CD Odyssey Disc 1100: Heart

After a very fun night out with friends at the Victoria Film Festival gala, I awoke this morning to a mild hangover but a sunny disposition fueled, in part, by the revelry of the night before. If you’re going to have a hangover, make sure the event was memorable.

I’m now off to CD shop and (hopefully) get as many as I can by my new obsession: Minnesota rapper/singer Dessa. This stuff is great and I MUST have all of it. Such is my sickness.

I don’t feel that way about this next band, although I do have a few so obviously I like them.

Disc 1100 is… Dreamboat Annie

Artist: Heart

Year of Release: 1976

What’s up with the Cover? A double Giant Head cover featuring Ann and Nancy Wilson looking dreamy. Ordinarily I’d think a cover like this rather boring but for some reason it appeals to me…

How I Came To Know It: A while back my buddy Chris was playing Heart’s 1977 album “Little Queen” and it appealed to me. Remembering all the Heart songs I liked when I was a kid I decided to dig into their back catalogue. Debut record “Dreamboat Annie” came out as one of the highlights.

How It Stacks Up:  I have three Heart albums. I used to have four but I got rid of “Bad Animals” after reviewing it. Since this is my last Heart review, here is a full recap, including the one I sold:

1. Little Queen: 4 stars (reviewed at Disc 970)
2. Heart (Self-Titled): 3 stars (reviewed at Disc 960)
3. Dreamboat Annie: 3 stars (reviewed right here)
4. Bad Animals: 2 stars (reviewed at Disc 827)

Ratings: 3 stars

Heart gets thrown into the category of Hard Rock with dismissive regularity, but Sisters Ann and Nancy Wilson are a lot more than just two more Zeppelin disciples. On “Dreamboat Annie” they demonstrate a lot of influences, not so much blending them as artfully pinning them together.

For all that the album’s opener (and best known song) “Magic Man” is more of a Zeppelin fueled guitar riff, with a chunky sound and Ann Wilson’s vocals climbing into the stratosphere before dropping back down to a bluesy resolution of the melody. Nancy’s guitar is blues-rock excess in all the good ways and on an atmospheric solo in the middle of the song she shines like a bright star.

Fun fact – there is a crazy guitar lick at the 3:53 mark of “Magic Man” which is sampled by Ice T on the song “Personal”. On “Personal” that little riff is core to the song’s awesomeness but on “Magic Man” Nancy throws it out there, then immediately moves on never to return. She’s got other musical fish to fry.

However, this album is about more than just “Magic Man” (and its other classic rock song, “Crazy On You”). Heart incorporates dreamy pop elements and a proto-disco sexy groove that gives the album balance and depth. “(Love Me Like Music) I’ll Be Your Song” has a smooth almost yacht rock quality, but also could be played as a slow dance at Studio 54. It feels slick and silky but never artificial, grounded as it is in exceptional and honest musicianship.

It can be taken too far, mind you. The title track is a meandering bit of treacle that predictably became the song that got overplayed on AM radio to the detriment of the record’s better songs. “Dreamboat Annie” is not even that good of a song, and it doesn’t help that there are three versions of it (the second and last track on Side One, the last track on Side Two).

There are a lot of prog elements on “Dreamboat Annie”, something I don’t think Heart gets enough credit for. Everyone is obsessed with the fact that two beautiful women are rocking out, and tend to overlook how cleverly they are doing it. “Magic Man” has early synthesizer sounds in that would be equally at home on a Rush album. “Soul of the Sea” is six and half minutes of constant shifts that feels like it could be the soundtrack for a contemporary dance number. “Sing Child” drops some Jethro Tull style jazz flute into the middle of its rock groove.

“Dreamboat Annie” is at its best when Heart feels like they are trying to be two totally different bands at the same time, fusing styles and production choices from multiple influences into an amalgam that is something new. It is hard to pull off, but for the most part, they totally get away with it.

In fact, songs like “White Lightning & Wine” which are just straight up blues tracks suffer by comparison, coming off as derivative. It can’t even be saved by cowbell, which is usually a sure fire musical cure for what ails you.

Despite a couple of these misses, overall, “Dreamboat Annie” is a solid record that for a debut shows incredible maturity and complexity.

Best tracks: Magic Man, Crazy On You, (Love Me Like Music) I’ll Be Your Song, Sing Child

CD Odyssey Disc 970: Heart

The CD Odyssey is random, but sometimes the Gods of Chaos have a killer sense of timing. Today is Valentine’s Day, and the next album is by…Heart.

