*
The Cars – Greatest Hits
I recall Shake It Up as a mood-lifter, and I’m sure the Grand Prix night of 1986 when Chrisso, Lukey, and I were in Nick’s unhinged Honda on the Freeling straight, there was plenty of brotherly love. Doubtless, The Cars roared out the open windows of that hatch-back as we hurtled past the darkened barley.
Can you imagine how many Triple Tracks of The Cars were rolled out on SA-FM across the 80s? If I had an icy-cold can of coke for each one then, well, I’d be diabetic and dead. I connect this Boston band with adolescent summers and, oddly enough, being in cars — like Nick’s Honda — rushing to the cricket, the drive-in, the beach at Port Willunga.
The songs are mostly upbeat with guitars and robotic Roland synths. Although I’ve made no deep investigation, the lyrics were the usual love’s good or love might be good or love’s a mess formula. Yes, mostly empty but we were nineteen, music didn’t need to be apocalyptic and Dylanesque. Solemn examinations of the human condition optional.
Uh well dance all night and whirl your hair
Make the night cats stop and stare
Dance all night go to work
Do the move with quirky jerk
Given The Cars drove, err, in a tight lane, you could be forgiven for thinking it’s all the same song, but I like Just What I Needed, You Might Think, and My Best Friend’s Girl.
*
Comes A Time – Neil Young
The muted tone of the sleeve triggers a memory of a TDK C-90 tape, though I can’t remember who dubbed it for me. I was fourteen — an age when life arrives without notice. Side 2 could’ve been ‘Glass Houses’ by Billy Joel. How does music find us?
Unlike his noise-guitar work with Crazy Horse, this is mostly quiet — occasionally country, but entirely Sunday afternoon.
Lotta Love is a favourite song from it. He sings in a fragile, upper-register voice that threatens to fray into a whine. But doesn’t. Nicolette Larson provides harmony vocals on it and across the album. She covered it soon after and it became her signature song. Melburnian Courtney Barnett did a worthy version too.
The title track, Peace Of Mind, and Four Strong Winds are other standouts.
*
Spirit Of Place – Goanna
Arriving during the summer I turned sixteen, whenever I flick across my car radio at the lights and the urgent drums of Solid Rock pound through the speakers, I’m instantly back in hot and hilly Kapunda.
It was among the first pricks to my conscience regarding the harm caused to Australia’s original inhabitants. The satirical use of marketplace warned me that money could be more important than people.
Out here nothin’ changes
Not in a hurry anyway
You can feel the endlessness
With the comin’ of the light of day
You’re talkin’ ’bout a chosen place
You wanna sell it in a marketplace, well
Well, just a minute now
I haven’t dropped the needle on it since I had nut-brown hair, so I’m gladly startled by its warmth. Burnt country and ragged outsiders hang in the melodies. I partly expected it to feel dated, but the songs and the storytelling are timeless. Shane Howard’s vocals are gracefully commanding, all woodsmoke and Kimberley sunsets.
Razor’s Edge, On the Platform, and Four Weeks Gone are my top picks.
*
Thanks, Lukey, for rocketing by in the DeLorean/Black Thunder to drop off my prize pack. I must’ve been the eighth caller through to Vinny and Cameron on SA-FM’s Morning Zoo. Vinyl isn’t just a nostalgia machine — the needle, the hiss and crackle come first, and then the music — and for a heartbeat, it isn’t the past at all. It’s right now — the way it found us in the first place.
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About Mickey Randall
Now whip it into shape/ Shape it up, get straight/ Go forward, move ahead/ Try to detect it, it's not too late/ To whip it, whip it good
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‘Eighth caller through…’ – love it, Mickey! I was a big fan of 70s Neil before he went too grunge/thrash. That frail waver always seemed to be on the verge of cracking but never did, meanwhile carrying some beautiful melodies. Nicolette Larson was the perfect foil for him in this style. Ah, nostalgia – it doesn’t seem that long ago but half a century has passed!
I lived out of SAFM range on YP, but The Cars were also a staple of our regional AM station’s playlist. Plus the St Elmo’s Fire and Dirty Dancing soundtracks.
One of the best parts of driving to Adelaide was periodically shifting the car radio to the FM band as you neared Port Wakefield to see if you could pick up SAFM yet, even tolerating it dropping in and out until the signal strengthened. Dire Straits never sounded so exotic.
I recently re-visited The Cars debut album, giving it a number of spins on the turntable.
It really is a wonderful album: “Good Times Roll”, “My Best Friend’s Girl” and “Just What I Needed” providing one of the great opening 1-2-3 punches in modern music. The second track, indeed, is one of the greatest pop songs of all time, in my humble opinion. But “I’m In Touch With Your World” and “Moving In Stereo” are glimpses into the unfortunate, over-produced electronic direction they would choose.
Had they continued that early more rock’n’roll trajectory, they may have gone on to be one of the great bands. Ric Ocasek certainly had the song-writing talent to propel them there.
Thanks for these words, Mickey.
Another ripper, Mickey.
Lovely words Mickey. The music brings us the past – and it’s right now.
I find Comes A Time is a good album to play when I need calm in my life. And it is a reminder that an album played in its entirety is what the artist intended, rather than tracks from a playlist.
In March 1985, a year or so before your Freeling straight Grand Prix hijinx, Neil Young played at Memorial Drive. Three concerts in one. Neil Young and the International Harvesters (including the wonderfully named Rufus Thibodeaux on fiddle), Neil Young solo and Neil Young with Crazy Horse. Comes A Time was one of the first songs played. Powderfinger was the encore. Brilliant.
Solid Rock is a majestic, important Australian song. Some years ago I was fortunate to hear Shane Howard speak about his life and music. Class act.
Just wonder, did Imelda’s Shoes play sole music?
Thanks to all for your thoughts on Young, the Cars, and SAFM. Each of these is hugely transportive. Of course, we insisted on Harvest Moon by Neil Young playing a central role in our wedding. Enjoy your Easter!
Comes a Time and Supertramp’s Breakfast in America and Crime of The Century were all vivid in my memory of early drinking and hooning days in WA Mickey. They were always on cassette in the cars we were passengers in around 1978/79 seat belt-less! Thanks for the memories.
As we made dinner last night, I had on Breakfast in America. It’s a great early Saturday evening record. There’s extra value in a band with twin lead vocalists too. I barely listened to Supertramp for decades but they’re on high rotation. I reckon they stand up well. Thanks, Ian.
Mickey, that last paragraph is the stuff of poetry. It should be cross-stitched and framed.
I would personally like to thank Ric Ocasek, who taught blokes that looked like me, that anything is possible, if you just have something interesting to say.
Thanks for your kind words, Jamie. Another reason I’d like to visit Bowling Green State University (BGSU) is that Ric Ocasek attended it, briefly!
Thank you for that reminder about the grand vinyl, Mickey. Aside from the nostalgic crackle-enhanced warmth of the medium, the old LP is the perfect alarm clock for those of us who need reminding to get up from our recliners and walk around every twenty minutes or so.
I don’t know which interview Peter Crossing might be alluding to – Shane Howard also did a lovely hour or so with Brian Wise on 3RRR a while back – but this hour and a half with Brian Nankervis is an epic of its kind, and Brian is mercifully self-effacing.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EUO4gWu0iZU
Thanks Andrew. I do enjoy the physical routine imposed by vinyl as it adds to the theatre and romance. Finding something on a streaming service lacks the warmth of looking at and reminiscing about an album sleeve with somebody close.