MADONNA Like A Virgin (Sire)

Joe (Like A Psychotic) Fernbacher

I lounge casually in a splintered doorway, adjust my leather mask, snap nodding fingers to some long-forgotten rhythm and fade, ever so gently, into rapidly shifting shadows, a luncher of lunacy, feigning all but the easiest of disinterests. Disinfected to all emotion, I let my mind willingly absorb the soundtrack that’s been pumping through my Walkman. Just as I slip completely into my bi-weekly pokey sensual self-Saturnalia, I realize that what I am hearing is either a very young and unfunked Diana Ross or...MADONNA!!

As consciousness begins to move into another realm (as it usually does in my reviews), fragmented images of marching legions of teen and pre-teen girls giggling saucily as they mouth, like some new language, the words to “Like A Virgin”—that sideglancing, tongue-in-orifice anthem to ’80s “innocence”—dissolve into a furiously psycho-sexual montage that included fleeting glimpses of gigantic, albeit shapely legs encased in a black fishnet stocking (with the obligatory line running up the back) stomping through Jerry Falwell’s living room, a disembodied omphalos being licked luridly by a monstrous silvergloved tongue, and a whole bunch of other sexually metaphorical etceteras too grisly and too pornographic to mention.

After another dimensional leap, I find myself seated at a table in a busy restaurant looking at everything and everyone as if though a light film of Vaseline. I am engaged in an amazing, sultry conversation with...MADONNA!. ME: “You say the word ‘Yeah’ better than anyone I’ve ever heard.” MADONNA: “Yeah.”

ME: "Ouch. That word ‘Yeah’ reminds me of Mick Jagger’s ‘Alright’ ’s. You know, how it kind of summed up a lot of contradictory filth-attitudinizing in rock back when...”

MADONNA: "Yeah. Is that good?” ME: “Are you related to JohnBoy?”

MADONNA: “Yeah. Who’s that?” ME: “You’d better stop with those ‘Yeahs’ or I’m gonna end up in jail tonight. By the way, what’s your favorite color?”

MADONNA: “Rawww Sienna. Yeah.”

ME: “So, I gotta tell ya. I like your record. I like your record almost as much as I like your navel. But I didn’t like one song.”

MADONNA: “Yeah. What song?” ME: “ ‘Material Girl.' I found it vile and offensive; it seemed to undermine the whole emotion of the rest of the record.”

MADONNA: “Yeah?”

(MADONNA gets up and pours a tureen full of tepid oyster stew all over her body.)

The scene splinters again. Shaking my head, I find myself back in that old doorway, which has miraculously turned itself into a telephone booth. I am screaming into the receiver. “The record really ain’t all that bad. The amazing thing is that all the strongest tunes—‘Angel,’ ‘Over And Over,’ and my favorite ‘Pretender’—are credited as having been written by her...MADONNA!! And boy, ‘Love Don’t Live Here Anymore,’ besides being a mini-masterpiece, could arouse a corpse. I’m really surprised because I went into this review thinking only to ridicule and snigger. But now the record has become a daily compulsion and that ain’t happened in a while. Even the touch of pressing the promo copies in white vinyl was inspired. And now I hear she’s making a movie with Rosanna Arquette. The mind boggles. But, like they say, the men don’t know but the little girls really do understand. Still and all...”

“This is the operator. Please deposit another quarter for the next five minutes. Otherwise, your call will be terminated...please deposit..."

Click.

Buzz.

BIO COUNTRY Steeltown (Mercury/PolyGram)

Sometimes Good Intentions aren’t enough. In rock ’n’ roll, the importance of being earnest must take a back seat to that of being entertaining. Which brings us to those well-meaning Scots Big Country, who come from the rolling hills of the Northlands with guitars slung over their shoulders and Steve Lillywhite’s bigbamboom production to fight the injustices of the world. Like fellow neo-classicists (yeah, I’m dredging up those same old crit comparisons again) U2 and the Alarm, Big Country comes at you pumped with Sound and Fury—and a lyric sheet named Obscurity.

Of course, no one seemed to mind that the band’s debut hit single, “In A Big Country” didn’t make much sense, as long as Bruce Watson’s ringing bagpipe guitars and Mark Brzezicki’s walloping drums punctuated leader Stuart Watson’s yearnings to get back to the homeland he never left. The trouble with creating such a perfectly realized set-piece your first time out is it leaves you no room to maneuver or grow, precisely the position these oh-so-idealistic lads find themselves in on the follow-up effort, Steeltown.

There are no anthems on the order of “In A Big Country” on Steeltown, but, given the time and effort, the hooks still kick in through the sensory overload. “Flame Of The West” and “East Of Eden” find BC caught between the two poles of world politics, all honest thrash and confusion, with little in the way of elucidation. The title track as a Springsteenian working class lament reminiscent of “Chance” on The Crossing, while the first single, “Where The Rose Is Sown,” is a Mott The Hoople-styled anthem which features Adamson in a call-andresponse with his overdubbed self. On “Come Back To Me,” Stuart poses as a pregnant wife waiting for her soldier to come home, a concept so unbelievably precious that it almost works.

