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Bowers's groups (7)

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Elton John - Too Low For Zero - 26-Aug-09 01:21 PM
From the opening chords of the first track, Cold As Christmas, listeners are in for a treat.
Eltons haunting vocal, coupled with the incredible backing vocals of the band, take the listener on a story of an elderly couple whose romantic flame as burned out.
From there, the album slowly builds. The synthesizers are heavy- its 1983 afterall, and i love early 80s sound! - but they never intrude. They supplement the melody and reinforce Elton staying with the times.
The title track should have been a single as it went over big on the tour that followed - the Breaking Hearts Tour.
I Guess Thats Why They Call It The Blues remains an instant Elton classic with its overtly sentimental lyric about pining for a love one.
Elton and the band deliver a rock solid effort on this one. And speaking of rock, the "rock" songs on the album are also worthy of mentioning.
Kiss The Bride and Whipping Boy are fun, yet throwaways that, taken in the context of the album, fit in just fine.
Crystal relies on a drum machine and is clearly an experimental effort that again, would have made a great choice for a single.
Saint and One More Arrow round out the ballads and are equally satisfying primarily on the strength of Eltons vocals.
The only song here that feels out of place is Religion.
An obvious attempt to mimic a country-rock feel and would have been better suited on a b-side.

Gary Numan - Berserker - 02-Jun-09 04:02 AM
Berserker, as a complete work is astounding. And held against even the best known acts of the time, this is an extremely mature album for a 24 year old to write. The title track could be released today and sound as fresh as it did then. Its a very well constructed piece that burns from the first chord, then completley slows up, expands, and then takes off again. I first heard this track in 1992 and it was the only song in a long time that actually had me smiling from ear to ear as I left my cd player on repeat for nearly an hour.
An awesome, and greatly underrated album, which features other gems such as the paranoid industrial eba of My Dying Machine, and the incredible Viola of Cold Warning, just to cite a couple of great tracks.

Visage - Whispers - 07-Dec-08 07:57 AM
Perfection, Whispers is one of the most beautiful moments for Visage in my opinion…such an extraordinary piece of music one could just drowned in.
So very peaceful yet so sad which means pure genius.

Anyway, this Japanese 7 is particularly interesting because it contains a unique edit of Whispers, in 1982 TDK Japan made two TV adverts featuring Steve Strange, using Night Train and Whispers, both later released as singles in Japan only.
Interesting feature is also the colour picture insert of the band photographed in the gardens of Munichs Schloss Nymphenburg with Japanese text biography and lyrics printed on the reverse of the vinyl.

Worth a listen also the B Side, the underrated The Horsemen, a magnificient track, one of the best from Visage.

Cybotron - Clear - 31-Aug-08 01:23 AM
The only old-school electro LP with any amount of staying power (thanks in part to its release on Fantasy), this CD release of the Cybotron album -- previously known as Enter -- includes crucial, early singles like "Alleys of Your Mind," "Cosmic Cars," and technos first defining moment, "Clear." The collision of Atkins vision for cosmic funk and the arena rock instincts of Rick Davis result in a surprisingly cohesive album, dated for all the right reasons and quite pop-minded. Ecological and political statements even crop up with the final tracks, "Cosmic Raindance" and "El Salvador."

Jon Hopkins - Opalescent - 01-Sep-07 03:38 AM
This is a masterpiece.
There are tracks on here that will make the hairs on your back stand up as its quite haunting in parts like Elegiac which opens the album and the stunning Inner Peace...but my favourite track is Cold Out There.
Pure emotions, pure genius.

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