By JAY ROBERTS

A funny thing happened…

The idea for this column was brought about after I started shopping at my friend Roger Chouinard’s Purchase Street Records shop. I had been picking up some cassettes from him and because I’d already been doing reviews of new music for a number of years for other websites, I thought this would be a good way to look back at albums from what was my formative musical era. Then I made the 100 cassette purchase from the shop and I had a wealth of material to write about.

Initially, The Cassette Chronicles was a part of the Classic Rock Bottom message forum that I am an active member of. But when I posted a link on my Facebook page to the first forum posting I did, I got contacted by the powers-that-be here at Limelight and asked if I’d be interested in writing the series for them.

As you can see, I was! Besides writing original articles, I went back and gussied up the albums I’d already written about and 33 articles later, here we are at the end of Year 1 and I’m looking back and ranking my ten favorite articles in the series thus far.

Thanks for reading and I look forward to writing more of The Cassette Chronicles in 2018.

Please click on the album title to read the full article!

#10 – TROUBLE TRIBE – TROUBLE TRIBE (1990) TIE

#10 FIFTH ANGEL – TIME WILL TELL (1989) TIE

#09 – NIGHT RANGER – MAN IN MOTION (1988)

#08 – SURVIVOR – TOO HOT TO SLEEP (1988)

#07 – CHEAP TRICK – LAP OF LUXURY (1988)

#06 – HONEYMOON SUITE – RACING AFTER MIDNIGHT (1988)

#05 – BRYAN ADAMS – RECKLESS (1983)

#04 – BLACK SABBATH – TYR (1990)

#03 – BABYLON A.D. – BABYLON A.D. (1989)

#02 – LEATHERWOLF – STREET READY (1989)

#01 – HELIX – WILD IN THE STREETS (1987)

BY JAY ROBERTS (SPECIAL TO LIMELIGHT MAGAZINE)

The Cassette Chronicles is a continuing series of mini reviews and reflections on albums from the 1980’s and 1990’s that I have acquired through Purchase Street Records in New Bedford, MA.

The aim of this series is to highlight both known and underappreciated albums from rock, pop and metal genres from the 1980’s through the cassette editions of their releases. Some of the albums I have known about and loved for years, while others are new to me and were music I’ve always wanted to hear. There will be some review analysis and my own personal stories about my connection with various albums.

These opinions are strictly my own and do not reflect the views of anyone else at Limelight Magazine.

WARRANT – ULTRAPHOBIC (1995)

In 1995, the commercial fortunes of bands most associated with the 80’s metal scene were poor at best. Grunge now ruled the world of music and I guess that might account for why Warrant’s fourth album is a decidedly open affair mixing both metal and grunge into sound of the music.

Unfortunately, this really didn’t work all that well. While bringing on Rick Steir and James Kottak from Kingdom Come to replace Joey Allen and Steven Sweet respectively, the resulting album failed to fire much in the way of imagination. Or at least that’s what I’ve read when researching this album. I say that because by 1995, I was long gone from the Warrant camp. Actually I was done with them after the Cherry Pie album. I hadn’t moved on to grunge (though I did like the first couple of Pearl Jam albums), but rather I just never really got into Warrant as much as many of their far more hardcore fans did.

The Ultraphobic album does come off sounding, at times, far more aggressive and gritty than would normally be associated with the band. The slick sound was given more of a raw production feel. Probably one of the best examples of this was the opening track “Undertow”. You can hear just how much the band went about incorporating the grunge “aesthetic” to the music. It’s probably the best out of the six songs on side one of the album, but not necessarily one that I would rush around trying to play again.

There’s a darker vibe to the songwriting which has apparently been attributed to the now deceased singer Jani Lane’s divorce at the time of the album’s recording.

I see this album as attempt by Warrant to stay relevant in the ever-changing musical landscape, but it really did nothing to call out to either their past or potentially future fans. Out of the eleven tracks on the album, there are really only two that I would consider worthwhile additions to their catalog. The first is the song “Live Inside Of You”. It leads off side two of the cassette and after the first six songs being an exercise in futility (to my ears anyway), it is the song that most resembles the fast paced rocker the band did so well on their first two albums.

