Songs as social commentary?  Yes, this happened in the '80s too
922401
Yeah, it was cheesy and it's sounds horribly dated now... but this song probably saved thousands of relationships when it came out.  It also sold millions of pitchers of Pina Coladas!
4230890
This will hit a note with the baby boomers who used to listen from the other room while your parents were playing this record for their guests on a saturday night."I lined a hundred men, against the wall, I bet a hundred dollors I can bang them all!", this was the degree of "filth" we turned red in the face in those days. Belle's little ditty songs were ahead of their time in my estimation, similar to a Red Foxx album of the same era, by today's standards, not rauncy enough, but certainly "risque" for it's times. What can I say?, I would buy this more for the nostalgia than for playing for today's audiences. This brings back very found memories of my "Queens Projects" childhood.
3839586
This album defined the sound of an era (early 1980's).  MIDI was new and nothing was standardized yet with regards to studio gear, software, etc... This DVD gives the viewer a glimpse into those early days of 'hybrid productions' between new electronic MIDI (and NON-MIDI) instruments and traditional Rock and Disco bands... With the technology and software that we have today running our DAW's, you can just imagine pulling your hair out back then attempting to sync, record and edit tracks that only take us a few seconds and a few mouse clicks to accomplish, took them days (sometimes weeks) back then...
2221144
First my bias: I saw many of these bands perform live and always enjoyed the shows.  The music is fun and some of it is pretty good.  Greg Kihn and the Rubinoos could have easily been stars, and Psychotic Pineapple will always have a special place in my memory for their offer at concerts to "butcher any song for $1", which they often did with great satirical lyrics.  Beserkely music represents a bygone time in the Power Pop, New wave, Punk era that produced some good tunes.  Check out Jonathan Richman for some poetic tunes that may remind you of simpler times.
3063268
This album recycles some good riffs from the 80's but you can tell these guys are right out of high school by reading their lyrics - the English class PC brainwashing hasn't quite worn off. They also use the thesaurus a little too loosely: "Wed-locked a prison Of antiquation" Good lord who wrote that? Their music may be copped from Metallica but the lyrics are something you would expect from Natalie Merchant (for you younger people she was the singer of 10,000 Maniacs in the 80's - a favorite of unpopular drama club girls who blamed all of their personal insecurities on society, patriarchy, sexism, homophobia and Ronald Reagan).
3330088
Growing up in the '80's, I had heard songs off the radio by the Boston-based Cars for a long while, including my favorites off this album "Hello Again", "Magic", Drive" (the last two being  performed on Saturday Night Live back in 1984), "You Might  Think", and "Heartbeat City" itself. So when I saw this CD  on sale at my local Borders', I snapped it up then. I also like the sounds  of "Looking For Love", "Stranger Eyes", "It's Not  The Night", "Why Can't I Have You" (very eerie), and "I  Refuse", which I definetly feel sums up the early '80's music era  perfectly. So, like I said, besides their recent "Anthology",  which, when I buy it, I will also review, this album is very cool-sounding  for New-Wave tune fans out there. Buy it today!
4759845
about the corporate market cashing in on "rock" music by inventing pop idols -- that's most of what there was on the popular music charts as "rock and roll" between the airplane crash killing Buddy Holly, etc., and The Beatles blowing all that crap off the radio -- or "boy" "bands" such as The Monkees.

What they did on the TeeVee show was a direct steal from The Beatles' film "A Hard Day's Night".  And as for their being a "band": studio musicians did the actual recording work -- which, when that fact became publicly known, ended The Monkees' phony "career".

A later echo of that marketing scam was Milli Vanilli.
303002
Hey, it's the police. It's the 80's calling. Great songs, pretty straight forward video, slightly corny, but a more honest time.
4123295
The idea of this album is off the meter. -- April, 1968

You might imagine, in the aftermath of the Beatles' SGT. PEPPER Lp the year before, if Pat Boone ...or Lawrence Welk... had sponsored his version of the Mamas & the Papas, then whitewashed Motown soul.  Stylistically, this album more than suggests the Mike Curb Congregation's WALT DISNEY'S GREATEST HITS a few years later.  Smiley-happy, white vacant amusement park interchangable employees happily singing more-than-vanilla versions of Motown catalog.

