Workout Wednesday: 148 BPM (Turn It Up High, Captain)

(What is Workout Wednesday?)

A huge, unashamed retro-bash, this one, reeking of hair mousse and shoulder pads. Good for the intervals trainer or a gentle run. Or, you know, dancing.

148 bpm 2: Turn It Up High, Captain
Vertigo – U2
Mickey – Toni Basil
88 Lines About 44 Women – The Nails
China – Red Rockers
UnAlone – Translator
Space Age Love Song – A Flock Of Seagulls
She Sells Sanctuary – The Cult
Hazy Shade Of Winter – The Bangles
That Demon Jive – An Emotional Fish
Mr. Jones – The Psychedelic Furs
Sultans Of Swing – Dire Straits
(cooldown) Dream Brother – Jeff Buckley

Lots of video links this time around. It wouldn’t feel like the Eighties if we couldn’t look at the haircuts, now would it?

“Mickey” was out at about the same time as Josie Cotton’s “Johnny, Are You Queer?” and it took me forever to realize that they’re basically the exact same song, except “Mickey” is miles dirtier.

God, I love “China”—all the interlocking guitar and bass riffs, and that huge chorus. Years ago, I worked out a solo acoustic arrangement that I still bust out from time to time. Red Rockers never really got their shot. Maybe their politics made people uncomfortable; they wanted to be the American Clash, and the leap-and-bounds musical progress they made from their first rote-hardcore record to the spaghetti-western pop glory of Good As Gold makes me think they had it in them. Jim Riley, the drummer, made his bones in Stiff Little Fingers; he and Rockers bassist Darren Hill eventually went East and ended up the rhythm section for Boston also-rans the Raindogs—another band that didn’t get a fair hearing.

When people remember Translator—if they remember them at all—it’s for “Everywhere That I’m Not,” rather than for this power-pop gem, though “UnAlone” is, to my ear, a far better song, and the one that I remember getting radio play back in the day. Eh. Whaddayagonnado?.

I’m inordinately pleased with the transitions in the first half of this mix, by the way.

Flock of Seagulls: GAH! THE HAIRCUT!
The Cult: Captain Jack Sparrow sings!
Both: Man, that’s a lot of smoke.

Not very coherent today. Shut up and dance, I guess.

[ MP3 expired - so sorry ]