The other song is the closing track “Stronger Now”. Written by Jani Lane, it deals with the aforementioned divorce. It’s just his vocal and a spare musical arrangment and it sounds wonderful. However, I did notice that some of the lyrics end up taking on more poignancy given the circumstances of Lane’s alchol related death in 2011.

I really wish I’d liked this album more but it just comes off as pandering to the prevailing musical tides of the time of its release while cynically expecting to keep their initial fan base as well. This is one album I won’t find myself playing again.

Notes of Interest: The band is still around today and released a new studio album called Louder Harder Faster in 2017 with their current singer Robert Mason.

Drummer James Kottak was out of the band by 1996 but joined The Scorpions and stayed with them for 20 years before being ousted in 2016.

The Cassette Chronicles is a continuing series of mini reviews and reflections on albums from the 1980’s and 1990’s that I have acquired through Purchase Street Records in New Bedford, MA.

The aim of this series is to highlight both known and underappreciated albums from rock, pop and metal genres from the 1980’s through the cassette editions of their releases. Some of the albums I have known about and loved for years, while others are new to me and were music I’ve always wanted to hear. There will be some review analysis and my own personal stories about my connection with various albums.

These opinions are strictly my own and do not reflect the views of anyone else at Limelight Magazine.

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JOHN WAITE – TEMPLE BAR (1995)

It is safe to say that while I love John Waite’s voice, that by 1995, I had pretty much moved on from any true active interest in his solo work. After listening to Temple Bar, I’m left with a little pang of regret that I skipped out on Waite during this particular period of his career.

The album was recorded the year after Waite left Bad English and according to a quote from Waite on his website, he was given the freedom to record the album as he wanted with no interference from the label.

It seems that plan paid off, at least in part. There are songs that come off as entirely too mellow for me such as the covers of Van Morrison’s “Someone Like You,” “I’m So Lonesome I Could Cry” from Hank Williams, and the Bill Withers song “Ain’t No Sunshine.” Maybe it is just the fact that I’m not particularly enamored with the original tracks but these renditions just came off entirely lacking in any kind of feeling for Waite making the songs his own.

Once you get into the original songs on the album, things get a lot more interesting though. I thought the album opener “How Did I Get By Without You?” was a bit afflicted by that same sense of mellowness, but the song’s overall melody was pleasant enough that I looked passed the slow pacing.

Lyrically, the album has some real high points. The first song to really kick things up a bit in terms of tempo and more in your face instrumentation (guitar and drums in particular) was “Price of My Tears”. The more active presence of the guitar is also fueled by a great set of lyrics. The track “Downtown” is piano driven but the reflective lyrics (which come off not only as someone looking back on their past, but given Waite’s own past, the words are definitely him reflecting back on his own career).

“The Glittering Prize” and “More” are two more examples of how a strong sense of lyric writing help make for that much more of a special tune. “The Glittering Prize” establishes itself as a more driven song while “More” slows things down in order for the words to sink in for the listener.

John Waite has said that Temple Bar is the album where his life as an artist began again. I find it hard to argue with his assertion because while the album isn’t nearly as aggressively uptempo as his earlier solo work, you can immediately sense a more complete package of songwriting from Waite and his co-writers. Despite my own personal lack of interest in the cover songs, the album flows well and it feels less like Waite is trying to satisfy someone else’s demands and instead recorded an album that first and foremost was important to his own sense of the artistic. This is deeply important because if the artist isn’t fully instep with the material, how could you expect the listener to be?

Temple Bar, for me at least, is as good an album as you could hope for. It lies pretty much at the opposite end of the musical spectrum from his amazing No Brakes release but stands well on its own and I’m immensely gratified to have heard it at long last.

BY JAY ROBERTS (SPECIAL TO LIMELIGHT MAGAZINE)

The Cassette Chronicles is a continuing series of mini reviews and reflections on albums from the 1980’s and 1990’s that I have acquired through Purchase Street Records in New Bedford, MA.

