Cheap Trick - Dream Police

174 is an odious number. That means it has an odd number of ones in its binary expansion (even numbered binary expansions are "evil"). Phi X 174 was the first DNA based genome to be mapped, the first virus model to be synthesized in a lab, and is still used as a control for testing sequencing equipment and personal protective equipment. 174 is the atomic number of Unseptquadium, a theoretical element formed in the gravitational collapse after a supernova.

None of which matters. Saying random interesting things about the number of essays i've written was just a cheap trick for introducing the random interesting things i'm going to say about tonight's album Dream Police...
...by...
...Cheap Trick.

They got their name from a comment about Slade ("they used every cheap trick in the book"). Each band member has his own consistent character/persona/image/wardrobe, and they ham it up great. I never paid much attention to them growing up, other than noting Rick Nielsen's thing for crazy guitars and sweaters, but i know all their hits and they are a lot of fun to watch.

Their mainstream breakthrough was really interesting. They made 3 albums that didn't really do much, then were blown away by the reception they got in Japan (Beatlemania level excitement). Their live Budakon recordings were meant to be a Japan only release, but got so popular they actually had to postpone the release of Dream Police to publish it in the US.

Musically speaking, they are a straightforward hard rock band. That might sound underwhelming, but they more than make up for the lack of sonic adventure by being quirky and writing interestingly weird songs. They're like your friend's strange older brother, not scary or intimidating, but not exactly living in your own reality either.

Highlights of the tracks include supposed satanic back masking, Steve Lukather (of Toto and any other 80s album you come across, not joking) playing guitar for money but no credit, and occasional Queen-style thousand-overdub vocals.

I wish the album had more of a unified concept, but i'm really just being picky; they have more than enough personality and style to be a great popular rock band playing unrelated songs from their unique perspective. I suppose if i'm really desperate, mild paranoia underpins a lot of their songs (and not just on this album).

Regardless, they really are fun and energetic, and i definitely appreciate their experimenting with orchestral backing in a hard rock (as opposed to prog- or psych-) context. There's not a bad song on Dream Police, and they certainly don't stay in any one style long enough to get tiresome. Definitely worth a listen if you haven't heard any of their deeper cuts.

Next

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Welcome to my blog, and my record collection.

This is a blog about my love of listening to albums. It started off as a nightly perusal of my dad's record collection (which sadly became mine) on my personal facebook page. Over the last two months it has become quite an enjoyable process of simply ranting about what i think is a real art form, the album. It needs a more permanent home. Some of my reviews are positive, some negative. They might not be what you expect from album reviews, but i hope you at least find them entertaining. For the most part i do very little research, and they tend to be train of thought reactions rather than calculated essays. If nothing else, know that i'm really listening to them and whether they are amazing or abysmal i want you to go listen to them too.  I'll start migrating the 60+ i've written so far over here in the next few days, and hopefully get to the point where i just start writing them here. I'd probably even take suggestions if you're just dying to know my tho
Read more

My Life With The Thrill Kill Kult - Hit & Run Holiday

Image
I noticed today that the strange part of the world who actually knows about My Life With The Thrill Kill Kult has finally accepted that they are in fact "industrial disco." The history of Wax Trax and Chicago industrial music is a subject worthy of an entire library, but MLWTTK is my favorite band to emerge from those humble record store beginnings. They are an unpredictable band for sure, and i definitely don't like all of their albums, but Hit & Run Holiday is an album i think every human being on the planet should hear at least once. This album is simply impossible to describe, because it doesn't actually belong to a musical genre as we understand them. It's actually a movie. I know that sounds weird, but the band is actually a movie. My Life With The Thrill Kill Kult was the name of the movie they were trying to make, but composing the soundtrack led them so far afield that they just shrugged and kept going as a band instead. All of their albums come f
Read more

Eyrth - Meridian

Image
A terrible sadness accompanies the release of Meridian by Latvian Ambient Metal band EYRTH. Since their debut Fracture in early 2019 the band, and indeed the whole world has suffered a global pandemic, intense ideo-political turmoil, the death of friend and bandmate Igor Golovin, and the Russian invasion of Ukraine.  The war in Ukraine still wages on, even though we in the Western hemisphere seem to have largely forgotten. These are turbulent times, and Alex and Andrey are rightfully entering an extended break. We may not see or hear new music from them for a while, if ever, and that is completely understandable. The music they've created, however, is truly breathtaking. Self-described as "Uranium wreckage in audio," the music of Eyrth is every bit as hauntingly beautiful as it is brutally crushing. Close your eyes and you'll quickly find yourself in the achingly cold and desolate wasteland of human technological atrophy. Slow, ponderously heavy, at times rabidly ragi
Read more