Consumer Guide Album

Richard Lloyd: Field of Fire [Mistiur, 1985]
In crucial ways he predates punk, and formally this is more Warren Zevon or Tom Petty than Tom Verlaine. What makes it go isn't songwriting--please, kids, never ever rhyme "fire" and "funeral pyre." It's Lloyd's concentration, plus of course his guitar, which I'll take over Mike Campbell's or even Waddy Wachtel's nine tries out of ten. B+