OVERLOOKED: "WALK THE MOON"

One of my biggest pet peeves is when a band names themselves and doesn't even bother to check to see if that name has already been taken.  In my view, once a band name has been taken, it belongs to that band - end of story!  You could modify it but you can't just use a name that has already been used!  I recently was searching out for an old album, the debut, self-titled album from Walk the Moon released on MCA in 1987.  I was surprised when I saw a flurry of new web pages and information about the band - until I realized that it was all about a NEW band from Ohio or somewhere called Walk the Moon.

Granted, the earlier band Walk the Moon never had a huge hit or made much of a dent in pop culture, but if they reached me as a kid growing up in the middle of nowhere, they were at least a blip on the radar.  Besides, it's not like Walk the Moon is really even that great of a band name - as the original band themselves must have known, because after their one album under that name, they rechristened themselves Eleven and released some really outstanding music, including the fantastic album "Avantgardedog" in 2000.

"Walk the Moon" was an album I picked up from a dollar bin at my local five and dime when I was in junior high.  It looked interesting and for a buck, I figured I'd give it a chance.  It never became one of my favorite albums, but it stuck with me enough that years and years later I dusted it off and decided to look up whatever became of the band, which lead me to discovering Eleven and their great music.  The band was comprised of Alain Johannes, who I was recently able to see play live, and his partner Natasha Shneider.  They are both very accomplished musicians who have long histories in the Los Angeles music scene.  Johannes especially has worked with many notable musicians, from his time in an early lineup of Red Hot Chili Peppers, to playing with Chris Cornell, Queens of the Stone Age and Arctic Monkeys.

This curious 80's album kicks off with what was presumably the lead single, "Daddy's Coming Home," which comes off as a little bit forced.  It seems like they were trying too hard to have a hit, and in 1987 this was not the cutting edge of mainstream rock.  However, it is kind of catchy so you can see what they were trying to accomplish.  The rest of the album is pretty consistent in its sound, with a few more rocking, catchy numbers like "Love is What You Make It," (which sounds vaguely Lita Ford-esque) and "Sugar" being some of the better ones.  Ballads like "On Your Lap" and "Tears in Your Smile" show more depth and passion, but the entire thing comes off slightly hollow, perhaps the result of a new band being pressured by a label to fit into a certain sound.

All in all, the album is mainly notable for me as a bit of nostalgia, because it introduced me to the amazing musicians who went on to grow and create some really great music.  Heck, they even wrote and produced a song for Adam Lambert ("Time for Miracles," a bonus track on Lambert's debut disc and featured on the soundtrack to the film 2012).

Sadly, Natasha passed away in 2008 following a battle with cancer.  Queens of the Stone Age performed a concert in tribute to her in Los Angeles featuring guest musicians including Alain, Jack Black and PJ Harvey.  They donated the proceeds to help defray the medical costs associated with Natasha's illness.

So, let's remember who the real Walk the Moon is and pay tribute to them.

ORIGINAL: COREY HART "BOY IN THE BOX"

This is one of the first records I ever remember buying.  There was this great little music store in the small town near where I grew up and unfortunately, they were going out of business right around the time I started having enough allowance to actually buy music, but on the bright side, they had slashed their prices so my measly pocket money went considerably further.  I remember my mom handed this album to me and said "You like Corey Hart, right?"  Well, I had never really thought much about it before, but I did love his song "Sunglasses at Night," and of course "Never Surrender" had been played to death on the radio but I still kinda liked it, so I bought this album, probably for about $1 or so.

I had this strange habit when I was a kid of amassing music but not listening to it.  I think I might have listened to this record once or twice back in the day.  I probably played "Never Surrender" a few more times, and I distinctly recall the chorus to "Komrade Kiev," but other than that it just didn't really stick with me.

Looking back, I find in general that a lot of Corey Hart's music is very subtle and at the time, when I was a weird kid delighting in obscure early electronica records by The Human League and the Icelandic art-rock of the Sugarcubes, Corey was probably just "too mainstream" for me!  It's funny to realize that now, especially because musically and vocally he's actually very similar to one of my favorite female solo artists of that time - Tiffany.

Lately I've been on a Corey Hart kick, going back and reliving the albums of his that I had before and discovering all the ones I missed, and this album sticks out as being one of the more overlooked ones.  Although I find the A-side of his debut, "First Offense," to be nearly flawless, side A of "Boy in the Box" is pretty damn good as well.  Because the title track was not a big radio hit I never thought too much about it, but now it's been stuck in my head for a week or so and I've been enjoying it.  I actually was prompted to change the way I thought about this song a couple years ago when reading one of my favorite pieces of music bloggery ever, the Bottom Feeders: Ass End of the 80's series from Pop Dose.  Unfortunately, Corey is the butt of many jokes at Bottom Feeders, as the guy who writes it has a serious beef with him.  One of the (many) things about Corey that annoys him is the way he switches the numbers five and six in the lyrics to this song.  But the 80's were all about quirky lyrics and music and "Boy in the Box" has the perfect combination of quirkiness, paranoia, and funny synth music mixed with powerful dance beats and it all wraps up to something I really enjoy.

