Berrycakeness

Today I indulged. Gaming, YouTube & Spotify. All whilst in a horizontal position.

Oh, if you hadn’t noticed…I finally decided to buy the domain berrycakeness.com. Go me!

Back to business. Tonight, I thought that perhaps I should utilise my awake state to write my first album review.

I’m no NME, Rolling Stone or even Smash Hits magazine circa 2002, however what I can bring to the table is lighthearted nonsense, and albums that you may have forgotten.

Choosing the first album was difficult – My listening routine is generally 2hrs a day, plus some thrown during times of need in the working hours. Therefore, I tend to opt for playlists that I know rather than listen to something interesting which will distract me.To listen to an album properly, I need to play it out loud before I can truly understand it’s direction and purpose on this planet.

That said, I don’t have a sound system as such, nor do I have a collection of vinyl/CD’s. Everything is played on Spotify through my phone or TV. I don’t even have a decent pair of headphones.

See, I can’t even write about one of my deepest passions without being negative.

Here goes.

Wham! – Fantastic

I chose this album to be the first I wrote about mainly because when I first heard it, I couldn’t quite believe it took 26 years to do so. George Michael and Andrew Ridgeley were not huge names in our household growing up, but not unappreciated. However, when I then played songs from the album my mother knew most if not all of the lyrics. She was a teen in the 80’s, so I guess I shouldn’t have been surprised.

The first track opens with the funkiest “Woo woo” I have ever heard. It’s promising a good time. I was not disappointed – Love Machine has the DUTTIEST vocals. Upsetting your parents and sex is the motto of this album, but really it is an example of good music in the early 80’s. Why do I say that? Despite it’s heavy use of synth, the songs are well written, catchy (albeit repetitive) and include a horn. Yes, I am a huge fan of brass instruments in pop music, and I will hunt them down. Also noteworthy is that the Wham! boys wrote most of their own songs, not unheard of at the time but in the world of pop, quite the rarity.

At the time, 5 singles were released from this album of 8 tracks before it hit the stores. One of those was Club Tropicana, which I personally couldn’t imagine fitting in on any album that wasn’t entitled “Cheesefest” but sits well between the craziness that is “Wham! Rap” and the downbeat of “Nothing Looks the Same in the Light”. If anything, the aforementioned track stands out on this album as a breather between downing a cocktail and then another one. If you’re in an 80’s mood, and wish to dance around like a fool to something in the pop category, this album will provide your fix.

My favourite song on this album is, and always will be, “Young Guns (Go for it!)”. Not only is the bridge is beautiful, the dialogue couldn’t be more 80’s and the opening few bars are a synth delight. The cherry on top? It ends with a honkytonk piano treat, which makes zero sense overall but it does make me chuckle. I’ve featured it below – so do listen.

What would I rate this album? I am a firm believer of not rating albums because there isn’t enough time in the day to care enough. However, it does feature in my saved albums on my phone (Spotify allows only 9999 songs to be saved per device) so that space is sacred. That may indicate how much I enjoy the album. I tend to listen to Fantastic when my mood is in the category of “almost miserable”.

Peace out xoxo