Just leafing through the NME from June 1978 in the garden, cool beer, warm sun and golden review of ATFTT:

'A beaming beacon in the murk of rock and roll

No two ways about - the boy's good

A marked development on the auspicious debut album

Like Clockwork is a well-constructed powerful pop song, the dense layers of musical and vocal effects meshing in a frenetic Sparks-like maelstrom of sound

Eva Braun is perfect, an extraordinary song with a nostalgic beer-hausen piano piece, military drumming and wistful whistling and an anonymous lady murmurs 'gee' at the end and you can't help but agree

Rat Trap is epic, an urban nightmare of a number that rivals 'Joey' for sheer weight and substance

At the death, the Rats still rule and whether you call it pop, rock or modern music, it's got bloody big balls'

The grey cloud on this fantastically sunny day is, they think, Living in an island. 'A half-assed reggae / rock number, too clever and not clever enough. 10cc without the puns'.

Give me clever any day of the week, Chalkie Davies. It could happen to you. No it won't, happen to you.

Mark L wrote:

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ronthecabbie wrote:

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I have a plethora of reviews from all the mags nme etc and the rats always had positive reviews

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Far from it, especially after Tonic. Granted the first two albums were generally very well received but the vitriol became quite marked after 1980 as the band experimented more and Geldof's celebrity grew. This was a review from Smash Hits from 1979 for Surfacing:

'Here we go again. Look, this exceedingly tiresome record 'borrows' so heavily from Bowie and Springsteen that you might as well buy 'Hunky Dory and 'Darkness on the Edge of Town' and have two genuine articles rather than none. Much frantic activity - signifying absolutely nothing - the most overrated band of the century. Awful cover as well. Best tracks 'Keep it up' and 'Nothing happened today' 3 out of 10'.

It is great to have them back albeit with just 4 original members and the reviews second time around have again been generally positive. But on these islands, we love nothing better than building people up only to knock them down later on.

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 Whatever about Bowie I don't get the Springsteen comparison(Re Surfacing) Not even the usual Pavlovs dog response of the music critics when they hear a piece of sax, and think nobody but Bruce Springsteen can write about life in an urban environment. Doubt Springsteen could have written Someones Looking At You.

Just my theory, but I suspect and have no proof, that the sax bit on Rat Trap was more likely to have been dreamt up by Mutt Lange than Bob Geldof. Rat Trap and Born To Run may have some thematic links, but most of the criticism I come across is from clueless Americans who judge a song just because it has a vague hint of a more well known (Born To Run?) song. Maybe if there was no sax on Rat Trap people would no be so quick to make lazy comparisons.

Of course most of these Springsteenites probably never heard of Dr feelgood, who the Rats were always willing to thank for inspiration. Anyway Smash Hits was for people too lazy or incompetent to read the NME (not that that is a complement to the NME). NME critic once called XTC's classic album Skylarking 'about as relevant as Cardinal Wolsey' (lol)

If you ask most music fans are they swayed by critics, most probably would say 'no'. 

-- Edited by noelindublin on Monday 15th of July 2013 01:25:34 PM

Mark L wrote:

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the most overrated band of the century. Awful cover as well.

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Overrated?  I don't think that accusation could ever stick.

But to be fair, It was an awful album cover.  I never liked the album title either.  Surfacing just calls to mind laying down tarmac.  And as for The Fine Art.... Still I suppose it wasn't as bad as Zenyatta Mondatta.  That was total cr@p.

ArrGee wrote:

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Mark L wrote:

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the most overrated band of the century. Awful cover as well.

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Overrated?  I don't think that accusation could ever stick.

But to be fair, It was an awful album cover.  I never liked the album title either.  Surfacing just calls to mind laying down tarmac.  And as for The Fine Art.... Still I suppose it wasn't as bad as Zenyatta Mondatta.  That was total cr@p.

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 I like the title, and I like Geldof's analogy of being like a drowning man, just getting to the surface in time to prevent death-' but I keep coming up, with time enough to breath....' Radiohead called their album The Bends , so diving/drowning metaphors are  pretty ok by me.

Slipknot had a song/album called Surfacing. 

Surfacing and Tonic are usually neck and neck with me, with Surfacing edging it every now and again. I think Surfacing was a confident, stick your jaw out, look at us album and I am delighted My Picture has made it on to the new Greatest Hits cd. If ever there were a more astonishing mid-guitar break in a pop song from the late 70s/early 80s, I have yet to hear it. Live versions I have heard of this song are amazing.

By contrast, I thought Nothing Happened Today was quite an average track, saved only by the Harry Hooper segment, although I had mates at the time who thought it trivialised the song and made it 'naff' - a very 1980's word!

Keep it Up is another brilliant song. Or 'ace' as we used to say in 1980.....!

I generally prefer Mondo Bongo to Grass, chiefly because Go Man Go, Banana Republic and Graveyard are exceptional tracks and I don't think anything on Grass touches them, although Drag Me Down and Dave come close. I prefer Grass to V Deep on balance though. Only V Deep contains really poor tracks (Charmed Lives, the Little Death etc) yet it astonishes in places too, such as He Watches it all, House on Fire and Million Years. Since the thread was review-orientated, Record Mirror described V Deep as 'mediocre with flashes of Geldof genius' - this is it's problem - it's an inconsistent record that veers all over the place - experimentation gone wild - whereas Grass was a much better effort with a distinctive, consistent sound and which ought to have done a lot better.