A month ago, the Random iTunes Fairy served up Elliott Smith songs on back-to-back weekends. Now she’s back with another one, the 11th from his catalog to appear on Random Weekends.
The RIF must really like Elliott Smith. He is outperforming the percentages considerably. The law of averages would predict about half as many Smith posts as we’ve gotten.
I slotted Pink Floyd’s The Final Cut in the #11 spot on my list of the best albums of 1983 because it has been so far off my radar for so long that I couldn’t justify it cracking the top ten.
If I’d made this list in 1990, this album might have occupied the top spot. That’s in part because I hadn’t yet discovered many of the albums to come on this list. But it’s mostly because Pink Floyd meant the world to me when I was in high school.
My 12th favorite 1983 album is one I definitely listened to at the time. Huey Lewis and the News were a big hit in my house, and I vividly remember listening to my older sister’s vinyl copy of the album Sports.
This baby has one hell of a tracklist. It could be mistaken for a greatest hits collection, boasting songs such as ‘The Heart of Rock and Roll,’ ‘Heart and Soul,’ ‘I Want a New Drug,’ ‘Walking On a Thin Line’ and today’s SOTD, ‘If This Is It,’ a favorite of mine.
Journey’s Frontiers claims the 13th spot on my list of 1983 albums. Like all of the albums toward the bottom of this list, Frontiers earns its spot on the strength of a few songs.
In this case, those songs are ‘Separate Ways (Worlds Apart),’ ‘Send Her My Love’ and especially the lovely road song ‘Faithfully.’ Solid tracks such as ‘Chain Reaction’ and ‘After the Fall’ flesh out the album nicely. Power ballads performed in Steve Perry’s terrific voice — that’s always a winning formula.
Violent Femmes’ self-titled debut is my #14 album of 1983, and a good example of the kind of album for which I have a lot of affection even though I never play it.
I discovered this album, and band, in college almost a decade after they first became popular. The alternative music scene at that point was leaning toward grunge, but the folk-punk aesthetic of this record still felt just right.
Meet Me In Montauk 