Big Country’s patented metallics is so sludged up, tho’, Bruce Watson’s guitar virtually disappears in the mix, except for the Tom Verlaine whimsy of “Girl With Grey Eyes” or the Television fade-out rave-up of Just A Shadow.” There’s nothing wrong with Steeletown that a sympathetic AOR hack like, say, Jimmy lovine, couldn’t have saved, but that still leaves us with Big Country’s strange military fascination. These guys sing with such passion about the horrors and misery of war, you get the impression they’re sorry they missed out on the excitement. The band’s so ardent about tall ships, combat zones, flames and blood, they achieve the opposite effect of what was probably intended. Instead of convincing us of a commitment to the pastoral life of their beloved Scotland, they rouse our emotions only to leave us in a post-industrial wasteland. Which wouldn’t have been that bad if we weren’t stranded up to our ankles in the slop of psychedelic Steve’s mudslide production. In the future, this big country needs to be tended by a more sympathetic hand.

Roy Trakin

JOAN JETT Glorious Results Of A Misspent Youth (Blackheart/MCA)

PSG “Black Hole” Theory points to the current rise of selfstyled, semi-sinister femmes of pop to the abrupt, maybe mysterious, departure from the scene of Patti Smith; that the resulting vacuum (there is one, they claim) enables those briefly tangent in disposition, demeanor and delivery to fill the “void” heretofore unrealized. Exponents in this school of thought postulate examples from the likes of Cyndi Lauper all the way to L.A.’s very own Betsy Bitch. And Joan Jett: she sounds like Patti, and her coy, maverick stamp of tuff-ness at times resembles the sticky side of Patti’s poltergeist. And, oh yeah, she loves rock ’n’ roll.

Half the tunes on this new Jett album pick up on the abovedescribed "Bad Reputation” strata of sound, others follow through at the “Fake Friends” end of the spectrum: adolescent-type gurlyearnings exposing (we presume) Joanie’s softer core. This sounds cynical, but there’s a couple of numbers waxing more personal, vulnerable-like cries of frustration and so forth (“I Love You Love Me Love,” “Hold Me”) that (for this reason) are more than awright.

If there’s a grim reality to the Joan Jett story it’s that the story itself began with the dreaded Runaways—one of the worst ideas matriculating to the ranks of rec’dcorporate Amerika ever ever ever. Despite this, Jett’s integrity remains intact; her crunching power and not-phony rhythm-axe assault became the calling card prototyped into the psyches of every second generation imitation soon to follow. Moral of this paragraph: Talent survives, and it’s this legacy of survival and enduring ability that jumps from the grooves.

We dispense with the tense (past) long enough to scrape side one’s opening opus. It’s the “Cherry Bomb” scene revisited and we dig it to the max ‘cause it’s way better than the orig (R-ways) incarnation if only for grizzly-bear snarls and growls—vocal leads this playfully seething something makes life worth living; other times her low-end delivery just makes the comic-book words (“Hello world, I’m your wild girl...”) suddenly sound not so stupid and almost imperative with message.

Some real bonafide losers to be found—her rendition of “New Orleans” is pretty wimpy and “Push And Stomp” does neither. The former, while we’re at it, loses it completely somewhere between the basic tracks and mix and is laughably tame (I’m guessing that wasn’t an intended payoff). More bad news is the echo layered on the drums and, for that matter, on too much of everything else. Like an unchecked fungus, said echo disease is systemic throughout both sides and the production t’ain’t sympathetic in minimizing the consequent lack of edge and something fuzzy focus—y’know, the fist-clenched kick-ass approach a la emcee-5/lmperial Dogs loses something in the wash with the more rounded delivery of, say, Sweet or even Kiss.

Not one to dwell on imperfections, I would like to point out that Joan’s looking real swell these days, and most of the stuff on this LP’s invigorated with the artist’s super-charged, unabashed enthusiasm and for this reason alone maybe it’s worth the price of admission...I’ll bet she’s a fun date to take to a boxing match.

Gregg Turner

THE KINKS Word Of Mouth (Arista)

Can you believe it? Now into their third decade, the Kinks have made yet another worthy addition to the kollected Kinkworks. Word Of Mouth isn’t just OK, which is what we say every time the equally aged Rolling Stones squeeze out another anemic LP, it’s truly swell! That is, it’s witty, feisty, lovable, and touching—and just what you want from Ray Davies and company.

