Consumer Guide '80s: G

Peter Gabriel: Peter Gabriel (Mercury, 1980) After hitting a sophomore jinx with Peter Gabriel, on Atlantic, the first man of Genesis fulfills the promise of Peter Gabriel, on Atco--with pessimistic postprog art-rock minidrama rather than DIY DOR. "Games Without Frontiers," a different kind of internationalism, and "Biko," a different kind of Africanism, lead and finish side two rather than side one. Either he doesn't know his own strengths or he underestimates his audience--or both. B-

Peter Gabriel: Security (Geffen, 1982) If Gabriel can't resist orchestrating his rock and roll, better he should lay on third-world rhythms than simulate first-world themes. But self-conscious primitivism hasn't cured his grandiosity--lyrical protestations notwithstanding, the only time those rhythms are around him and inside him, in control and in his soul, is on "Shock the Monkey," which has a good old first-world hook. Only Gabriel probably doesn't want to be cured--bet he admires African music not because it flows like a stream but because it taps the divine, and while he may know in his head that animists can't have one without the other, he's not about to become a believer. C+

Peter Gabriel: So (Geffen, 1986) Gabriel's so smart he knows rhythm is what makes music go, which relieves him of humdrum melodic responsibilities but doesn't get him up on the one--smart guys do go for texture in a pinch. Like his smart predecessor James Taylor, who used to climax concerts with the clever macho parody "Steamroller," this supporter of good causes reaches the masses with "Sledgehammer," which is no parody. Where is "Biko" now that we need it more than ever? B-

Galaxie 500: Today (Rough Trade, 1988) With their strained, murmuring Sprechgesang, half-speed raveups, and sobbing guitar, they evoke circa-"Pale Blue Eyes" Velvets so beautifully you think they're an imitation until you recheck the original. Instead it's like Today's supposed to be as soft and gawky compared to The Velvet Underground as that album was up against The Velvet Underground and Nico. Like Jonathan Richman, source of the sole cover, they're sweet young aesthetes who love the Velvets without making them role models. "I'd rather stay in bed with you/Until it's time to get a drink"--what kind of decadent is that? B+

Galaxie 500: On Fire (Rough Trade, 1989) Who needs world-beat when indie darlings might as well be singing in Tagalog? I don't mean the words are physically or even semantically incomprehensible, either. Twinkies and decomposing trees and staring at the wall do break through the fog; motivated, I could probably construct a lyric sheet. But just like Lisandro Meza or Chaba Fadela, only not as well, what they produce for the curious outsider is a sound--halting, folk-psychedelic guitar signatures that establish each song's atmosphere. With George Harrison's "Isn't it a pity" the measure of their wisdom, verbal motivation isn't on the agenda. B

Dee Dee Sharp Gamble: Dee Dee (Philadelphia International, 1981) After "Breaking and Entering" and "Let's Get This Party Started" get the party started, Dee Dee torches into "I Love You Anyway," written to a disaffected hub by none other than ex-hub Kenny G. This she brings off with such heartbrokenly matter-of-fact determination--all for show, I hope--that I felt ready for a whole side of slow ones. Which unfortunately I got. B

Gang of Four: Entertainment! (Warner Bros., 1980) Though the stressful zigzag rhythms sound thinner on record than from the stage where their chanted lyrics/nonmelodies become visible, the progressive atavism of these university Marxists is a formal accomplishment worth attending. By propelling punk's amateur ethos into uncharted musical territory, they pull the kind of trick that's eluded avant-garde primitives since the dawn of romanticism. And if you want to complain that their leftism is received, so's your common sense. No matter how merely liberal their merely critical verbal content, the tension/release dynamics are praxis at its most dialectical. Don't let's boogie--let's flop like fish escaping a line. A

Gang of Four: Gang of Four (Warner Bros. EP, 1980) Whatever your reservations about quickie twelve-inches, the wide grooves here power a bassy hi-fi that does justice to an ace club band. Two forward-looking new songs, two forward-looking old ones, all eminently consumable. A-

Gang of Four: Solid Gold (Warner Bros., 1981) Only when a jazz critic uttered the word "harmolodic" in conjunction with this music did I realize why I admired it so. Not for its politics, which unlike some of my more ideological comrades I find suspiciously lacking in charity. And not for its funk, which like some of my more funky comrades I find suspiciously lacking in on-the-one. And certainly not for its melodies. I admire it, and dig it to the nth, for its tensile contradictions, which are mostly a function of sprung harmony, a perfect model for the asynchronous union at the heart of their political (and rhythmic) message. Here Jimmy Douglass's production strategy is to cram everything together. Compare the more spacious versions of the two recorded songs on their 1980 EP, and dig those to the nth as well. A

