By mid-fall of 1984, my friend Mark H and I were falling hard for the game of bridge, self-teaching through hours of dealing, bidding, and playing, never minding that it was often just the two of us trying to learn a four-person game. Often, but not always. That fall and winter we occasionally did battle with Michelle and Jim over at Jim's house on a Friday or Saturday evening. Michelle, Mark, and I had met Jim over the summer, working at the computing camp for grades 7-12 that Transy ran (he was an alum from a few years earlier who would be attending grad school in CS in the fall and was serving as the head counselor). It wouldn't surprise me in the least if the four of us had gotten together on the last weekend of that October.
As for what was in Stereo Review at the time? Let's take a look.
Article
Alanna Nash Interviews Exile
Nash catches up with the band as they're recording Kentucky Hearts, their second LP after transitioning from soft rock to country (the album would soon reach #1 on the Country chart and spawn three #1 Country singles). Between "Kiss You All Over" and this moment of ascension, they'd served as a bowling alley bar band in Lexington (having originated in the mid-60s in Richmond, about 25 miles south of Lex). Leader/co-vocalist J.P. Pennington: "I think if we're helping country music at all, we're helping to bring it a little more toward the middle."
This month's reviewers are Chris Albertson, Louis Meredith, Alanna Nash, Mark Peel, Peter Reilly, and Steve Simels.
Best of the Month
--Prince, Purple Rain (MP) "Although Prince may plead, seduce, chide, and promise all over the record, this really is a party album, an orgy or searing electric guitar and calliope-cranking synthesizers, played with the frenzy of a band trying to raise this month's rent."
--Hank Williams, Jr., Major Moves (AN) "He is still singing about the same old things, but he is presenting them in a fresh, new, creative way, experimenting not only in terms of approach, but in style…(this album) signifies that Hank Jr. has finally come of age."
Other Disks Reviewed
--Bangles, All Over the Place (MP) "It's not until you listen to the lyrics that it really sinks in: how different a woman's perspective can make otherwise familiar rock-and-roll sound…The Bangles aren't a great girl band or a great garage band. They're just a great band." I regularly claim that All Over the Place is one of my ten favorite albums of all-time.
--Elvis Costello and the Attractions, Goodbye Cruel World (SS) "The emotions are built in, rather than felt, and his phrasing is on automatic pilot, with the passion obviously programmed."
--Josie Cotton, From the Hip (PR) "On the remainder of the album, she whizzes through…with all the noisy hauteur of a Tex-Mex waitress explaining the menu to a party of Eskimos. I'm not that hungry."
--Echo & the Bunnymen, Ocean Rain (MP) The temptation is to think 'major work,' so unusual and original is this music, but it's also repetitive, excessively dramatic, and unintentionally hilarious…not nearly as important as it sounds."
--Eddy Grant, Going for Broke (MP) "…frankly, it's a pleasant change to find reggae this well recorded. But if you're looking for something beyond entertainment, you won't find it here."
--The Jacksons, Victory (MP) "…sounds disappointingly like a dry run for the Jacksons' tour, a chance for each brother to take a turn in the spotlight and for each to cash a royalty check."
--Waylon Jennings, Never Could Toe the Mark (AN) "Like Hank Williams, Jr., Waylon almost runs that no-strings-attached, ramblin' man stuff into the ground, but he gets away with it by doing it so convincingly." I saw Waylon in concert with high school friends Tony and Bill in the summer of '84; I have no recollection as to what if anything he might have played from this album.
--Elton John, Breaking Hearts (MP) "…an unadventurous but dauntingly professional outing, the kind only big leaguers like the Stones and Rod Stewart can pull off."
--David Knopfler, Release (MP) "…may find himself in the company of Dave Davies, Tom Fogerty, Bob Crosby, and Wilhelm Friedrich Bach as the brother no one remembers, but (this) can stand on its own as accomplished and often very affecting rock."
--Repo Man soundtrack (SS) "…features various obnoxious noises provided by a cross-section of hard-core California punk bands, and much of it is both amusing and kinetically exciting." James bought this album sometime during that '84-'85 junior year and I know he played it in the dorm room (particularly the song featured below) from time to time.
--Sheila E., In the Glamorous Life (PR) "As a singer she has a sassy, flamboyant approach that beautifully zings…and as an instrumentalist she has a rhythm and a beat that could induce a cast-iron statue to begin tapping its foot."
--Style Council, My Ever Changing Moods (SS) "(Paul) Weller and his colleague Mick Talbot aren't so much interested in aping old Stax/Volt or Jimmy Smith records as they seem to be with mating easily recognizable genre riffs with lyrics reflecting their current personal politics, which are understatedly humanist and a big improvement over the Jam's haranguing."
--Tina Turner, Private Dancer (CA) "(Her) talent is not just undiminished, but in greater abundance than before. The proof lies in the grooves of (this album), and this is one good Turner than deserves another, and another."
Video Reviews
--Eurthymics, Sweet Dreams (LM) "But all in all, Lennox and Stewart's vaguely ominous brand of synth-pop Jacques Brel doesn't seem to translate in a live concert."
--Barry Manilow, In Concert at the Greek Theatre (CA) A 1978 show now released on LaserDisc. "I must confess that I am not a fan, but Manilow knows how to entertain, and when he applies that talent to a varied program of likable songs, his vocal weaknesses seem to matter little."
--Diana Ross, In Concert (LM) A 1979 Vegas show now released on LaserDisc. "…all of this is as slick and glitzy as humanly and financially possible. As spectacle, it can't be faulted. Emotionally, however, it's as numbing and showbiz-phony as the comparable show you might get from Wayne Newton or Jerry Vale."
--
For a while Jim and I were good friends. That changed over time; we weren't much in touch after my first couple of years of grad school. When I moved back to Lexington in 1992, we talked on the phone once or twice, but I neglected to follow up. In the interim he had gone to dentistry school and eventually moved out of state to practice. A little over a week ago I learned through Mark's wife Lana on Facebook that Jim had passed away, having been ill for a couple of years.
(In the blank book that James's then-gf Stacey gave me for Christmas 1984, one of the few entries I penned was about 10 people who "played a significant role in my life" for the year just ending. Two were Transy faculty—one each in political science and English—and the other eight friends/peers. I've learned in writing this up that the English prof passed away early last month; Jim's death makes three of the eight contemporaries that are now gone.)
I'm very sorry about Jim's passing from this world. I do have feelings of regret over not ever reaching back out, over now having lost the opportunity ever to do so, but I recognize there's no one to blame but myself. I am sad for Jim's loved ones and friends, wishing them peace as they grieve, and hoping that Jim found great joy and fulfillment over the years.
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