Welcome to The Pleasuredome

I was not very familiar with Frankie Goes to Hollywood other than the usual songs, Two Tribes and the ever popular Relax.  So imagine my amazement when I finally listen to their first album Welcome To the Pleasuredome. Not only did they have the notable hits as the a fore mentioned, but there were also covers!  3 to be exact if I'm not mistaken "quickly looks at song list"  Yes there are 3.  That I know of any way, there could be more but I don't recognize any of them.  I'm sure someone will set me straight on that later.

War-excellent version and arrangement, really like that narrative in the background.
Born to Run-Wow! gutsy choice of songs to cover, I really think I like this version more than the Boss's
San Jose-Okay not sure why it was chosen, but it is one of my favorite Bossa nova type songs.  They even kept the same feel to it which was quite nice.

At first when I listened to the album, I was really dead set against the title track Welcome To The Pleasuredome, mainly because its like 15 mins long.  But truthfully in hindsight, if you listen to it in it's entirety, it goes by pretty quickly, kind of like an ambiance new age kind of song..like Enya without the chanting.  Oh wait, I think there was a little chanting..

All in all I really enjoyed listening to the album.  Holly Johnson and the guys are high octane at its finest and it's displayed in their songs.  I hope if you haven't already, you get an opportunity to give this gem a listen.

Oh, and one more thing.  If you can, check out the artwork inside the liner notes, very creative.  I especially like the quote about Andy Warhol.

Ciao For Now...xx

New Tunes-Visage by Visage

Well honestly I don't know what to say.  Had I not already have heard Fade to Grey I would not have known this was Visage.  Which means as you may have guessed, nothing else on the album sounds like it.  Not that I was hoping it would, but some part of me really want to hear some more of that sultry French murmuring in the back ground on perhaps another song?  I know I'm not the only one, come on now, don't leave me hanging here....Anyone? Anyone?..

So which songs did I like?  I like Tar, that song to me is candy for your ears, not so much the lyrics but all of the sounds and rhythms that were produced to create it..very cool.  Same with Malapaso Man, lots of percussion, I love percussion!  Steps was very good as well, short, sweet and to the point.  I like that too. As a matter of fact if you blink you might miss the whole album, the majority of the songs are only 3-4 minutes long and there are only ten of them. 

The jury is still out on how I feel about the album as a whole.   I don't hate it, but it's not quite what I thought it was going to be.  I will give it a few more listens and let some of the other songs grow on me, like "Moon Over Moscow" and "Blocks on Blocks"  A lot of theses songs are reminiscent of  some of John Foxx's stuff  which I do like very much.

I will say however I am glad to have in in my 80s Music Library as it was a long time coming.  Who knows I might even have some one to thank for that.  After all Limahl recently referenced Visage in his song 1983. But seeing as I cannot tell a lie, I had already purchased it before I heard the song :) (Yay! I'm psychic!)  What can I say, there was a lot of Steve Strange buzz going around Twitter at the time, I just jumped into the vortex and ran with it ;)  Next on the list of albums to blog?  Frankie Goes To Hollywood-Welcome to The PleasureDome very excited about that one.  Ciao For Now!

In closing, I will thank Limahl for giving a shout out to Visage and several other bands that were cresting the 80s New Wave Era, everyone likes to be appreciated every now and then.