In fact, Word Of Mouth stands tall as the most powerful Kinks offering in some time, thanks to a series of songs dealing with separation and betrayal. You don’t have to be a connoisseur of showbiz gossip to know that Ray and the Pretenders’ Chrissie Hynde were once an “item” or that said relationship is now over. Whether the heartfelt tone of the LP stems from that experience or not, Ray’s not holding back here. In the frantic “Sold Me Out,” he acts like he’s going to turn over the furniture, bellowing angry accusations while brother Dave discharges blazing guitar chords. At the other end of the spectrum, the hushed “Missing Persons” finds out our hero awaiting the dreaded phone call that will confirm the end of the affair and trigger a massive attack of depression.

The real gems on Word Of Mouth, however, fall somewhere between these two extremes. Both “Good Day” and “Summer’s Gone” bob and weave wistfully, providing Davies the perfect backdrop for his endearing tipsy warbling. With typical Kinksian irony, the former tune doesn’t depict a good day, it only longs for one. When Ray declares that the return of his beloved would make even the dropping of a “small atom bomb” bearable, you’d best believe he’s hurting. For extra pathos, he throws an affectionate nod to the late Diana Dors, a likably minor talent once touted as England’s answer to Marilyn Monroe (and the one-time wife of Family Feud’s Richard Dawson, by the way). “Summer’s Gone” entertains no illusions of hope, intercutting reflections on a ruined romance with a strangely moving flashback to young Ray riding in the car with Mom and Dad. This one tends to bring a tear to the eye, so keep a hankie handy.

Neurotic Dave Davies does his part with two high-strung tracks, “Living On A Thin Line” and “Guilty,” not to mention some of the hottest guitar bursts this side of hell. Then again, you can't ignore signs of age like the novelty tune that fizzles (“Too Hot”) or the fact that Word Of Mouth requires a few listens before it really feels comfortable. And it must be noted with sorrow that slammin' Mick Avory, the original Kinkdrummer, appears on only three cuts, giving way to Bob Henrit elsewhere. Bye, Mick. Between Henrit and bassist Jim Rodford, the Kinks now have half of the original Argent, which is quite enough, thank you.

Regardless, they’re still the good old Kinks on Word Of Mouth, still making music that tempers the bravado of rock ’n’ roll with plenty of wonderfully corny sentimentality. I would close by saying “God save the Kinks,” but it looks like the Big Boy’s already done a fine job.

Jon Young

DAVID JOHANSEN Sweet Revenge (Passport)

Once upon a time punk was gonna get sweet revenge on all the formula pops that’s made the 70s so dismal. David Johansen wasn’t a punk, but his New York Dolls had helped father the scene, and it looked like his solo LPs would earn him a post-glitter spot among the stars. But punk flopped, and the consumer masses didn’t catch up with Johansen until he finally notched a hit with his Animals medley in '82. Musta been great news for the author of gems like “Donna” and “Frenchette” that the public wanted him only for his covers (of songs even the Animals didn’t write).

A couple more years down the pike, and we’re lucky if the average MTV slave can tell David Johansen from Eric Burdon in a police lineup. Sweet revenge ain’t half as sweet as it is vengeful, but Johansen, cool metroprole that he is, doesn’t wanna give in to hardcore nastiness just yet. His new Sweet Revenge is all about standing on the edge of maybe getting it on, here in the post-modern, bleak-assed 1980s.

“Heard The News” is the lead single both on the album and on your vid screen, so you already know that it’s an urban guerilla Latino blooze nooze anthem every bit as stimulating (and as confused) as the Stones’ “Undercover Of The Night.” What’s David mean here? Dunno exactly, but like the rest of us this year, he hadda say it.

I can clue into the private destinies of “I Ain’t Workin’ Anymore” a bit easier. It’s a technicolor fantasy about giving up the struggle & dropping out, quaintly enough: "We could go to Norway and live like Vikings there/We’d be like Hagar and Helga we wouldn’t have a care.” Johansen was scheduled to earn his ancestral Hagar-hood as long ago as the Dolls days, so you can imagine his yearning for those V-8 fjords by now. The bright, lanternjawed sincerity of his vocals tell it all.

No wonder he’s pissed at “The Stinkin’ Rich,” who not only have '& won't share, but inevitably use their dough for boring props like Rolls-Royces, and could never imagine the bohemian sweets of simply becoming a humble Hagar. Johansen snorts out a James Brown-like “Good God!” or two to underline his frustrations. “Where’d they get all that money from?” Meanwhile, he’s stuck inside “Too Many Midnights” trying to acquire the filthy stuff himself, by taking a rock band on the road, among other crazy notions.

Being a former N.Y. Doll doesn’t even guarantee cab fare in the cold hard ’80s, so Johansen spoofs his onetime cult hero status in a couple tunes. “King Of Babylon” is a pseudo rapper that skirts parody racism just as closely as “Stranded In The Jungle” did, while “N.Y. Doll” sure ain’t no glittery gender-transcender no more, just another babe floating over the shattered city. (Synthesizer courtesy of Joe Delia, Johansen’s latest musical partner.)