"Eurasian Eyes" is a great ballad on the album which is similar to other Corey Hart ballads, but a little darker and more unique than "Never Surrender," which of course was Corey's biggest hit ever here in the states event though you hardly ever hear it now.

Side B is actually better than I remember it being but Corey always seemed to do better A sides than B sides.  I do really like "Everything in My Heart" but it's another ballad, and he tends to be a little ballad-heavy.  I would have liked at least one more quirky synth rock number similar to the title track, although "Silent Talking" is pretty close.

All in all, probably the best early-era Corey Hart record, just slightly better than "First Offense."

Rating:  OOOO (Four out of Five O's)

OUT NOW: LANA DEL REY "BORN TO DIE"

Here's our first post of 2012 and it's all about the new phenomenon known as "Lana Del Rey," otherwise known by her real name, Lizzy Grant.  With all the hoopla - and there HAS been a lot of hoopla - it's kind of surprising that her debut album, "Born To Die," is surprisingly solid in a very non-earth-shattering type of way.  Described (by herself, or by someone else who credited it to Lana) as a "gangsta Nancy Sinatra," Del Rey cleverly has packaged herself (or been packaged) as a sort of modern torch singer, mixing in the glamour of 1960's Hamptons with more street-wise, hip-hop elements.  She can definitely make her voice sound all "old fashioned" as demonstrated in a couple of the darker numbers, which happen to be the hits, "Blue Jeans" (our personal favorite here at Aural-O), the internet meme sensation "Video Games," as well as the title track.  The "gangsta" part seems to come from the few tracks that do include Del Rey using more of a rap-style vocal delivery, such as the frenetic "Off To The Races," and the sublimely beautiful (and for some reason, critically reviled) "National Anthem," (which happens to be our second-favorite song.)

If it seems that we are using a lot of parenthesis in this review (and indeed, we are) it may be due to the highly contentious nature of most of the aforementioned "hoopla" surrounding Del Rey and her persona.  If you hadn't ever met Del Rey (I have) or seen her perform live in the flesh, and if you had only paid attention to what you read in the blogs or heard from your hipster friends, you'd think that Del Rey had, as Kristin Wiig stated during her impression of the young singer on a recent episode of Saturday Night Live, "clubbed a baby seal while singing the taliban national anthem" during her US premiere on that very same show several weeks earlier.  The rage was immediate and harsh, ranging from mean tweets from celebrities, to countless "she sucks" comments on various online articles about the singer.  Here are the common claims: that her dad is a millionaire so she bought her success, that she changed her name/look/sound to try to be more successful, that she had her lips surgically enhanced, and that she is inexperienced and unpolished as a live performer.  Why these complaints have been lodged so forcefully, and with such great ire by so many, seems to speak more to the current state of society than anything Del Rey herself did or did not do.  Being a singer has always been akin to being an actor.  The song is your script and it is up to you how you are going to interpret it, how you are going to emote the feelings contained in the lyrics using your voice and body.  Any singer signed to a major label in the history of music has been packaged and marketed by the suits in the corporate office.  A huge amount of successful musicians and other celebrities have changed their names, looks, and styles either before their success or during the course of it, often many times.  Look at Madonna: who would dare to criticize her for changing her looks?  It's always been a part of who she is and what she does.

We could sit here and debate the merits and authenticity of Lana Del Rey all day, as many people apparently are wont to do, but the fact is that as a performer and a singer/songwriter, she has something special that clearly evokes lots of emotions in others - some good, some bad.  The fact that her album just debuted at #2 on the Billboard album charts seems to show that there are plenty of people who dig Del Rey.  Despite what the haters may say, we at Aural-O think she is a bright new star in the music industry and has a great career in front of her.

Oh, and one last thing: to those who argue that she bought her way to the top, please think about this:  How many girls (and guys) who's parents belong to the 1% do you think have done everything in their power to turn their money into fame and success?  If it was that easy, don't you think the radio would be filled with the voices of spoiled rich kids having used daddy's money to hire producers to auto-tune them into oblivion?  In reality, that story is a rarity.  Even "Posh Spice" didn't really come from a rich family.  Most rich kids are too lazy to lug an acoustic guitar around to open mic nights in Brooklyn, so whether it's true that Del Rey's father is an internet impresario is frankly irrelevant.  But, haters gonna hate...

Rating: OOOO (Four out of Five O's)