The Cars (1978)
Ah, power pop!
In the entry about Orange Juice et al I mentioned that punk as in 1977-and-all-that had pretty much passed me by. What came next, though - new wave and power pop, and hybrids of the two - did however feature quite heavily in my life via my sister and her then boyfriend. So UA-era Buzzcocks, The Stranglers, Elvis Costello, a lot of one hit wonders ... and some proper punk stuff (such as The Damned) entered my perception first through the bedroom wall, and then via cassette tapes that I would casually "borrow". Blondie and The Police I discovered for myself thanks to the charts, but I first got to hear their albums too from the same source.
That's also how I discovered and fell for the first LP by The Cars. Despite the haircuts and synthesizers, they weren't really new wave - the opening tracks "Good Times Roll" and "My Best Friend's Girl" clearly showed their love for classic rock'n'roll. But they could do the power chord thing as well as anyone.
One of my favourite things about the album is how well sequenced it is. So few pop albums get the sequencing absolutely right (remember, this LP dates from the analogue era where you had no choice in which order you listen to the songs, other than which side of the record you played first). But it's clear the band thought really hard about the running order. "Side 2" in particular just flows beautifully.
I must have handed back the tape to my sister (or lost it) many years ago. So I went out and bought a copy of the album on CD in order to listen to it for this project. I found I can still sing along to pretty much every note.
In the entry about Orange Juice et al I mentioned that punk as in 1977-and-all-that had pretty much passed me by. What came next, though - new wave and power pop, and hybrids of the two - did however feature quite heavily in my life via my sister and her then boyfriend. So UA-era Buzzcocks, The Stranglers, Elvis Costello, a lot of one hit wonders ... and some proper punk stuff (such as The Damned) entered my perception first through the bedroom wall, and then via cassette tapes that I would casually "borrow". Blondie and The Police I discovered for myself thanks to the charts, but I first got to hear their albums too from the same source.
That's also how I discovered and fell for the first LP by The Cars. Despite the haircuts and synthesizers, they weren't really new wave - the opening tracks "Good Times Roll" and "My Best Friend's Girl" clearly showed their love for classic rock'n'roll. But they could do the power chord thing as well as anyone.
One of my favourite things about the album is how well sequenced it is. So few pop albums get the sequencing absolutely right (remember, this LP dates from the analogue era where you had no choice in which order you listen to the songs, other than which side of the record you played first). But it's clear the band thought really hard about the running order. "Side 2" in particular just flows beautifully.
I must have handed back the tape to my sister (or lost it) many years ago. So I went out and bought a copy of the album on CD in order to listen to it for this project. I found I can still sing along to pretty much every note.