Gang of Four: Another Day/Another Dollar (Warner Bros. EP, 1981) Caveats about live-version/album-available EP ripoffs don't apply to this product, which adds the militantly dialectical "History's Bunk!" and the U.K.-only outside-agitating "Capital (It Fails Us Now)" to the endlessly repeatable "To Hell With Poverty" on the all-studio A and debuts concert versions of the undeniable "What We All Want" and the ineffable "Cheeseburger" on the B. Hungry Americans who find Solid Gold dry should taste-test these juicy, nutritious remakes. A

Gang of Four: Songs of the Free (Warner Bros., 1982) What I love about their records is the very thing that keeps me from playing them much--the guitars are so harsh, the rhythms so skewed, the voices so hectoring, the lyrics so programmatic that they function as a critique of casual hedonism. Their pleasure is like Barthes or forward bends--good for you, in a limited way. So while it's all right in theory for "I Love a Man in a Uniform" to make me think I've been underrating the Human League every time its intro makes me want to get up and dance, I don't find such amenities formally appropriate. And never fear--there are almost as few here as they think they can get away with. A-

Gang of Four: Hard (Warner Bros., 1983) This record is damn near dead on its feet, but I don't think the missing ingredient is Hugo Burnham's human chops so much as his humane spirit. The sick-soul-of-success lyrics are part of it--even their most received new-left truisms always had a sloganeering hookiness about them. What really makes the difference, though, is the detachment of Jon King's delivery. If I didn't know better, I'd wonder whether now he really wants to turn into Phil Oakey. And actually, I don't know better. B

Gap Band: Gap Band IV (Total Experience, 1982) Although women may disagree, I don't think the cartoon sincerity of Bootsy and the Ohio Players will ever evolve into romantic credibility. So while I'm not saying these total entertainers sound like Huey, Louie & Dewey on the slow ones, I insist that they don't sound like the Temptations either--vocally, they're mere professionals singing merely professional love songs. Which isn't to deny that the funk tunes burn rubber and the funktoons drop the bomb. B+

Gap Band: Gap Band V: Jammin' (Total Experience, 1983) Like Cameo and Rick James before them, these old pros blew their sure shots on the breakthrough--this drops no bombs. But once again the follow-up album compensates for never getting up by never letting up--the uptempo stuff steadfastly maintains their hand-stamped party groove, and like Cameo (forget Rick James), they've figured out what to do with the slow ones. That Stevie Wonder move is a no-fail--just ask George Benson, or Eddie Murphy. B+

Gap Band: Gap Gold: Best of the Gap Band (Total Experience, 1984) What a waste. If ever a band cried out for that corny old fast side/slow side split, it's the creators of "Burn Rubber," "You Dropped a Bomb on Me," "Early in the Morning," and, God spare you, "Season's No Reason To Change." Taken in a single rush, the uptempo classics (augmented by a few expert imitations, including "Party Trains"'s imitation Gap Band) would stand as twenty-five minutes of rock and roll so spectacular you'd never think to turn the damn thing over. B+

Gap Band: The 12" Collection (Mercury, 1986) Tsk-tsk--"Party Train," which leads off side two, repeats the formula of "You Dropped a Bomb on Me" and "Burn Rubber" and for that matter "Early in the Morning," which begin-middle-and-end side one. I mean--wotta formula: stratoliner funk that leaves their more than passable P-Funk rip in the dust. In fact, Party Train is what they should have called the only Gap Band anybody need own. And anybody includes you. A

Taana Gardner: "Heartbeat" (West End 12-inch, 1981) This classic one-shot is the hottest r&b record in the city right now for two self-evident reasons. First is the beat, which is like what it says only deeper and more deliberate (in the drums and handclaps) with palpitations (provided by a slow-humping bass). Second is Taana, who'd combine the melodic dislocations of Esther Phillips and the girlish screech of Diana Ross if she had the technical control of either. Because she doesn't, she also recalls another timbre-sister, Shirley Goodman (of & Lee and "Shame, Shame, Shame"). First I played the 6:30-minute "party" version; now I prefer the 9:34-minute "club" version. One-shot, eh? A