Disc 970 is…Little Queen

Artist: Heart

Year of Release: 1977

What’s up with the Cover? There are so many Ren-fair jokes I could make here, but I’m not going to make a single one. Why not? Because for a couple of years I belonged to the Society for Creative Anachronism (SCA) and dressed up like a 15^th century pirate named Roger Bloedlaeter once a month. I had a great time and regret nothing, so if Ann and Nancy want to hang out in medieval costumes, comb each other’s hair and speak forsoothly, all the power to them.

How I Came To Know It: Everyone knows the hit single “Barracuda” but I was introduced to the album by my friend Chris. He brought a vinyl copy to a music listening night and I liked what I heard.

How It Stacks Up:  I have two Heart albums, this one and their self-titled eighties comeback record that I reviewed back at Disc 960. I used to also own “Bad Animals” but it was…bad. Anyway, of the three albums, I put “Little Queen” first. I meant to stick by my teenage crush album, 1985’s self-titled comeback, but critically I can’t deny that “Little Queen” is the better record.

Ratings: 4 stars

On “Little Queen” hard rock ‘n’ roll meets swords ‘n’ sorcery and the result is magical, powerful and just the right amount of weird.

“Little Queen” is only Heart’s second record, which makes the brave and crazy decisions on it all the more impressive. For every sophomore record where a band successfully expands their sound, there are five that lose their way in directionless excess. This record is excessive, to be sure, and sisters Ann and Nancy Wilson definitely push the boundaries, but it is all mounted on a solid foundation of rock.

Once again, it is the vocals of Ann Wilson that first hold your attention, with that effortless rock power, and an innate sense of just when to throw in a well-timed ‘ooh’ or ‘aah’. Juxtaposed to this is sister Nancy’s solid guitar, dependable and always down in the groove; a home port for her sister’s stormy vocals to return to whenever she needs it.

The album opens with “Barracuda,” and with it one of rock’s most instantly recognizable guitar riffs. The furious and insistent chugging of electric guitar played low and reverbing into your lower spine would send you to the chiropractor if it weren’t so evenly balanced.

That is immediately followed by an almost folksy “Love Alive” a gentle pastoral number, punctuated with whimsy and plucked guitar strings, with Ann’s vocal trilling along effortlessly above it. Then halfway through, the song finds electricity and takes you down an anthemic journey that would make Led Zeppelin proud.

The album owes a lot to Led Zeppelin, and they are clearly an influence on the song structures, but it avoids being derivative. This is new music, taking some of Zeppelin’s ideas and shifting them one step away from the blues (but only a small step) and one step closer to fantasy theme park.

“Sylvan Song” sounds like it is being played by elves (I think that’s the point) and fades directly into “Dream of the Archer” which I’m pretty sure is just the ladies telling us about their last Dungeons and Dragons session. If I had known this album as a kid I would have eaten this stuff up. Now I prefer the songs that rock out, but I won’t lie; the fantasy elements are still appealing (both to me and that alter ego pirate guy I mentioned earlier).

The title track launches Side Two with jaunty flair, that side-skips its way across the stage in a way that had me thinking of Steven Tyler and his scarf-swathed microphone. For all its party atmosphere, the song is about a girl who deep down is struggling. As Ann Wilson sings “no one knows your melancholy mind” while simultaneously giving us all a backstage pass to it. Later on the album, “Cry To Me” serves as the perfect book-end to the moment. Gone are the up-tempo grooves, replaced with a slow confessional as Ann sings:

“You better not hide it

Let it come, let it bleed

I ain't laughing, reach in and get it

And set it free

Cry to me, cry to me”

Despite the sadness in the lyrics, the song’s structure is full of a fierce resoluteness. You get the feeling this album was the soundtrack for a thousand small town girls who wanted to be tough and vulnerable. “Little Queen” is an album that lets them be both.

The record isn’t perfect, and “Cry to Me” is followed by the pointless meandering of “Go On Cry” which is more like a cry that goes on a little too long, leaving you feeling a bit dried out and suffering from a pressure headache. The musicianship is good, but the song doesn’t really go anywhere and it is a bummer of a way for the original album to end.

Fortunately, my CD copy has two bonus tracks that follow it. The first is an early demo version of “Love Alive” called “Too Long a Time” which is pretty sweet (if a bit heavy on the noodling). The second is a cover of “Stairway to Heaven” that is so good it has become an underground classic in its own right. Both tracks are not only solid, they make the album better, and that’s a rarity.