“Sweet Revenge” is the nominal title tune here, and while it’s a good love song about taking a stand with all that’s left alive, I suspect that “In My Own Time” may be the real theme of the album. “Standing on a sidewalk in my neighborhood/I have seen so many people look so good,” sez David, and you know he knows his stuff. The music’s softer than all the jagged tunes, but just as biting. “I’ve cursed reality in my own time.” Ain’t we all. This album’s the right stuff.

Richard Riegel

TOM ROBINSON Hope And Glory (Geffen)

Like a lot of good-but-not-great pop musicians, Tom Robinson deserves some success more for who he is than for what he does. No mystery, then, as to why he keeps trying on styles and sounds as if they were pieces of clothing, working to assemble a look that will bring out what’s special and hide what is not. On Hope And Glory, Robinson is garbed in the moods and methods of grandmaster pop modern men like Bowie, Peter Gabriel (who sometimes co-writes with Robinson) and the Police. The fact that this sound suits Robinson only soso is not the main thing. The main thing is that the Police and Gabriel and Bowie sell lots of records. Maybe Robinson will sell a few now, too.

Last time he sold any to speak of in the U.S. was in ’78, when his liberal/gay/humanist politics were showcased in a Clash-a-like LP called Power In The Darkness. Everyone but the homophobes couldn’t help but recognize his smarts, warmth, humor and courage; it was one of those relatively rare times in post-’60s pop where a person’s abundant goodness made his music sound better than it probably was. Other pop stars with more heart than talent have made a decent career for themselves, but most of them are good looking and none of them are overtly homosexual. In a world now filled with the likes of Loverboy, homosexuality not presented as a gimmick or a joke can be a serious problem.

The pop modeme sound of Hope And Glory is wrong for Robinson in two crucial ways—there’s too little singing and too much instrumental clutter. Robinson’s voice is as personal and poignant as an embrace; here it’s mixed way back and boomy, and ends up sounding like second-rate Sting. A few of the instruments new to Robinson’s lexicon are well worth star billing next time—the sax, horns and harmonica are the kind of heating implements his songs can use. They can also use power, not the general complications they suffer from here.

As for the songs, Robinson has come a long way, baby. No more knee-jerking for this liberal, no more easy sloganeering and Billy Idol fist in the air. Hope And Glory is all about what grown-ups are supposed to understand, that the horrors (and glory) Out There are just like the horrors (and glory) inside each of use; people screw up, they screw each other, and, if they’re lucky, they learn how to give love and take it, too, in every sense of the word. Tom also gives us his first-ever three hankie ballad (“Old Friend”) and a very funny bit of soft-core naughtiness called “Cabin Boy.” Hey, should people buy this record because it sounds like Bowie or Gabriel, so what? If it’s a matter of replacing the loverboy with the cabin boy, the means justify the ends.

Laura Fissinger

THE DEL-LORDS Frontier Days (EMI America)

Frontier Days is one of the most bracing debut LPs I’ve heard in ages. It is so damn good; pure, unabashed American rock ’n’ roll that refuses to pander id revivalism or nostalgia. The influences of the past are certainly there, but the Del-Lords opt for embracing rather than genuflecting. And it is also one of the most delightfully surprising debut LPs I’ve heard in ages.

I mean, I always knew Scott Kempner’s aesthetics of rock were in order (it was he, after all, who anchored the gone-but-neverforgottten Dictators with his heartbeat rhythm guitar work), but I never knew there was a first-class songwriter lurking within. A lot of these songs are simply smokin'.

“Get Tough,” for instance, is one long war whoop of exultation. ‘Livin’ On Love” sounds like some miraculous revitalization of Neil Young. “Double Life” is one of many that sports those aw-shucks Del-Lords group harmonies (all four of the boys can kick in with fine vocals), topped off by a beautiful Flamin’ Groovies guitar quote (paging Cyril Jordan) and an unbeatable chant involving the word “whoa.”

Side two may end on a low-key note (“Feel Like Going Home,” which Gram Parsons aficionados will enjoy), but what precedes it is high octane all the way. “Burning In The Flame Of Love is straight from AM heaven, “pledge Of Love” is a wonderful tribute to true blue devotion, and “Shame On You” goes up, and away with a touch of Byrdsian splendor.

Almost forgot to bestow kudos on Lou Whitney of the marvelous Morells (he co-produced with the band) for the fresh, crisp, kick of a sound that informs this record. You should also know that the spirit of Creedence is in here, that the Del-Lords recently took the stage in N.Y.C. following a spin of the ‘Tators doing “Slow Death,” and that this is the second time that Top Ten has landed in a band that matters. Way to go, buddy.

Craig Zeller