It's a short package--10 songs, even for a period Lp.  Normally Columbia pop albums had 11 tracks when this package issued, which suggests that this album was shorted one song, mostly likely to cut down on the mechanical royalty payments due for Barry Gordy's song catalog.  Track list:

Side one--
Dancing in the Streets/Where Did Our Love Go/Reach Out (I'll Be There)/Stop in the Name of Love/Ain't Gonna Waste My Time
Side two--
Shotgun/Ain't No Mountain High Enough/My Girl/A Place in the Sun/Just Look at Her Now

"Where Did Our Love Go," "Stop in the Name of Love," and "A Place in the Sun" are treated as dreamy slow ballads, a la what the Doodletown Pipers did to the Beatles' "A Hard Day's Night," and the Christies' own execreble slow version of "I Want to Hold Your Hand" on their NEW KICK album a little before.  The male group vocals on "My Girl" wreaks of earnestness.  "Ain't No Mountain High Enough" is also slowed down, and the lead male vocal just calls out a vocal presence resembling Conway Twitty, if he'd crooned lounge.  The album ends with a comic reading (ugh) version of "Just Look At Her Now," complete with "wah-wah-wah..." alto sax and muted trumpet aping laughing, and guitar with a "wah-wah" pedal.  Overall, the band and backing on this set sounds like the house band for an early '70s variety/music TV show like those by Tony Orlando & Dawn, Jim Nabors, etc...--not quite right funky bass and rock guitar, too loud horn section over-weighed by trumpets blasting away, add the occasional harpsicord, orchestra string section, just oozing "This is SHOW BUSINESS!!!"

From the late '60s, this is one of three albums Columbia and affiliated acts don't seem to want remembered/reissued:  The Brothers Four, THE LENNON-MCCARTNEY SONGBOOK, and Tony Bennett, SINGS THE GREAT HITS OF TODAY.

Kitsch recommended!
2466691
I'm in my 60's and  its nice to hear songs of yesteryear. going back to the good old days, where singers were singers. not this screaming  of  rock n, roll.
4154251
The problem with this book is that it is a social commentary about the time it was written in. While you could adapt some of that commentary to today's world, much of the meaning is lost because we do not have the temporal context in which to understand nor to appreciate it in. If you think it is about a man travelling to strange lands, then you missed the entire point of the book. If you want to know where the origins of the words lilliputian and yahoo come from, then by all means read it.
3305714
As opposed to several others, I found the commentary really interesting and personal. I must admit, the band with Shirley MacLaine should have been left off-I just skip through it. This CD brought back memories of the first "record" album of Streisand I bought when I bought my first Stereo in 1963. The make up of the CD took the listener from her earliest days to the present. This transition is, after all, what the meaning of the change from the 1900's to the 2000's is all about.
1749633
These days, it's not difficult to find music from the 1980s - there are digital music stations, FM radio stations dedicated solely to this decade, and, of course, downloads.  However, there are still songs that elude a dedicated 80s fan, and this compilation is a worthy addition to one's collection.  Personally, I bought this CD for Deon Estus' "Heaven Help Me", but was happy with the other songs, including Hipsway's "The Honeythief", "10-9-8" by Face to Face and "No More 'I Love You's'" by The Lover Speaks (most listeners will be familiar with Annie Lennox's version).  There are songs from ABC, Hall & Oates and the Thompson Twins, as well as from more obscure acts like The Models and One 2 Many.  Like the album promises, these are the hard to find songs, the ones that have been forgotten (for the most part).  If you're looking for 80's pop music other than Rick Springfield, Journey or Pat Benatar, this is the collection for you!
3479348
The collaboration between Fee Waybill and Todd Rundgren produced this great album of largely social commentary lyrics wrapped in catchy pop tunes. Fee and Todd delve into how the mass media have taken over our lives; not since Frank Zappa's album 'Over-Nite Sensation' (more specifically the song "I'm The Slime") have Pop/Rock artists so firmly bitten the hand that feeds them. This disc has quite a few enjoyable tracks here that never got radio play except on College FM stations- such as 'Love's A Mystery (I Don't Understand)' This particular track seems to pay homage (for better or worse) to the young teen romantic tragedy style of Meat Loaf. Rundgren's influence in the songwriting is strong here so fans of The Todd will feel very much at home while listening to this disc as will anyone who likes somewhat obscure 80's pop.
4803234
Our culture is already bored with meta-commentary about the potential effects of the digital revolution. Its here, its everywhere, its the water flowing over the gills of the millennial and nourishing an isolated global community of social mavens, prepared to Google-as-a-verb the meaning of the word maven at a moments notice from a smartphone, tablet, netbook, and eyeglasses. It is no surprise, then, that possibly the most influential musician of the 21st century personifies and embraces the identity-crafting realm of the real-time and connected. It's important that any book about this musician understands the world we live in.

Kirk Walker Graves, author of the 33 1/3 entry for Kanye Wests album My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy, assumed the burden of dissecting the eponymous album for this very reason. Why focus an intellectual analysis on an album only four years old, nearly devoid of historical context? The author sends the message that MBDTF is the first album that wraps its tendrils directly into the psyche of a society that treats socializing as preparation for personal celebrity, desiring all things immediately not just due to impatience, but because soon now will be irrelevant. Much like the album and our pop culture, the importance of Graves analysis cannot be understated, or delayed.

