I Love It From Behind! (1981)

Phil Collins' first solo album, 1981's Face Value, was a long time coming, but it proved worth the wait, both for the Genesis drummer/vocalist himself and fans of thoughtful, emotionally charged pop. He'd been wrestling with the idea of doing a solo record for years, finding great inspiration in the pain caused by an impending divorce and craving artistic independence after years of collaboration…

CARL CARLTON, born in 1952 and hailing from Detroit, Michigan, was an R&B, Funk and Soul singer/songwriter who is arguably best known for his crossover hits “Everlasting Love” from 1974 and the Leon Haywood penned “She’s A Bad Mama Jama (She’s Built, She’s Stacked)” from 1981 which features on this, his eponymously titled album release from the same year. Carlton’s career got started through the most coincidental of circumstances – while playing baseball with friends in a vacant lot a neighbour called down and yelled for the boys to “stop playing and turn that radio off,” the reply came back, “that ain’t no radio, that’s Carl.” Within a short space of time the astonished neighbour had helped Carlton secure a deal with Lando Records in the mid-sixties, recording under the name “Little” Carl Carlton, as his voice had similarities to Stevie Wonder.

Ramones - The Sire Years 1976-1981 (2013) {6CD Box Set Rhino-Warner 8122796278}
EAC rip (secure mode) | FLAC (tracks)+CUE+LOG -> 1.44 Gb | MP3 @320 -> 461 Mb
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© 1976-81, 2013 Rhino / Sire / Warner | 8122796278
Rock / Punk Rock/ Alternative

Not many bands can honestly say they changed the shape of rock & roll as we know it and upended part of the larger global culture at the same time. The Ramones did just that; by stripping down and speeding up rock & roll like a hot rod that could outrun all competition, and injecting it with a massive dose of snotty, absurdist humor, they gave the music a new lease on life, and left behind a handful of brilliant recordings that are still a solid kick to hear nearly four decades after their debut hit the streets. Punk rock first emerged from a very specific time and place, but the best of it is timeless in its joyous roar, and the first four Ramones albums absolutely live up to that description.

In the early years of Los Angeles punk, one of the premiere hardcore bands was T.S.O.L., which stood for True Sounds of Liberty. Offering poppier music than many of their contemporaries and featuring an image that appealed to punks who wanted to dive deeper into the gothic subgenre already being offered by many British punk bands, T.S.O.L. became hugely popular on the local scene but never translated that success to national exposure because of their ever-shifting lineup and sound.

Phil Collins - Face Value (1981). Phil Collins' first solo album, 1981's Face Value, was a long time coming, but it proved worth the wait, both for the Genesis drummer/vocalist himself and fans of thoughtful, emotionally charged pop. He'd been wrestling with the idea of doing a solo record for years, finding great inspiration in the pain caused by an impending divorce and craving artistic independence after years of collaboration. Many of the songs ended up on Genesis' 1980 album Duke - and "Against All Odds" was pocketed for later use - but he kept enough to make an album that stands as a classic moment of '80s pop/rock. Collins produced the album himself and played keyboards and drums, calling in friends and the Earth, Wind & Fire horns to fill out the songs…

The Blasters - Testament: The Complete Slash Recordings (2002) {2CD Set, Rhino-Slash-Warner Bros. R2 78345 rel 1981-1985}
EAC rip (secure mode) | FLAC (tracks)+CUE+LOG -> 1.04 Gb | MP3 @320 -> 373 Mb
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© 1981-85, 2002 Rhino / Slash / Warner Bros. | R2 78345
Rock & Roll / Rockabilly / College Rock / Classic Rock

"We got the Louisiana boogie and the Delta blues/We got country swing and rockabilly, too/We got jazz, country western, and Chicago blues/It's the greatest music that you ever knew." Dave Alvin was writing about "American Music" in his song of the same name when he penned those lines, but while he would never be quite so arrogant as to say so himself, he could have been talking about his band, the Blasters, who used the song as the title track of their first album. While often lumped in with the L.A. rockabilly scene that rose up in the wake of punk rock, from the start the Blasters displayed a wide-ranging musical diversity that set them far apart from, say, Levi and the Rockats.

The most commercially successful pop group of the 1970s, the origins of the Swedish superstars ABBA dated back to 1966, when keyboardist and vocalist Benny Andersson, a onetime member of the popular beat outfit the Hep Stars, first teamed with guitarist and vocalist Bjorn Ulvaeus, the leader of the folk-rock unit the Hootenanny Singers…

Swamp Dogg never stopped working in the late '70s but after 1974's Have You Heard This Story??, his last stab at a major, he faded away, grinding out records on labels that were, at best, regionally known. Things changed in 1981 when Takoma – a roots label then owed by Chrysalis Records – decided to sign Dogg and fund the recording of I'm Not Selling Out – I'm Buying In!, an album that represented both an artistic comeback and something of a signal boost as well. It, like all the other Swamp Dogg records before it, did not sell but it did garner attention upon its release, and it stands as one of his best and better-known albums. Despite Dogg's proclamation in the liner notes that he produced this album "because I love Rock & Roll," there's not much three-chord boogie here: just "Wine, Women and Rock 'n' Roll," plus the cheeky revival "Total Destruction to Your Mind Once Again."