50 albums: 1980 - Crazy Rhythms by The Feelies

2014-02-03
Categories: 50 albums a head full of wishes music

50 albums: 1980 - Crazy Rhythms by The Feelies

How much!?
I was late to The Feelies, of course I'd seen them in Something Wild in 1986, but that was just a bunch of folk in a film playing "Fame" (or it was to my ignorant and untrained eyes and ears) - sometime in the later 80s (or very early 90s) I bought Crazy Rhthyms, I'm not sure why, but wouldn't be surprised if it was because Dean Wareham name-checked them in an interview... but still I didn't go any further than that.

Then Luna happened, and the (British inky) media was full of this "indie supergroup" thing and I'd seen and loved (obviously) Galaxie 500, and seen and loved The Chills, and then there was Stanley, of The Feelies, and all I had was Crazy Rhythms... and Stanley didn't even play on that. This needed fixing, and I fixed it as best I could over the next few years. I'm still fixing it by mopping up all the fabulous music that washes around in The Feelies wake.

Because of my lateness and carelessness, I've never seen The Feelies live, and it seems unlikely I ever will, neither me nor them seem keen to visit each others continent so those insanely long shows with endless encores will have to be something I live through the words, and videos and audios of others. Luckily the internet has done a fine job of facilitating my vicarious living.

I love The Feelies so much now, I find it astonishing (and shameful) that I let them slip by for so long.

And here's the song I probably love most of all - first in 1987

and then... 26 years later and still effing awesome!

Here they are in Something Wild - playing Crazy Rhythms and then that cover of Bowie's Fame

Oh, you won't believe how hard it was not to do a metal album for 1980 - in 1980 my entirety was tied up in British metal and as I went through the list of albums released in 1980 I so wanted to pick one of those albums I loved back then... but then so many posts in this series have (or will have) the shadow of my metal years over it.

50 films and 50 albums