Today’s Cool Album of the Day (#745 in the Series) is Bruce Springsteen, Born in the USA At the start of 1984, with a new album imminent, Bruce Springsteen’s longtime fans must have been curious, maybe even anxious, about which direction he was going to take. His last effort, 1982’s superb “Nebraska” had been a bit of a departure, consisting as it did of a fairly sombre, and stark, suite of mainly downbeat songs. Bruce had been given artistic freedom to do his own thing on that release and he delivered a majestic masterpiece which has stood the test of time and remains, for many (myself included), his best album to date. This time around though both fans...

  Today’s Cool Album of the Day (#738 in the Series) is Roger Powell, Air Pocket One of my favourites Sunday morning pastimes is the ¨catch-an-obscure-and-great lp¨ from the sales bin… Buenos Aires is fascinating in this respect: a big city, music lovers everywhere, lots of people with a great insight in local and foreign artists… Sometimes, something beautiful emerges from those dusty used lp´s bins And this one is a real gem… From the sleeve´s art (some distorted and pixelated video image), to the assorted keyboard juggernaut, the album screams 1980. Not 1979, not 1983. 1980. Why?  Well… in my subconscious, the period 1980/1981-82 was the epitome of the purest eighties zeitgeist: modernity without mannerism… and a lot...

This was their debut album. I actually started this write up planning to do their second release, Faster and Llouder, but I couldn’t find many videos for that album. I really wanted you to be able to check out some of the album. I was able to find some for the first album so I made the switch. One of the things I’ve always liked about Foster and Lloyd was the little taste of The Everly Brothers that they’ve thrown in.  Make sure you listen to ‘What Do You Want From Me This Time.’ You’ll hear some heavy Everly Brothers influence in that track! ‘Crazy Over You’ did well for the band as well.  As did ‘Sure Thing’ and...

  Today’s Cool Album of the Day (#722 in the Series) is Dire Straits, Love Over Gold It’s hard to believe that Dire Straits only released six studio albums. They had such a reach and such an impact on music that it seems that they were one of those acts that would spit them our year after year.  That was actually true for the early part of their career when they indeed released their first four albums in a short period of five years. That was from 1978 through 1982.  They then took a couple years off before releasing their most popular album sales-wise that would be Brothers in Arms. After that album’s success they would really lay low,...

Today’s Cool Album of the Day (#718 in the Series) is Joe Cocker, Cocker. This is one of those albums that did not include a disappointing track. I hadn’t listened to a new Cocker release in years when a promo of this arrived in my mail one day. I guess it’s not as bluesy as most Cocker albums, in fact, some people might not be thrilled with the inclusion of a couple power-ballads, but I always loved the release.  The most well known song was Randy Newman’s ‘You Can Leave Your Hat On.’ Sure, it still provides for some great video memories for many, but it was hardly the best song. Give me JC’s reading of Marvin Gaye’s “Inner...

  Today’s Cool Album of the Day (#713 in the Series) is Neal Schon, Late Night I decided to feature this album today because I’ve always been a huge fan of Neal Schon’s guitar playing. He’s always been my favorite soloist. I always felt that so many of the so called “guitar gods” never played with the emotion that this man does. We first saw him as a child prodigy with Santana at about age 16.  He was the first “second guitarist” that Carlos ever had in his band.  He’d play with them for a few years or so before forming Journey about 1973. We’ve featured the first two Journey albums here on Cool Album of the Day in...

Today’s Cool Album of the Day (#707 in the Series) is the The Blasters. How strong of a debut album this is! Some might not consider it The Blasters debut; they did have one earlier with many of the same songs,  but we’re calling it their major label debut at least. Oddly enough, this wasn’t originally a major label album. It was picked up by the Warner Brothers -distributed Slash label (BoDeans, Rank and File etc.) as word about The Blasters and their hot live shows got out. Just think….a new band playing a retro sound in the early 80’s, and they throw five hits at you!  It’s very rare to see success like that. Part Americana, part rockabilly...

  Today’s Cool Album of the Day (#694 in the series) is The Smiths, The Queen is Dead.  By the time this album was released The Smiths were slap bang in the middle of one of the greatest creative rolls that any band or artist has EVER managed , four studio albums and nine stand alone singles in little over four years . And yes, you did read that correctly , they released nine singles in this time period that weren’t on any album!  And, just for good measure, the majority of those singles contained brand new , and for the most part ,superb, tracks on the flipside. Can you imagine anyone even coming close to that sort of...

Today’s Cool Album of the Day (#693 in the Series) is The Bangles, All Over The Place I remember when this one was just released. It was too early in the girl-band genre to admit that a 26-year-old male was a fan.  It still had to be a guilty pleasure that you played when no one was around. Heck, I even remember when I bought the first Pretenders album. I looked around the record store to make sure none of my buddies were watching, and that wasn’t even a girl band. The Go-Go’s had much to do with that. Yes, they were a very good band, but they were marketed very much for the young girl record buyer. The...

  Today’s Cool Album of the Day (#689 in the Series) is The Roches, Keep on Doing. I recently heard a song by The Roches on the radio and then it hit me, man I hadn’t thought about them for a long time (Sorry ladies if you’re reading this. I’ll make it up to you!), What a shame, I really like their music.  It’s been too long! What did I like about them? I think it was the melting of sounds that intrigued me when I first had this album thirty years ago. That and the sense of humor that is clearly visible in these songs. The Roches were a New York band that began in the late ’70....