Best tracks: Barracuda, Love Alive, Little Queen, Treat Me Well, Cry to Me, Stairway to Heaven

CD Odyssey Disc 960: Heart

You can’t always choose what you love. So if loving this record is wrong – and it probably is – I don’t want to be right.

This next review will make me sound very hypocritical, but I’m hoping to make up for it with embarrassing honesty. At least I know I shouldn’t like this stuff.

Disc 960 is….Self-Titled

Artist: Heart

Year of Release: 1985

What’s up with the Cover? Ah, Heart. You have my sympathies; the eighties were cruel on fashion. Ann Wilson looks like a wealthy dowager off to a company Christmas party, and Ann looks like she’s going to clean the house while she’s out. The less said about three men the better, who collectively are covering every facet of what made men’s hair styles in the eighties terrible: mullet, mousse and mini-fro. I had the latter.

How I Came To Know It: Back in the eighties my brother and I pretty much only bought Heavy Metal, but he made an exception for this album, likely because Heart were sufficiently hard rock to not be embarrassing. Also, I suspect that, like me, he thought the songs were good. I bought it on CD a few years ago at very low price – maybe $7 in a bargain bin.

How It Stacks Up:  Since giving away the terrible “Bad Animals” (reviewed back at Disc 827) I only have two Heart albums. This one probably doesn’t deserve to be ranked first, but that’s what I’m doing anyway so…#1!

Ratings: 3 stars

Yeehaw – mid-eighties production! Organs where guitars should be! But…wait a minute. Don’t I hate those things? Don’t I prefer organic sound and sparse production? Well, there’s an exception for everything, and Heart’s self-titled eighties comeback is the exception for me.

Admittedly it is a strange choice, with songs that straddle the line between hard rock and power pop and lyrics that range from teenage angst to creepy sex metaphors. But damn it, there are some really good songs on this record.

It helps that I grew up with this record and I know it like the back of my hand, particularly Side One. I’ve been singing along to these songs since the ninth grade. Familiarity makes a difference, I suppose.

It also helps that Ann Wilson has one of the rock’s greatest voices ever. Big and bold with wicked range and power on songs like “Never” and “If Looks Could Kill” then soft and sweet on lighter tracks like “These Dreams” and “Nobody Home.” Sister Nancy manages the same range on guitar.

Finally, if I’m being honest, in the great age of eighties music videos both women were easy on the eyes. That probably held my attention a little longer and gave the music a chance to win me over.

As I noted earlier, Side One is easily the best half of the record. “If Looks Could Kill” launches the record with a thick, eighties metal sound; crunching guitar (including the requisite gratuitous solo). The organ adds a bit of pop spice and gives it the mass appeal this record enjoyed in the day.

That synthesizer and organ sounds are present on almost every song, and it should wreck them but doesn’t. On “What About Love” it (along with Ann’s vocal) is the star of the show, underscoring the overwrought emotion that would make Bonnie Tyler or a Broadway musical equally proud. I like it too.

Despite my love for all the great songs on Side One, Side Two had my favourite; a deep cut called “Nobody Home” full of strained imagery that really worked for me when I was 15. Wilson’s vocal is soft as a prayer, but still fills the room with warnings to her man to not go too wild, or one day when he comes home she won’t be there:

“Don’t run too fast like a shot from a gun

Don’t jump too high and knock out the sun

Don’t stray too far out on your own

When you finally come knocking there’ll be nobody home.”

Based on what the guy is apparently up to, I assume these lines are sung by Lois Lane. Yes it is schlocky, but I can’t help liking it. Like the rest of this record, it is half great artistry, half guilty pleasure.

The rest of Side Two is not good however, even for me. “All Eyes” is supposed to be charged with sexual tension, but just feels awkwardly creepy to me, with lines like:

“When you look at me

It melts my legs

Wraps me around your fingertip

You don’t have to say a word

To get a hold of me”

What the hell is going on here, and are pictures available? But no…no eighties video for this one.

The album spawned four top ten hits and the worst of them, “Nothing At All” isn’t bad so much as it doesn’t hold up against the other tracks with its strange back up singing that makes it way too…eighties.

But wait a minute – why didn’t I complain about the same issues with all the other songs? I can’t explain it except sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn’t. Or maybe I’ve been cooped up singing the songs on this record so long that I have the music listening strain of Stockholm syndrome.

