(renamed) Albums from the 70s and early 80s that are the tits.

Rocinante wrote:I'm barely breaking over the decade line with this one, but, I barely remembered this band and wanted to check this record out.  NICE.

EdMartinsLoan wrote:

We've been following Blue Rodeo for ages.  We were in Ireland playing golf and met Jim Cuddy in the streets of some small town I don't even remember the name of.  He processed the restraining order after that.

I.B. Fine wrote:
Steely Dan, take your pick, Katy Lied, Pretzel Logic

Strangers in the Night peaked at No. 7 on the UK charts and No. 42 on the US charts. Strangers in the Night is often listed by critics and fans as one of the greatest live rock albums of all time. Kerrang! magazine listed the album at No. 47 among the "100 Greatest Heavy Metal Albums of All Time". Slash, former guitarist for Guns N' Roses has stated that this is his favorite live album

One of the top 3 hard rock and rock live recordings, Strangers in the Night is absolute monolith of fine '70s style hard rock music. UFO played a heavier, more metallic and riff-heavy hard rock, offering a chief influence to future metal bands. Michael Schenker's guitar playing is possibly in the greatest shape of his lifetime and the band themselves are on fire during this night in Chicago

Unfortunately, this concert album is often overlooked when discussions of the great live rock albums of the '70s arise. UFO's Strangers in the Night deserves to be right up there with Kiss' Alive! and Thin Lizzy's Live and Dangerous, based on the excitement the group and its audience generate and due to the quality of the hard rock compositions. This is a band at its peak, with its prime lineup (led by German guitar-monger Michael Schenker) and all of its best songs. The group paces itself at the beginning, opting for some lesser material, but begins to hit a stride on the early track "Doctor Doctor." "Mother Mary" and "This Kids" combine all the elements of Led Zeppelin's best rock (concise riffs, mammoth drumming, etc.), while the introduction to "Love to Love" displays the talent of the instrumentalists. "Lights Out" is probably the band's best-known song, while the guitar solo-soaked "Rock Bottom" was an oft-requested fan favorite. UFO closes their set with the let-the-good-times-roll singalong "Too Hot to Handle" and the then-state-of-the-art heavy metal of "Let It Roll." The group may have been at its peak at the time of Strangers in the Night, but Schenker had a falling out with singer Phil Mogg (whose vocals bear a resemblance at times to AC/DC's Bon Scott) soon after the album's completion, and promptly left UFO. Schenker pursued pop-metal in the '80s with the Michael Schenker Group/MSG (plus very short stints with both Aerosmith and the Scorpions), while UFO never recovered from losing him and sank into obscurity. Although the group is rarely mentioned anymore in America, UFO's mark has been left on bands such as Metallica, Megadeth, Def Leppard, and the Smashing Pumpkins. A long-lost hard rock classic.

If ever a band was destined for underrated status, that band would have to be UFO. There is no greater proof of that fact than their classic 1978 live album, Strangers in the Night. UFO had quite a run of outstanding studio albums beginning with Phenomenon in 1974 and continuing through Obsession in 1978. Listening to these albums today, it is amazing to think that UFO's legacy didn't hover as highly as that of more touted bands such as Aerosmith, AC/DC and Queen. For a while, it looked as though UFO might break into the mainstream. The 1977 release Lights Out made it into the US Billboard Top Forty charts and was their only LP to do so. Obsession should have consolidated that status, but only charted at #41. Frankly, the album isn't quite as consistent as Lights Out and may have disappointed some fans expecting Lights Out Part II. But Strangers in the Night more than made up for Obsession's shortcomings, although it too would be overlooked by the musical mainstream, peaking at #42. It did, however, climb into the British Top Ten.

Essentially a double live greatest hits album, Strangers in the Night deserves to be mentioned in the same breath as Deep Purple's Made in Japan, Thin Lizzy's Live and Dangerous and The Allman Brothers at Fillmore East. Unlike most live albums of the time, Strangers in the Night rarely launches into lengthy jams. It is the tightness of the performances, the Phil Mogg braggadocio, the unpredictability of loose cannon guitarist Michael Schenker, the powerful drumming of Andy Parker, the hammering bass lines of Pete Way and the crisp production values that elevate the album to classic status.

Recently remastered and expanded by Chrysalis Records, and with a running order that more closely reflects that of the concerts, the album begins with "Hot 'N' Ready" and gradually gets better and better… which is saying a lot because it starts out great! Every studio album with Michael Schenker is represented and many of the best songs from each album are featured and often trump their respective studio counterparts. "Love to Love" for example is free of its string arrangement found on the Lights Out album and becomes a prototypical power ballad, presaging a phenomenon that would continue with younger metal bands throughout the 1980s ad nauseam. You can practically see the audience breaking out the lighters for this one. On "Let It Roll", Andy Parker goes ballistic on the bass drums while rhythm guitarist Paul Raymond doubles on keyboards. The AC/DC like swagger of "Natural Thing" is particularly effective on Strangers in the Night; Phil Mogg's tale of backstage debauchery and the woes of a sexually transmitted disease are that much more palpable in a live environment.

“The claim that I once shat in Michael Schenker’s shoe and made him put it on is rubbish, although I might have shut his head in the door and then slammed it.”

“He was a force of nature. Most people actually need to be sober at some point in the day, but he didn’t seem to require that. At one gig we were backstage listening to them play and the bass just disappeared – of course he’d fallen off the stage.”

“When I was doing cocaine regularly I would say it was very much out of boredom - plus the fact that I was addicted.”

I.B. Fine wrote:Wasn't a party unless someone flipped on B52's.     Rock Lobster, anyone?

The Pantry wrote:Jazz, anyone?  

Forget the call letters of the Lansing station when I first got to MSU in 77.  The stuff they played (a lot of fusion) was quite different from stations I listened to growing up in metro Detroit...and I liked it.  Still do.

Echos Myron wrote:Throwing out a few I didn't see...

No. 1 Record / Radio City -- Big Star
Hunky Dory -- David Bowie
Heaven Tonight / In Color -- Cheap Trick
Armed Forces -- Elvis Costello
Marshall Crenshaw -- Marshall Crenshaw
Best of -- Faces
Look Sharp -- Joe Jackson
Jesus of Cool -- Nick Lowe
Lust for Life -- Iggy Pop
Pretenders -- Pretenders
Siren -- Roxy Music
Underwater Moonlight -- Soft Boys
More Songs About Buildings and Food / Remain in Light -- Talking Heads
Jail Break -- Thin Lizzy
Damn the Torpedos -- Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers
Black Sea -- XTC
Fragile -- Yes

EdMartinsLoan wrote:Joe Jackson - Look Sharp

I still think this album would be a hit if it was only released today.

I.B. Fine wrote:

Freshman in '77? what dorm? You ever listen to Brand X? Phil Collins side project before he went POP!