I never even knew it was released until years later. But of course when it comes to Blondie, everyone sees Debbie first and the boys second, but anyone who knows their Blondie knows it was always a group effort and the person who seemed to have contributed the most song wise behind Debbie and Chris is Jimmy. In fact when making a Blondie mix I realized most of my favorite songs on any Blondie album are written by Jimmy - "Accidents Never Happen", "Detroit 442", "11:59", "Look Good In Blue", "Angels On The Balcony", "Walk Like Me", "Maria" - all Jimmy classics. The songs he uses here are just as clever and ironic as the best stuff he wrote for Blondie, and as you listen I think it's a safe bet that everyone wonders how the songs would sound with Debbie singing the lead. Jimmy is first and foremost a keyboardist and a singer second, so it's not terribly surpising he isn't a blow you away crooner, but he more than makes up in style, after all Heart On A Wall is
a Jimmy Destri new wave rock production and that requires more attitude than aptitude as far as I'm concerned. This is one of those albums that has never, nor will it ever probably, have a CD reissue date, so I'm so glad my pal Luther was able to take my vinyl copy and make a premo "remastered" version containing all 9 songs from the album. Debbie and Chris even show up for some background vocals and help but it's Jimmy who takes the cake with interesting little songs; "Numbers Don't Count (On Me)" is probably my ultimate favorite with Jimmy not only creating that iconic Blondie sound but actually referencing earlier Blondie songs he wrote, followed by "My Little World" which is premiere new wave rock in the Destri vein, "Under The Ice" and the title track are both moody little rockers and "Don't Look Around" should not only have been released as a single but it should've been a hit of some sort.

Track List:
01. Bad Dreams 02. Don't Look Around 03. Living In Your Heart 04. My Little World 05. Little Metal Drummer (Little Metal Drummer) 06. Numbers Don't Count (On Me) 07. The King Of Steam 08. Under The Ice 09. Heart On A Wall


bub 39 Tanya Tucker - TEAR ME APART (2004; 1979)
Tanya's rock album of 1979, Tear Me Apart is one of my all time favorite albums ever, and I'm not even kidding! When I figured out how to take my vinyl records and put them into the computer to make a CDR, Tear Me Apart was the very first album I had to do. Luckily, my pal Luther has a better stereo and a better system to do this and he did a little "remastering" and this classic, and oft overlooked little ditty is now available on CD!

Tear Me Apart has intrigued me ever since I was a little kid. The album was the follow up to 1978's TNT which had shown Miss T heading to a more pop/rock orientated style than the country she had been known for. It only made sense to me that she would go this route as she was only about 19 years old at the time and though she had made country records for the last 6 years, I could hear the rock voice in her just itching to come out. Around 1978/79 producer Mike Chapman approached our girl about producing a full on rock album for her even (according to Tanya) offering not to charge her if the album wasn't successful.

Mike Chapman is one of my all time fav producers, having taken Blondie to brand new heights in 1978 and through to the end of the first incarnation of their career. He also produced parts of Pat Benatar's debut album that came out in October 1979. Rumor has it that Tanya Tucker was even in the recording booth during Blondie's Eat To The Beat sessions early in the summer of 1979. Anyway, Mike had also been responsible for Nick Gilder's "Hot Child In The City", The Knack's album (“My Sharona”), Smokie, Sweet ("Ballroom Blitz") and Suzi Quatro ("Happy Days" Leather Tuscadero).

So he opted to take our girl into the valley and record what would become Tear Me Apart. I've always liked the album but due to bad vinyl copies, I was never able to fully appreciate it until now when it's all cleaned up and I have to say I love it, love it. In fact can't stop listening to it - just for added effect I added "bonus tracks" to my copy of four of the more rocking songs from TNT.

Listening to it now, Tear Me Apart isn't as radical, or rock and roll for that matter, as it probably was upon its release. There are even twinges of country on some of the songs but in 1979 and with Mike Chapman at the helm, I'm sure the album was perceived as completely out there.

As for the music, Tanya sounds incredible - she is harsh, she is raw, she is fun! The album opens with the straight up in your face rock of "Blind Love". Tanya as the rock goddess is a very convincing thing once you hear this number, with its keyboards and drums. Of course the rock and roll reflected on Tear Me Apart is a little more subtle than say Pat Benatar's "Heartbreaker" but it is very much in the vein of Suzi Quatro and Sweet - the glam rock/southern rock hybrid Mike Chapman had been perfecting for years.

