ROCK.A.RAMA

ROCK.A.RAMA

BOB TayloR

This month's Rock-a-ramas were written bp Richard Riegel, Michael Dauis, Ed Ward and The Mad Peck.

DR. FEELGOOD—Sneakin' Suspicion (Columbia)::Blues, blues, and more blues. Great stuff for us senile rock critics who were weaned on the Animals and Nashville Teens, this album has more echoes of The Rolling Stones Now! than dagger's old lady has jewels. But is it relevant? Just ask Peter Wolf .'bout the ol' J. Geils conundrum. Seems as though the existential droppings of punk (q.v.) are the rill blooze for today's teen agents. Sorry, lads. Maybe you can hire some "chick singers" or whatever and metamorphose into contemporary stars via the patented Fleetwood (Cli) Mack Blues Band route. I'll give you an "A" for "able blokes after the fact" in the meantime. R.R.

REX—Where Do We Go From Here? (Columbia):: All right, here's a little competition for Starz and Piper in the metallic pretty-boy sweepstakes. Not only that, but lead voker Rex Smith had the foresight to name his band of cryptostudz after himself right off the bat. Paves the way for future solo breakouts plus prevents the kind of charisma-undercutting Steve Tyler's experiencing right now, what with a certain rock journal promoting "sexy Joe Perry" as the Mr. Aerosmith. Speaking of which, Rex's "7 Come 11" handily echoes the classy chugrock popularized by their labelmate elders. R.R.

EMPEROR (Private Stock)::Aspirations to American art-rock on the level of, say, Styx, but

RUBY STARR—Smokey Places (Capitol):: Ruby prob'ly thinks her discovery by the Black Oak bunch was the biggest break in her li'l ol' life but after three albums, I'm beginning to wonder. This little lady has a voice that can raise the hair on the back of your neck (as well as, um, induce other physiological changes), but too many mediocre songs and too few arrangements that set her up to wail lessen her impact considerably. This album's better than her last but has only one real standout: "Don't Kill My Love," as tough a piece of rock 'n' roll as you're likely to find. If she'd only exposed her vocal power all over Smokey Places, she wouldn't have had to expose her nips to try to sell it (not that I'm actually complaining, y' understand).

M.D.

STUFF—More Stuff (Warner'BrotheTs)::In which the finest instrumental studio group in the country demonstrates why they're the finest instrumental studio group in the country by attempting vocals. Oh well, there's always the first album. Remember what happened to the Meters, boys... E.W.

JAY BOY ADAMS (Atlantic)::I was wondering how long it would take Bill "Z.Z." Ham to manufacture a synthetic outlaw country singer/ songwriter and here he' is. It's hard to tell if the disc or the performances contain more plastic.

E.W.

CHRIS HILLMAN—Clear Sailin' (Asylum):: Yet another chapter in the So You Used To Be A Byrd story. Harmlessly opaque songwriting (some in collaboration with the editor of a Rival Rock Mag!) best summed up by the lead-off number, "Nothing Gets Through." You're telling me... E.W.

TERENCE BOYLAN (Asylum)::So your brother is a famous producer and you show the good taste to put a Robert Motherwell painting on the cover of your album. This means you have something to say? E.W.

CHARLIE BURTON AND ROCK THERAPY—"Rock'And Roll Behavior" b/w"That ''Boy And My Girl" (Wild)::Rockabilly meets the Ramones in Lincoln, Nebraska, and this demented bunch crunches out some A+ rock V roll. Charlie's tormented vocals are the star feature here, but the whole band is tighter than hell. They want to play CBGB's, and if they do, boy, is New York ever, in for a surprise! $1.50 fO. Box 80222, Lincoln, E.W.

TONES—Schoolboy )::You know that big always singing about? s the one, 45 rpm, too. discussed but seldom es," cited as the world's of an authority than Oui o the accepted legend, ed to get out of a 16-song blisher. So Mick fell by this number. Then he ^ other 15?" Musically, it hough, is vintage studio irst album to the tune of " "Andrew Blues" is a manager Andrew Loog lectors take note: you He wuz there. T.M.P.