From the Archives: INXS · Mar 26, 07:07 PM by Don
My Timedoor partner, Chaka, recently emailed me asking me if I had certain new wave and pop hits of the ’80’s. When I asked him to elaborate, he wrote:
I’m enjoying the new PS2 port of the PSP game Grand Theft Auto: Vice City Stories. The GTA games always have killer soundtracks, and this one is no exception (Wikipedia article on the soundtrack). I’m really digging INXS’ ‘The One Thing’, and I remembered you were the first person I knew to be into those early INXS records. That’s really the only track I want unless you remember any other keepers from that album.
I did, in fact, enjoy early INXS in junior high and high school. Like most teens in the early to mid ’80’s, I learned of new music via MTV. “The One Thing” video was my introduction to INXS. I immediately bought Shabooh Shoobah and later The Swing. My favorite INXS album is Listen Like Thieves. Once Kick came out in 1987, I lost interest. It wasn’t as painful as watching R.E.M. become popular with the jocks and other trend-hoppers at my high school ; nonetheless, Kick‘s success dampened my enthusiasm for the band.
Chaka’s original email asked if I had the band’s 1982 album, Shabooh Shoobah. I now share three songs from the album. “The One Thing,” as stated before, was my introduction to the band. The song is one big flirtatious come-on, a perfect vehicle for libidinous singer Michael Hutchence. “Spy of Love” is a playful bit of faux-funk pop. “Don’t Change” is an uplifting anthem, fueled by that impossible optimism only someone too young to have experienced defeat can express.
mp3: INXS – The One Thing
mp3: INXS – Spy of Love
mp3: INXS – Don’t Change
As INXS’s fame grew, frontman Hutchence became more and more the focus. Beginning with the cover of 1987’s Kick, Hutchence was front and not-quite-center. On the follow-up, X, he was front and truly center. For the 1991 live album, Live Baby Live, he was the only person on the cover. After the rise of Nirvana and similar fare, INXS took a sales hit. Subsequent album covers never did feature Hutchence the way they did at the band’s commercial peak. Maybe the band was taking a cue from Nirvana and Pearl Jam and other bands experiencing success at that time, who pushed against the frontman-and-band hierarchy.
Finally, let me (belatedly) say what a travesty it was that INXS would subject themselves, the band’s fans, and Michael Hutchence’s family to that corpse-fuck of a show, Rock Star.
Timedoor Policy Memo: All songs posted by Enik during a given month will be purged during the first week of the third month. For example, all January songs will be taken down early in March, all February songs will be taken down early in April, and so on. Enjoy!
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Listening Post: Don't feel like lying Listening Post: The taste just slips away
I discovered INXS through a friend who lived in a nearby city that got MTV. Shabooh Shoobah and the Swing were eye-opening albums for me at the time. Somewhere in my boxes of cassettes is a still-sealed way OOP Decadance EP with the remixes of “Black and White”, “To Look At You”, “The One Thing”, and “Here Comes II” from 1983. I’ve always been tempted to drag out the cassette deck and rip it. You’d think that they could have appended these to a “remaster” of The Swing or something.
Thanks for the tracks! I’ll be wathing this site with my RSS reader.
Mike Roeder
It’s Time To Play B-Sides
http://www.playbsides.com
— Mike Roeder Apr 6, 01:31 PM #