ROCK 'N'RAMA

ROCK 'N'RAMA

DAVID THOMAS & THE PEDESTRIANS —The Sound Of The Sand (Rough Trade):: Who else would follow up The Art Of Walking with a solo album recorded with a pickup band called the Pedestrians but head Pere Ubuan David Thomas? True, there are Ubumen past and present here but most of the tracks are played by a diverse bunch including exmembers of Young Marble Giants, Boney M and Fairport Convention—youve never heard Richard Thompson play like this before. Unlikely? Sure. Also fresh, joyful and totally successful in its own weird way. Uh, I had a good time. M.D.

GLEAMING SPIRES-Songs of the Spires (PoshBoy):: These guys are endorsed by the Bros. Mael (& even play in Sparks when theyre not cutting their own discs), which may or may not quicken your pulse in appreciating this record. Myself, I like Gleaming Spires David Kendrick and Leslie Bohem for their expression of more nakedly emotional turbulence (verbal & musical) than 1 usually associate with these .rapid-synthesizers-go-bonk efforts. The recurrent theme is intellectuals breaking out of their shells, into the truly threatening world beyond, and boy do these cruel shoes fit! N.B.: Pitiful to worship a life that you havent led." (Rock criticism unmasked.) R.R.

GIRLS AT OUR BEST!—Pleasure (Happy Birthday Import):: This is sneaky, insidious stuff. First impressions were not encouraging: another British pop band tossing hooks right, left, and center, with the dippiest-sounding femme vocalist Ive heard recently. But then lines like, Buy me, buy me with your salary," or Will you get to heaven with advance publicity?" begin to sink in and you begin to notice the hooks tearing off bits of flesh and hair. I mean, can you resist an album that begins, Can you fit me into all this lunacy?" I cant. M.D.

SHEILA—A Little Dartin (Carrere):: A big blonde Eurofemme with an unplaceable accent (something charming in a Nordic, perhaps?), doing countryrock-cliched lyrics to slick postdisco dancersizes played by way-too-familiar L.A.-studio subhumans? A totally idiotic concept, of course, but in practice rather pleasant as such throwaway muzik goes. Have I already heard the title cut on the radio? (Yeh, its safe enough.) Does Abba know about this? (Ja.) Could it be Sheilas white boots? (Naughty, naughty.) R.R.

SPACE CADETS (Vanguard):: Yet more George Clintonian boat-people (Muthaship refugees), real hotfoots for the freedom to practice they own funk. You may recall keyboard whiz Bernie Worrell as he sashays among the alternate zany funkers and mellow funkers on here, though guitarist Nairobi Sailcat is surely a name to be reckoned with in the coming funk wars. Acute liquid bump stuff, probably as profound as the latest synthesizer fetishists from England. You can already visualize the cover art on this, the fact that its plastered all over product from a certain old stuffy/folky label (Recordings For The Connoisseur") is almost worth the price of admission alone. R.R.

MARTIN BRILEY-A Fear Of The Unknown(Mercury):: Briley used to be in Greenslade, but that doesnt help much in placing him, does it? Okay, so hes British, naturally, & has a voice sorta like Phil Collinss (post-testosterone therapy), and he writes relatively clever rock ballads. Which tell us that Brileys not as cynical as he thinks he is, for sure hes still on the make out there in Singles Land (which may add up to cynicism for some blokes). Snatches of rather nice imagery scattered around his songs (And the world was your bidet"), while his I Feel Like a Milkshake" is the best cop of the Jags gently-symbolist sound since they were copping Elvis Costello awhile back. R.R.

AGENT ORANGE—Living In Darkness (PoshBoy):: Are like if the Jam had grown up in Southern California, & were just as morally intense & earnest about that sunny homeland, as they already are about rainy old England. Take it: Agent Orange are a nervous surf clatter & possibility-of-love band, its still pre-assassination times (no Dead Kennedys aboard), the young Agent Orange are still doing Rubber Soul as surf musique concrete or some such thing. Appropriatetothisstance modifiedbuzzsaw guitar zazz, sounds fine. Why cant popsters like these be the bright basics of our radio days? Tell me about it. Kal. R.R.

LAURIE ANDERSONO Superman"/ Walk The Dog" (Warner Bros. EP):: Ms. Anderson was an established veteran on the hotsy-totsy avantgarde multimedia performance scene, long before she decided to tackle Presleys domain by cutting this vanity disc to her own Mama Art. Unfortunately, cutesycutesy pretentiousness is never further than a Vocoder burp away, thruout these heavilyencoded, electronic-pillow novelty numbers. Walk The Dog," with its omniscient canine narrator, wags my tail better than the A-side, O Superman," a grating assemblage of found lyrics EVEN DEVO would draw the line at merchandising. Dont they teach em anything in these are schools anymore?!? Why, in my day, Mick & Keith... R.R.

THE DEAD BOYS-Night Of The Living Dead Boys (Bomp):: This live documentation of the late (but forever undead) Dead Boys is such a terminal rouser that I kinda hoped one of our other CREEM maroons would step forward to write it up, cause youve taken my word for these guys way too often already. But since a stampede hasnt exactly developed, lemme tell ya one more time: The Dead Boys were the hippest bumpkins of punkrock ever. Loud, fast, vulgar, etc., etc., sorta Van Halen w/o the excess hair & incipient beyootiful peopleness, Valerie B. wouldnt marry no Dead Boy on a bet! From O-Hl-O, naturellement. R.R.