Mike even uses his own back catalog for Tanya's album with "Lay Back In The Arms Of Someone" and "Tear Me Apart" - both of which were done by his other female protégé Suzi Quatro. To me Tanya's raspiness really takes the songs to new levels, particularly “Lay Back In The Arms Of Someone.” The song was chosen as the first single and it should’ve been a huge hit if not in country (it has some twang to it) at least on the 1979 pop scene. It's an interesting note that Juice Newton known as the pop/country queen recorded the song the same year only Juice’s was more country sounding… strange isn’t it?

Despite the album’s rock flavor, it’s ironically the ballads that have really captured me. The first ballad we hear is "Somebody Must've Loved You Right Last Night" the story of an affair from the wounded woman's point of view set to a 1979 synthesized keyboard. The song contains such brazen delights as "I don't think that smiles for me/you didn't make it home till after 3" but it's the chorus and her delivery which grabs me.. "Somebody must've loved you right last night cuz you're so faraway today/somebody turned your love light on in a different way." The second verse continues with “Don’t you get tired of using me,” a line which she growls so furiously I get chills. “Am I just the fool you come home to/after someone else has had the best of you?” The song shows the guts behind the glory that is Tanya Tucker. Sure, she’s being used and sure she’s sad but she’s not about to let you just walk in without getting her say in. I think it’s one of Tanya's best vocal performances and one of her best songs.

“San Francisco (Be Sure Wear Flowers In Your Hair)/I Left My Heart In San Francisco” always seemed to be such a strange selection. Particularly since this was the time in Tanya’s life where she was hitting the Hollywood scene with fervor. Perhaps she wanted to celebrate California life in general and found this song (s) to be the best way to do it. The song has some good guitar playing in it but it doesn’t particularly stand out as anything much more than filler, though the added change in the song to incorporate “I Left My Heart In San Francisco” (the only line of that song used here) is a fairly creative turn.

"Tear Me Apart" and its next number "Crossfire Of Desire" are more rock in flavor than anything else on the album. “I’ve been seen in the back of a limousine/I may not own it but it’s bigger than you’ve ever seen/She drives away and thinks she’s a star/if you think she’s a tease you won’t get far/Tear Me Apart/if you want to win my heart” growls the Texas Queen in the title track.

“Crossfire” is a pretty hilarious song in terms of its subject manner. The crossfire Tanya finds herself in is whether to cheat with a complete stranger or head home to her lover. Typical flavor for a country tune I think but the piano churning and the synthesized guitar riff coming through shines as Tanya says, “I know he would never understand if passion finds me in a one night stand/but I can’t let the pleasures so close at hand slip by.” What a slut, I love her.

“Crossfire Of Desire” has the additional delight of a killer sax solo and backup vocals whispering "crossfire" filling up the middle of the song before the guitars kick back in and Tanya finishes up the cut.

Both "Tear Me Apart" and "Crossfire Of Desire" are absolutely spectacular songs and wonderful vehicles for Tanya's voice, which can be very fairly argued is pretty much made for rock and roll (which is why she's so wonderful when she growls in her country tunes).

“Better Late Than Never” is a strange little song but one strange little song I can’t get enough of. The song opens with Tanya half singing/half talking; “The insults and the punches flew/just like they always have” and then she growls, “He knocked me down and left the room/but I came running back/and I said, “Hey look around/Hey look in the mirror/Lay your ego down/it will get so much clearer.” The song has by this time become a country rock hybrid with a twangy guitar pushing the drama through. The chorus is almost brilliant as Tanya delivers, “Put up the flag/lay down your weapon/this perpetual battle royal here is a long way from Heaven/Call it a mistake/or call it whatever/let’s just call it off/better late than never.”

The second verse continues the talk/sing part before breaking into some of my favorite lines ever, “So you keep the car/and all those passionate letters/it won’t get you that far/they won’t make you feel better…” The chorus comes up again and before we get another refrain Tanya crashes in singing, “I’m through with you, you son of a ….” And I fall off my chair every time I hear it! In fact, don’t be too surprised if you hear a Swivek rendition in the near future.