Graves shows a level of enthusiasm for his work comparable to a toddler with a leaf blower in a realm of endless cotton candy. The book begins by giving one of the best explanations of Kanye, the artist and the human, that I have yet read. It helps the reader place him within the digital culture now pervading the world that I previously mentioned. At times, Graves ardor lends the book a zest for cultural context that informs the reader of even the most implacable song-sample or lyrical choice. There is a clear appreciation for sociological an anthropological meaning here as well; the many aspects of Kanye and the individual works within MBDTF are frequently described in terms of Americas love-hate response to His ego and ambitions. If youve ever felt theres a fiendishly clever quality to the production of pop-friendly or nearly-pop-friendly songs like All of the Lights or Runaway, Graves is more than happy to validate you. In most cases, I found myself a convert.

That is not to say that this issue of the 33 1/3 series is without its faults. It feels that on occasion, Graves digs too deep to strike oil on analyses; its important that you agree with Graves on the conclusion that Kanye is intractably intertwined with the music he produces, or else all the talk of Kanyes narcissism and aplomb in the text can become frustratingly psychoanalytical. However, to Graves credit, he generally avoids jargon and thesaurus-bombs in favor of flowery and just-short-of-excessive description, leaving it accessible to most learners interested in all the hoopla about Mr. West.

My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy (the book) is a superb look at how our society is feeding the Kanye machine, producing great works of maximalist conglomeration (as well as Yeezus, which even the author admits lacked the initial vitality of MBDTF). When Graves then opens up the machine to give the readers a look at the parts, he proves his credentials. In homage to his imagery-thick writing style, I offer my personal interpretation of his thesis, for you to decide whether or not to read his book:

Kanye is a pop-culture amalgam, accumulating the discarded love and scorn of the public eye, screaming from the mountaintop of public consciousness, Wi-Fi enabled, spotlights overhead, clutching a fistful of forgotten hooks and blistering verse, daring the cameras to look away. He is a one-man 24-hour news cycle channeling the ferocity of a boundless ego, repressed by men in suits in corner offices and sitting at talk-show desks. Hes producer, pariah, artist, child, deity, caricature and soon-to-be-king of pop all in one, and MBDTF is the promise.
839698
Released at the end of the 80's, this album sums up all that was good (and fun) about rap/hip hop at the time : mad sampling (from BS&T, Aretha Franklin, Gary Wright, etc.), having minor beefs with other artists (like M.C. Black & Decker), minimal cursing (I don't mind it but it's hard to play other stuff with your kids around, if you really care), and it was less violence oriented (see previous note). M.C. Serch, Prime Minister Pete Nice, D.J. Richie Rich, and a host of guest artists (KMD's Zev Love X !!! [Daniel Dumile] - that's MF Doom for those of you too young to remember) come together to make The Cactus Cee/D a perfect late 80's time capsule of fun rhymes and funky beats. Now if only someone would step up and release a version of The Cactus Vide-Yo on Dee/Vee/D.
820625
This album illustrates an interesting point about the humor and satire in early and late period Zappa (for the purposes of this review, the dividing line is around 1976). From 1966-1975, Frank did plenty of music that was considering shocking, and some that was considered offensive. But with one exception ("Dinah Moe Humm"), none of that music made it onto "Have I Offended Someone?" The reason might be that the humor from this earlier period tended to be more surreal, and there was less distinction between Zappa's "arty" music and his "satirical" music. Also, in his earlier period, the satire and humor tended to stop short of what the mainstream culture would have called "obscene," even when the lyrics were about having sex with teen-aged groupies ("Motherly Love," 1966) or boyhood experiments with human waste ("Lets Make the Water Turn Black," 1968).

With "Don't Eat the Yellow Snow" (1974), Zappa found that there was a big audience for a more blunt, less avant-garde brand of Zappa humor. "Dinah Moe Humm," from 1973, is another example of this style, but the risqu "Dinah Moe" had no chance of becoming a left-field hit like "Yellow Snow."

The humor and satire pieces from 1976 through 1988 were more in the vein of "Yellow Snow" and "Dinah Moe," and it is that style of song that is featured here, and which has led people only vaguely familiar with Zappa's work to classify him alongside Weird Al Yankovic as a novelty songwriter. (No slight intended towards Weird Al, whose parodies have amused me greatly.) In this later Zappa period, his targets (made into caricatures or stereotypes, take your pick) include Jewish women, Catholic women, French women, kinky women, gay men, union members, TV preachers, disco dancers, and more. Mostly absent from this compilation are songs targeting politicians, though they too were frequent fodder.

Zappa claimed in a 1978 Downbeat Magazine interview that his original boomer audience had settled down by the mid-70s (and were attending fewer shows), and that his concert audiences were skewing younger. Whether or not that's the reason he began writing more of the type of material on this disc is an open question, but its clear that there was a conscious decision to do more of this type of song, and to separate it (for the most part) from his "highbrow" orchestral and Synclavier projects. With "Valley Girl" (one of the mildest songs on this disc), that strategy paid off handsomely and gave Zappa the luxury of spending $400,000 of his own cash to hire the London Symphony Orchestra to record two albums-worth of his orchestral pieces.