I grade the first side of this record at 4 stars and the second at 2, so I’ll split the difference and give it 3 overall. I really wanted to give this record an extra star. Maybe that one I arbitrarily sucked from my last Duran Duran review…But no, I squandered that long ago on movies featuring Ron Pearlman and vampires. So I guess I’ll stick with 3, but it is a very heartfelt and appreciative 3. Thanks, Heart, for reminding me that even at its worst, eighties production can’t completely sink great singing and a good melody. Every now and then it even helps things along.

Best tracks: If Looks Could Kill, What About Love, Never, These Dreams, Nobody Home

CD Odyssey Disc 827: Heart

I wanted to get this review written yesterday but a late night at work followed by a social engagement denied me. This meant that I was stuck listening to it for a second straight day. Fate can be cruel.

Disc 827 is….Bad Animals

Artist: Heart

Year of Release: 1987

What’s up with the Cover? A series of drawings stylized to look like cave art, if cave art was drawn by dudes in pastel suit jackets with big shoulder pads.

How I Came To Know It: I knew this album as a kid, but I never bothered to buy it until our friend Gord was parting with his CD collection, and I picked it up on the cheap along with a bunch of other albums. Not my finest purchase of the day. Sorry, Gord.

How It Stacks Up:  I have three Heart albums, and this is easily the worst. I think that if I had six or seven heart albums, this would still be the worst.

Ratings: 2 stars

If this album were an animal it would be the dog that eats your shoe or the cat that pees on your radiator. “Bad Animals” is a bad animal indeed.

This album annoys me in so many ways, but only makes me happy in two. And it isn’t that I don’t like Heart, because I do. I have two of their other albums, and I plan to buy another at some point.

In 1987 classic rock bands were mowed down by the saccharine production of synthesizers and drum machines. Sometimes the quality of the songs kept these albums afloat, as they do on Bruce Springsteen’s “Tunnel of Love” or Rush’s “Hold Your Fire.” “Bad Animals” is an example of when that doesn’t happen.

That is not to say this album has no good songs. In fact, it has one and it is even their biggest hit. “Alone” is a great track; an anthem for all the awkward girls in love with some popular guy who doesn’t know they exist. Despite the bells and whistles of eighties production, Ann Wilson’s voice soars with power and pathos. The producers even take a break from all their tinkling and futzing about long enough to let Nancy Wilson unleash a passable guitar solo.

Sadly, even “Alone” doesn’t have the sway over me it once did, having been dismantled and abused by year after year of Idol and Voice hopefuls wishing they could do what Ann does, and failing by various degrees.

Fortunately, “Alone” isn’t totally alone for me. It has a guilty pleasure to keep it company! “You Ain’t So Tough” is not what most people would call a good song, but I love it anyway. It is the nerdy and cynical friend to “Alone’s” awkward hero. I don’t care that it has some of the worst drum machine on the album, or that the guitar solo is marred with some sort of electronic version of the triangle. I love this song, and I don’t care what anyone thinks (which is pretty much the only way you can love this song).

Other than this, “Bad Animals” is a bunch of eighties radio pop. This is not a great genre to begin with and the songwriting doesn’t save it. It is sad that a band with the hard rock roots of Heart descended into the world of vacuous pop. Their 1985 self-titled album that preceded this one was more of the same but the writing is just better than you find here.

“Bad Animals” other tracks are forgettable. Even the other hits (“Who Will You Run To” and “There’s The Girl”) don’t stand out except perhaps against the remainder of the record. “I Want You So Bad” made me want them to sing different songs so bad, but that was the extent of my desire. “Wait For An Answer” had me mentally responding with a firm “no” whenever it came on. “R.S.V.P” is the musical equivalent of a party no one attends: sad and empty, with streamers decorating the place and an untouched spinach dip on the dining room table.

Despite all this Heart can still smugly cash their royalty cheques (“Bad Animals” is their second-highest selling of 15 studio albums), so in the eyes of a lot of other people they clearly did something right. And like I said earlier, there are a couple of tracks that I still like despite all the other warts. On the other hand, I'm not one for keeping just singles., so what shall be the fate of such a record in my collection?

“Alone” ends with a fervent hope that to not end the night without companionship. Not to worry, song, you’ll have plenty of company with the other tracks on this album in the deleted items folder of my computer, at least until I empty it.

And…delete.

Best tracks:  Alone, You Ain’t So Tough