The aim of this series is to highlight both known and underappreciated albums from rock, pop and metal genres from the 1980’s through the cassette editions of their releases. Some of the albums I have known about and loved for years, while others are new to me and were music I’ve always wanted to hear. There will be some review analysis and my own personal stories about my connection with various albums.

These opinions are strictly my own and do not reflect the views of anyone else at Limelight Magazine.

CONTRABAND – CONTRABAND (1991)

We’ve all heard that cliche of how when you assume, you just make an ass of you and me, right? Well, that kind of happened when I decided to write about this album.

The musical pedigree for this so-called supergroup or side project is rather noteworthy for the variety of well received rock groups of the 70’s and 80’s. You’ve got Michael Schenker (UFO, Scorpions, solo) and Tracii Guns (L.A. Guns) on guitar, Shark Island’s singer Richard Black on vocals, Bobby Blotzer from Ratt on drums and Share Pedersen from Vixen on bass. Honestly, the reason I paid any attention to the band initially was because of Pedersen, who I had a major thing for at the time.

The release of this album came with a big single and video for the opening track, the Ian Hunter written “All The Way From Memphis”. This version of the song is ultimately outstanding and likely the best remembered track from the album.

But that act of assumption by me led me to thinking that this album had been a pretty successful one when it was initially released. My perception was corrected when I read that not only were the sales of the album disappointing but the reviews weren’t all that great either. So I was left to wrack my brain as to why what I thought was so far from the truth. The reason turned out to be pretty simple. I never bought the damn album in the first place. My total exposure to the band was in fact the “All The Way To Memphis” song. I could’ve sworn I owned this one back in the day.

It might’ve been a bit of a good thing I failed to grab this one up when it was released. The material on the album leaves you with just enough of a tease to leave you rather unsatisfied. In fact, the band pretty much bookends both sides of the album with good songs while the 3 songs in the middle are at best mediocre or abysmal at their worst.

“Loud Guitars, Fast Cars & Wild, Wild Livin'” is a burst of pure adrenaline racing from one high point to the next at breakneck speed to close out the first side. The song ended up being used on the soundtrack of the movie If Looks Could Kill as well.

A cover of blues singer Roy Brown’s “Good Rockin’ Tonight” is given a more hard rock or metallic going over, but remains a superb cut and the band joined an impressive lineup of artists to record their own version of Brown’s hit including Bruce Springsteen, Montrose, Elvis Presley, Jerry Lee Lewis and James Brown.

David Bowie’s “Hang On To Yourself” closed out side two and that was the fourth really great sounding track on the release.

Sadly, that’s where the good news ends. The remaining six songs came off as trying a little too hard and failing to hit whatever the target was. I just wanted those songs to be over with each time I listened so I could get to the worthwhile tracks.

If I could just hear the four songs I liked, I’d be fine. However, since you have to take the album as a whole, I found my admittedly inaccurate perception of the album shattered and was left profoundly disappointed in the end.

Notes of Interest – The songwriting credits on Contraband were a treat to read about. While Richard Black got co-writing credits on three songs (only one that I liked), the rest of the band had nothing to do with any of the creative side of things. This might explain why the album comes off a bit more like a hired gun project trying to cash in at the twilight of the metal glory days than a full fledged band.

Besides the covers I already mentioned, there were a number of other songwriters utilized for the album. Two of them in particular have had a host of collaborations with big name musical acts. Michael Thompson co-wrote “Kiss By Kiss” with Mark Spiro. Thompson has worked with Babyface, David Foster, Celine Dion and Eric Clapton amongst a host of others. Meanwhile, Spiro has worked on music that is reportedly responsible for 100 million albums sold by artists such as John Waite, Bad English, Laura Branigan, Heart, Cheap Trick and many more.

Dann Huff co-wrote the song “Intimate Outrage”. He was a part of the band Giant, whose album “Last of the Runaways” was a featured album in an earlier installment of this Cassette Chronicles series.