"I've Never Said No Before" is the ballad that is more in the Tanya vein people were probably used to in 1979. Ever since 1975's Tanya Tucker album, Tanya was moving slowly into a more pop attitude and was would incorporate electric guitar, keyboards and the like into her ballads. “I’ve Never Said…” could have fit in on any of those country albums and a reworking today would no doubt work on one of her albums. The song is typical Tanya rhetoric, opening with "I've never said no before/ I didn't know how/ I've never said that before now", moving into the verses where she growls and croons, "you need the peeerrrfeeect looooove, it's just not me.." before breaking into the song's crescendo of "It's easy to see what you're doing to me/you're stealing my heart/I've got to let goooo..." and quietly ending with, "I've never said no before/I didn't know how/for your sake I'm saying 'No' now."

I love songs like these. It’s a love song yet not really. It’s not a poor poor me type of song, instead it’s a song saying, “You better stay away from me because I could fuck you up ” and that’s sad, but brilliant.

"Shady Streets" is another one that could easily be re-recorded today - part ballad, part upbeat - it's very reminiscent of the pop flavorings offered on TNT. Again, it’s not much of a bombshell compared to the other tracks but the imagery is nice as Tanya hopes to find life on those elite shady streets while wearing shiny shoes, something that has apparently eluded her up to this point. Plus Tanya’s voice is so enchanting to me. The passion that comes through on even the most mundane lyric leaves me in a trance. Tanya from the age of only 13 has the power to make you believe she is feeling ever single shred of emotion being described and I’m left rooting she finds those damn shiny shoes and her life works out.

Tear Me Apart ends with "By Day By Day" a jaunty run through pseudo rock that works almost as country as it is firmly based in the Southern rock mode. Piano jumping, drums and high hats thumping, gospel chorus crooning; it has it all. Tanya's "whoohs" add to the fun feeling coursing through the track, “Did you ever wake up sweating from a midnight dream…” is the song’s smoky opening line while Tanya continues, “You sit there smiling/ but if you could read my brain/you’d see yourself under the wheels of this runaway train/and you know that train keeps getting closer baby day by day/day by day now.” The song is pure Tanya Tucker declaring she’s “One part woman, one part wild, one part machine” and you better beware cuz that train known as Miss T keeps getting closer day by day now.

The musical break in the middle of the song is filled with a piano/sax combo solo that keeps this little bluesy train love song chugging down the track until Tanya is left screaming, “By day by day by day by day” and a full on vocal choir ending. It’s really quite a little ditty and a great way to end what has fast become my ultimate favorite Tanya Tucker album.

To make this the ultimate foray into the all too brief rock world of Tanya Tucker, I added "If You Feel It", "Brown Eyed Handsome Man", "Not Fade Away" and "Lover Goodbye" from the TNT album. TNT came out the year prior to Tear Me Apart and was Tanya’s way of whetting her noodle into more pop/rock fair. The songs on that album are all contemporary pop for the most part with the exception of the final track, “Texas (When I Die)” which was probably her most country twinged song ever.

But the pop songs she did were quite infectious. “If You Feel It” is probably the song that most mastered the pop side of Tanya during this period. Starting with a synthesized intro and then going into a piano/guitar driven track, there’s choir vocals added and one of the catchiest choruses, “If you feel it/you can have it/if you want it/come and get it..”

“Brown Eyed Handsome Man” is the type of rock songs Tanya had been doing since 1975. Perhaps feeling secure enough to cover a 50’s rock song rather than do something terribly radical like 1979 rock. The song is a Chuck Berry song and with the exception of Tanya’s voice it’s not all that different or radical from the original, which isn’t bad as it is a fun song with one of my favorite lines, “The beautiful daughter couldn’t make up her mind between a doctor and a lawyer man/her mama said, “go out and get yourself a brown eyed handsome man/just like your daddy was!/a brown eyed handsome man.” For some reason it reminds me of my brown eyed handsome Alf.

“Not Fade Away” is another cover, this time of the Crickets. “I’m gonna tell you how it’s gonna be/you’re gonna give your love to me,” declares Tanya at the very beginning of the song and I’m ready to give it to her. This song was actually released along with “Texas (When I Die)” as double A sided 45 and then sent out to the public and radio stations. It was a fairly good marketing plan, as the country stations would play the one side and the rock station would play this song. It worked a little as “Not Fade Away” hit #70 on the pop charts.