Marvin Gaye: In Our Lifetime (Tamla, 1981) Personal to David and Brian: For techno-Afro atmospherics, try this. Pay attention to Nigel Martinez's drumming on "Far Cry" or Frank Blair's bass on "Funk Me" and you might even try to hire them. And though the words are confused, at least they're sincere, which in an age of irony has its advantages. Just like on your record, not one cut announces itself, but that's only because these days Gaye aspires to a line (by which I mean a con or a come-on as well as a musical schema) more sinuous and insinuating than the peculiar hooks and JB elementals of yore. And though not one cut announces itself, every one gets through the door. A-

Marvin Gaye: Midnight Love (Columbia, 1982) Gaye's always had more feel for sexual healing than for wholly-holy or inner city blues, and this album's concentration on the carnal is one reason it's his best ever: after a week of grumping about his coke-snorting super freaks, dick-brained Bob Marley tribute, and jive ooh-la-la, I realized I was in bed with the man anyway and decided to lie back enjoy it. His wet croon makes up for the lost grit of Let's Get It On, and never before has the rhythm master layered the tracks with such deftness and power. King Sunny Adé, meet Dr. Feelgood. A-

Marvin Gaye: Dream of a Lifetime (Columbia, 1985) Like a lot of rock and roll geniuses, Gaye was also a nut (or jerk, if you prefer). One reason he worked so assiduously in the studio was that he was loath to let us see all the way inside him, which means that these posthumously consummated outtakes and private jokes are by his own best standard too unmediated to carry much aesthetic weight. By my own best standards, too. On "Ain't It Funny (How Things Turn Around)," the only track that bears Gaye's rhythmic and harmonic signature rather than Gordon Banks's or Harvey Fuqua's schlock-it-to-'em, and "Savage in the Sack," a joke he knew enough to find funny, his wit and charm shine through. Elsewhere he's just letting off guilt in heavenly visions or sexual fantasies out of control. Maybe bondage freaks will find "Masochistic Beauty" a turn-on--what do I know? I know what I infer from "Sanctified Lady" (formerly "Sanctified Pussy")--that this man found himself despising women for doing the kinky things he forced them to do. And there's no way that's a turn-on. C+

Marvin Gaye: Motown Remembers Marvin Gaye (Motown, 1986) These "never before released masters" were rejected for good reason--they lacked both the hooky spark that spelled hit to Mr. Gordy and the show-tune gentility he thought appropriate to the upscale LP market. The result is a groove album Motown wouldn't have risked back in 1965, by which time seven of these twelve tracks had been laid down, though not so sparklingly engineered. As much a showcase for the Funk Brothers band as for the jazz-tinged pop-gospel phrasing of the label's pet matinee idol, it's a chance to hear Motown's music unalloyed, without the distraction of sweet memory. And damned if I can tell what flaw Gordy descried in Smokey's "Just Like a Man," Ashford & Simpson's "Dark Side of the World," or Cosby & Stevenson's "That's the Way It Goes." A-

Marvin Gaye: Romantically Yours (Columbia, 1986) The sad testament of a tormented weirdo who longed to redeem himself in the world of middle-class convention. On side one he covers "standards" that are beneath him ("More"), beyond him ("Fly Me to the Moon"), or beside the point ("Maria"). On side two he attempts to write his own. The singing isn't bad--was it ever? The strings are godawful. C+

Spoonie Gee: The Godfather of Rap (Tuff City, 1987) Spoonie is so unreconstructed he talks the same old shit without even pretending he made it up--a little romantic vulnerability (not much) is as venturesome as he gets thematically. His rhymes'll sneak up on you, though, and his groove is so old it's new. Surprising a Mike Tyson fan is such a counterpuncher; Lee Dorsey as JB, he doesn't float like a butterfly--more like a waterbug on a shore current. Marley Marl is his match, deploying riff and dub and dissonance with a laggardly subtlety that'll pass hotbloods right by. So let me put it this way--Spoonie probably thinks Bob Marley stole his handle from Marl, and he's still the first rapper to come by his reggae naturally. B+

The J. Geils Band: Love Stinks (EMI America, 1980) So it's broad--nothing wrong with broad. Just ask the uproarious single and title tune. But really, the rest is more overbearing white r&b--Seth Justman's organ blams, not to mention his furbelows on the endless-at-3:35 "Desire," are the work of a man who thinks "No Anchovies, Please" is funny. C+