“Lover Goodbye” is the other hard rocker from TNT included here. A perfect little number lauding the death of one more sad love affair. “When rain clouds come there’s bound to be thunder/when lightning strikes/it’s gonna light up the night/when lovers lie/you’re bound to lose your lover/and that is why I’m telling you goodbye..” Again this song was released in the US as a double sided 45 with “I’m The Singer You’re The Song” as the country side. This time the rock song didn’t fair quite as well as “Lover Goodbye” bubbled under the top 100 peaking at #103 on the pop charts. In the UK it was released as its own single with “If You Feel It” as the Bside. But it didn’t score over there either.

When listening to this collection of songs I am always amazed at to why it didn’t score. Maybe people didn’t like change. Rock fans didn’t want some country star coming over to their territory; the country fans didn’t want their ‘little dynamo’ headed to the scary side of rock. Either way, this album isn’t much different than anything else released by a female rock singer. It’s not as hardcore as Pat Benatar’s release of the same year but it’s not all that different from Ellen Foley’s Night Out and it’s gutsier than Olivia Newton-John’s Totally Hot, which scored huge.

Either way I think the album is great and even my Alf who doesn’t care for much had a straight face when he said he didn’t know why it wasn’t a popular album either, and he lived in the rock teenaged world of 1979 so he knows what he’s talking about.

Due to the dismal reception Tear Me Apart received and the tabloids constantly busting her in rather compromising positions around Los Angeles, Tanya's father grabbed her and brought her back to her "senses" to which put her back to country records with 1980's Dreamlovers and though the next albums were good, as every Enquiring mind knows her personal affairs remained rather out of order. Eventually, she’d completely clean up and start making really excellent country records again, though she still kept up with her Ms. Bad Ass…she busted up bars, she had two children out of wedlock refusing to name the father in public, she doesn’t give a rip what you think about her…

It's really Mike Chapman who was the loser in the whole situation because MCA Records got their money from Tanya in other albums, we as fans got a fabulous little look at what could've been and Tanya got to sing rock and roll. But Mike, he offered to do this pro bono if it wasn't a hit and I get the impression he may have had to dip into all that Blondie savings to pay his condo that month.

As for Tear Me Apart, it's my hope this album sees the light of day on CD - preferably with the artwork I created for it and the bonus tracks, as I firmly believe it is the most overlooked album in Tanya's career but one that should definitely not be ignored. Thankfully, I learned how to work that damn computer.

And for an extra dose of 1979 Tanya, check out this performance on You Tube with Tanya singing "Crossfire Of Desire" - it's too die for. I swear.

Track List:
01. Blind Love 02. Lay Back In The Arms Of Someone 03. Somebody Must Have Loved You Right Last Night 04. San Francisco (Be Sure To Wear A Flower In Your Hair)/I Left My Heart In San Francisco 05. Tear Me Apart 06. Crossfire Of Desire 07. Better Late Than Never 08. I've Never Said No Before 09. Shady Streets 10. By Day By Day
Bonus Tracks:
11. If You Feel It 12. Brown Eyed Handsome Man 13. Not Fade Away 14. Lover Goodbye

bub 40 Pat Benatar - IN THE HEAT OF THE NIGHT 25th Anniversary Edition (2004; 1979)
My Patty Patty, how I love thee - and yes I did just do a reveiw of In The Heat Of The Night recently on our 7 Random CD's thread, but this is the Bubbatunes Edition, this is the edition Chrysalis Records should have released when they remastered it last year. Pat's debut In The Heat Of The Night is definitely in my top 5 albums of all time. It's a disc I play every couple of months and then replay over and over for about two weeks, and here along with the original 10 glorious gems of hard rock/new wave and pop are an additional 7 songs including 3 live cuts, a remix, the original demo that got Pat signed and two songs from a very early 1974 cabaret styled single our girl cut while working the circuit of Virginia nightclubs. Oh yes, it's all that good!From the thumpity thump drum beat in the opening number "Heartbreaker" to the ending guitar squeeze of "So Sincere", Pat has it going on in every single note of these 10 excellant songs. It was 1979 and the city was steamy and so was Patty Patty - just look at that cover; and the cover actually summed up the music you hear. The city groove of the title cut with its sultry lyrics and Pat's high octave kicking in, it's one of those overlooked tracks of such a great career; the new wave crashes in on here as well most notably on the single "We Live For Love" and the Nick Gilder cover "Rated X", but rock is there for our girl including her version of Mellenhead's "I Need A Lover" which is so much better here than his version, I don't care if he did write it. The fact a woman is not only singing lines like "I need a lover who knows the meaning of hey hit the highway/ someone who'll thrill me then just go away" but that she actually hisses the vocal. This is a woman you don't want to mess with but such a heat wave of sensuality, you would want to try it. There's cabaret lounge thrown in on "My Clone Sleeps Alone" which in turn belts into a rocking little ditty by the end of those 3 and a half minutes. The uber rock ballad "Don't Let It Show" breaks into the uber rock domination of "No You Don't" with barely a breath. Just listen to some of these songs and Pat's delivery on them - one second of hoarse foulness and one second later a high note of epic proportions all over a cover of new wave nuances and rocking guitars.

Track List:
01. Heartbreaker 02. I Need A Lover 03. If You Think You Know How To Love Me 04. In The Heat Of The Night 05. My Clone Sleeps Alone 06. We Live For Love 07. Rated X 08. Don't Let It Show 09. No You Don't 10. So Sincere
Bonus Tracks:
11. We Live For Love (Special Mix) 12. Come On Let's Go (Live 1980) 13. Just Like Me (Live 1980) 14. I Need A Lover (Live 1979) 15. Crying (demo) 16. Day Gig 17. Last Saturday

bub 41 Go-Go's - BEAUTY & THE BEAT (2004; 1981)
Okay, Beauty & The Beat, the debut and quissessential disc by the Go-Go's does have a release on CD by IRS Records but while their next two albums 1982's Vacation and 1984's Talk Show got a huge remastering treatment on their releases, this album lacks the sound quality of those discs. Why I ask you Why??? So it was up to me to turn up the volume a bit, throw some bonus cuts on and call Beauty & The Beat a Bubbatune. Most definitely the best of the Go-Go's albums, this launched their career and took us all by storm in 1981, "Our Lips Are Sealed" and "We Got The Beat" were the big singles but that's only the surface of this gem packed full of high energy poppy new wave. "Skidmarks On My Heart" is a hilarious walk through the mind of a girl whose boyfriend spends more time working on his cars than on her, "Lust To Love" could be the story of my life, "This Town" is one of the all time best songs about Hollywood ever performed, "Can't Stop The World" is highly kinetic energy in all of its glorious 3 minutes and even when they turn the beat down a bit on "Automatic" it's still highly energetic. For bonus tracks we included the instrumental "Surfing & Spying", a surf punk instrumental from the "Our Lips Are Sealed" single, "Speeding", a song the group did for the movie Fast Times At Ridgemount High in between their first and second albums, the original Stiff versions of "We Got The Beat" and "How Much More" which was the band's very first single ever released plus the additional Stiff version recording of "Lust To Love", and the single mix (though it's not all that different) of "We Got The Beat." All in all, a very very good CD and one that should get IRS off their butts and do it right.

Track List:
01. Our Lips Are Sealed 02. How Much More 03. Tonite 04. Lust To Love 05. This Town 06. We Got The Beat 07. Fading Fast 08. Automatic 09. You Can't Talk In Your Sleep (If You Can't Sleep) 10. Skidmarks On My Heart 11. Can't Stop The World
Bonus Tracks:
12. Surfing & Spying 13. Speeding 14. We Got The Beat (Original Stiff Version) 15. How Much More (Original Stiff Version) 16. Lust To Love (Original Stiff Version) 17. We Got The Beat (Single Mix)