The J. Geils Band: Freeze-Frame (EMI America, 1981) For me, their best since Monkey Island if not the debut divides neatly into three groups of three: slick get-me-off trash (hit single plus two music-as-escape songs), slick get-'em-off trash (opener, closer, and "Angel in Blue," a whore with a heart of brass that I'm just a sucker for), and slick get-offa-me trash (two throwaways at the end of side one plus "River Blindness," a more pretentious try at "Monkey Island," that album's sole bumout). If you're discovering the great audience these days it might even change your life for a month. But I guarantee you it didn't change the band's. B+

The J. Geils Band: You're Gettin' Even While I'm Gettin' Odd (EMI America, 1984) This has always been an unnecessarily obvious pop group, and while fill-in vocalists Seth Justman and Stephen Bladd eschew illusions of grandeur, they're neither gifted nor skilled enough to dance that nuance. And so the hooks pound on, making the wordplay in the sex lyrics seem unnecessarily salacious and the poetry in the political lyrics seem unnecessarily overwrought. B-

Bob Geldof: Deep in the Heart of Nowhere (Atlantic, 1986) As a struggling front man he had a weakness for bathos; as a disappointed Nobel laureate he makes me miss Harry Chapin. On and on he blathers, a Bowie clone with glossomania, rolling out additional songs and verses for cassette and CD because they can't be squeezed onto twelve inches of vinyl. Though he knows far more about world suffering than you or I, he's almost incapable of writing about it. All he proves is that when you dwell on suffering you get pompous, something all too many rock-and-rollers have already noticed. C

General Public: All the Rage (I.R.S., 1984) Songcraft notwithstanding, I find that the (English) Beat's (debut) ska and (follow-up) panafrobeat albums wear better than their (farewell) pop album, and I'm sorry to report that Dave Wakeling's and Ranking Roger's new group turn a tendency into an avalanche. Although they've managed a unique sound within current English pop fashion, which makes do with unintrusive dance grooves instead of beat and melody, they don't break out of its rut. Their new rhythm section is no more an improvement on David Steele and Everett Martin than Wesley Magoogan was on Saxa. They place too much weight on lyrics that even when they escape modern romance simply don't deconstruct clichés the way they propose to (viz. "As a Matter of Fact"). And the breathy expressionism of their vocals is fast evolving into affectation. B-

Genesis: Invisible Touch (Atlantic, 1986) For a while I was tempted to buzz Phil Collins over his former fearless leader. He's a warmer singer, God help them both, and the formerly useless Tony Banks proves adept with the keyb hooks. But in the end I couldn't tolerate the generalization density--not just of the lyrics (where Peter Gabriel's personal and geopolitical details offer some evidence that he's been there) but of the hooks, which end up feeling coercive, an effect unmitigated by Collins's whomping instrumental technique. And just to prove they're still Genesis, we get solos. C+

Georgia Satellites: Georgia Satellites (Elektra, 1986) If you love "Keep Your Hands to Yourself" for its own raunchy self rather than appreciating the alternative it afford to Bon Jovi and Cyndi Lauper, you want this album. Opening the B is a bottleneck rocker that slides as hard as "Happy," and while nothing else matches the inspiration of hit and follow-up, these guys do know how to put out those two-guitar basics. They just don't know why--except to provide an alternative to Bon Jovi and Cyndi Lauper. "Happy," after all, never pretends to be anything more than a change of pace, and because Keith Richards understands its limits, he's lining up a new front man right now. B

Georgia Satellites: Open All Night (Elektra, 1988) Forget bars 'n' barbeque--the 24-hour eatery of the title tune belongs to Dan Baird's new sweetie ("I just got to know if that thing is open all night"), who shouldn't be confused with "Mon Cheri" ("Her skirt rolled up and I could see she was French"). I know, I know, but trust me when I say their appetite makes up for their boogie recidivism. Sure they'd like to be the Stones, but they're smart enough to know they won't make it and young enough to take their fun where they can get it. B+

Georgia Satellites: In the Land of Salvation and Sin (Elektra, 1989) No longer content to be known as a boogie animal, Dan Baird shares with us his pain, his songcraft, his abiding respect for Lowell George. Just what we needed--a pretentious boogie animal. C+

Mark Germino: London Moon and Backyard Remedies (RCA Victor, 1986) These days singer-songwriters are as likely to start out in Nashville as end up there, and though this literary thirty-five-year-old loves words too much to keep it simple and celebrated his big break by recording in London, he's a country boy at heart. When he falls in love he hears crickets and jackrabbits, when he tunes a diesel it sings like Patsy Cline, and when he gets to thinking about barn burnings and "suicide amortization" he writes one called "Political." Even his Dylanesque turns have their poetry, and if he betrays both his muse and his immigrant forebears with "God Ain't No Stained Glass Window," just remember--country boys always sink into bathos when they approach the Almighty. B+