bub 42 Toni Basil - WORD OF MOUTH (2004; 1982)
Here we have one of the most overlooked albums in not only new wave but in the 80's in general; dubbed the ultimate one hit wonder Toni Basil in the Smithsonian for crying out loud because "Mickey" was such a huge hit and then there was nothing else from this super duper choreographer gone new wave pop princess. Of all the songs on Word Of Mouth, "Mickey" is probably actually one of the more lackluster tunes, perhaps only because it's played to death even in 2006; I mean it is a great song and when you listen to the album in full you start tapping and chanting along with Toni and her girls but the other songs found on this album is what really makes it a premiere footnote in the new wave world of the early 80's. Incorporating members of Devo as band members, Toni used her high chirped hiccup vocals to good use on hilarious, endearing and best of all hugely fun songs. The album was released in two different versions, first as a 9 song album in the UK and then a few months later with a different track list and a few new songs it was released in the US. Since the US version deleted one track and added a few songs, and since it was the UK version that came out first, that is the track list I used for this Bubbatune. So we open up Word Of Mouth with "Nobody" was a single even hitting a notch in the UK, and it's one of my favorites on the album, "I don't want nobody/ I don't want no one", refraining from just the obvious of wanting to be alone, the verses of the song actually talk about body functions and you realize the whole double meaning found in the lyrics, "Hanging Around" was released only on the original UK version of the album but it's high energy fun, then onto my two favorites of Word Of Mouth - a rocking pop track called "Theif On The Loose" which changes melody a few times and is mostly just a cut up Benatarish sung doozy - "you better stop that man/cuz he's walking away with my heart in his hand.." and a new wave cover of Nick Gilder's "Time After Time" - "always changing your colored hair/I don't care if you come and go/ you're starring in my video/you're the great pretender/a hero of your gender/time after time you pretend but you don't listen/time after time you arrive another person"; then a psycho tranced version of Burt Bacharach's "Little Red Book", Devo's "Be Stiff" and the Devo written "Space Girls" both set to trancy robotic hip waves, and another Devo cover, this time of their song "Pity You" which for some reason is changed to the title "You Gotta Problem"; either way, this is a great cover and I'm sure she had the approval of the Mothersbaugh boys since they are right there on the record. When Word Of Mouth was released in the US about 6 months after the UK release, there were two songs added to the mix and the track listing was rearranged - gone was "Hanging Around" and "Mickey" became the first track; and they moved the great "Theif" and "Time" to the end of the album, but along with those changes came two newly recorded gems, a punky electronic pop version of "Rock On" which years later would give strange Michael Damien a hit; but with the robotic vocals by Toni and the boys of Devo on the music, this version is to me even better than the 70's original and just a mention of James Dean seems to put an iconic twist on any song - "hey kids rock and roll/rock on/ooh my soul/hey kids boogie too/didn't you?/hey shock/summertime blues/jump up and down in my blue suede shoes/hey kids rock and roll/rock on" and finally what would become Toni's second US single "Shoppin' From A To Z", a manic power pop new wave tune about well, grocery shopping. The album version is fun but it's really the single version that made the song what it is, as Toni declares, "good girls shop/bad girls shop/shoppin' from a to z", she goes through her list of items, "I went shoppin' with a list from a to z/a - apples, b - bananas" and then as the song progresses she has encounters with the samples lady, the check out girl and oh my she forgets her list, so in an audiable and chant worthy countdown you get to help out Toni by going through A to Z - incidentally there isn't anything on her list that starts with x (X - NOTHING!); in the single version the final countdown is done by several different back vocalists doing different styled voices on each it. It's really something to hear; and to see. In fact most of the album Word Of Mouth was done in video form. Toni was and is a choregrapher and the whole purpose in making her album was so she could have something to lip synch to when she did a videocassette. It's hard to find but Word Of Mouth, the video is out there and until then you can check out most of the videos incluuding the one for "Shoppin From A To Z" at You Tube.

The single mixes of both "Shoppin' From A To Z" and "Mickey" are here as bonus cuts, as well as the Spanish version of "Mickey" and the 12" mix of "Shoppin'". Originally when I made Word Of Mouth I had also included some singles from her 1983 self titled album but thanks to all the independant record shops closing in LA, I got a vinyl copy of Toni Basil and it will be having its own Bubbatunes release in the not so distant future (thanx to Luther and his hot new record player).

Track List:
01. Nobody 02. Hanging Around 03. Thief On The Loose 04. Time After Time 05. Mickey 06. Little Red Book 07. Be Stiff 08. Space Girls 09. You Gotta Problem 10. Shoppin' From A To Z 11. Rock On
Bonus Tracks:
12. Mickey (Single Mix) 13. Shoppin' From A To Z (Single Mix) 14. Mickey (Spanish Version) 15. Shoppin' From A To Z (Special Mix)

and there you have #s 37-42 in our Bubbatunes series, but stay tuned for next time when we go through the last of our original Album Reissue series where we find a whole series of a rock chanteuse who never hit the big time but did end up on a wonderful TV series as two different characters, and a white winged dove of a rock witch and perhaps a little UK new wave pop princess. Until then....

posted by swivek @ 6:47 AM