Gettovetts: Missionaries Moving (Island, 1988) "Intellectual terrorism" by "Rock Box" out of Sly & Robbie's Rhythm Killers, this Rammellzee-Laswell metal-rap is heaviest when it's funkiest and can move the crowd just by moving its ass. Slows down on the rhythm dirge "Go Down! Now Take Your Balls!," which is Laswell's indulgence, and comes to a virtual halt on the wacko lecture "Lecture," which is Rammellzee's. B+

Renée Geyer: Renée Geyer (Epic/Portrait, 1982) Others marvel that this transplanted Aussie is white; I marvel that she's female. If she recalls Tina Turner it's Tina Turner in her (often overstated) rock mode, covering Lee Michael's "Do You Know What I Mean" and (the real giveaway) Chuck Berry's "Come On." And half the time she could almost be Paul Rodgers essaying a comeback. As if Paul Rodgers could make macho sound so human. B

Debbie Gibson: Out of the Blue (Atlantic, 1987) People think there's something cute about this schemer, but I ask you--is it really possible to be a self-made millionaire and the girl next door simultaneously? I'll take a Harvard M.B.A. any day. Paul Anka wrote his own songs too, and he had more of a flair for language. As for beats, well, I'm not going to argue with "Only in My Dreams" or "Shake Your Love." But the one she produced by herself is a flat-out dog. C+

Debbie Gibson: Electric Youth (Atlantic, 1989) Casting about for a clue to this cipher, I found a gem in the bio: "My mom and dad took me to literally thousands of auditions, lessons, and performances." Making her a showbiz kid manque who immersed her perfect pitch and competitive Chopin in disco and Billy Joel, with every pop dream supported by doting parents who didn't want to raise a rebel and got their wish--so far. Unable to fall back on even an alienated childhood for inspiration, her music is synthesis without thesis or antithesis. A mimic and nothing more, she emits banalities about relationships and life choices that are no doubt deeper than anything she's actually experienced--so far. C+

Gilberto Gil: Um Banda Um (WEA Latina, 1982) I'm not naive--I know importers love stupid haircuts and Japanese vinyl. But it still disturbs me that no one has worked this Brazilian item in the U.S. Already a dozen albums to the good, Gil converted me utterly at a recent Beacon concert with tunes I'd never heard before yet will know by heart when he brings them back, and most of these are the same way. Usually I play side one, the perfect upful morning groove, but when I turned it over to make sure I hadn't been kidding myself, old friends sashayed out of the speaker and shook my hand. We'll meet again. A-

Gilberto Gil: Human Race/Raça Humana (WEA International, 1985) How readily songs breach the language barrier varies inversely with how verbal they are. As engaging as Gil's vocabulary of trills, growls, whoops, keens, and discretionary phonemes may be, he's also a careful wordsmith, and listeners who don't know Portuguese feel an absence unallayed by universalist title or Jamaican rhythm section (though a printed translation might help). Which makes the relative legibility of Um Banda Um all the more miraculous--though it's worth noting that that title sounds like discretionary phonemes to this English speaker. B+

Gilberto Gil: Soy Loco Por Ti America (Braziloid, 1988) Milton Nascimento and Caetano Veloso are aesthetes like, to be kind, Joni Mitchell; Gil is a pop adept like Stevie Wonder, which I'd probably think was kind to Stevie if I understood Gil's lyrics. A warm-voiced natural melodist at home with Afro-American rhythms of every latitude, he's tried to break here with tours and Anglophone flops and reggae albums. Only Brazil fans have taken much notice--Nascimento and Veloso get much snazzier institutional support--and this effortlessly funky tour de force, the finest Gil album I know, probably won't do the trick either, but go for it. I find most Brazilian music genteel myself. Gil ain't, and this definitely ain't. A-

Jimmie Dale Gilmore: Jimmie Dale Gilmore (HighTone, 1989) Cut in Joe Ely's basement, Gilmore's 1988 debut sank or swam with his rather pinched delivery, so if it contained anything as gorgeous as Gilmore-Hancock's "See the Way" and "When the Nights Are Cold," there was no way to know it. Cut in Nashville, this one beefs up both voice and settings. The imagistic honky tonk of Gilmore's "Dallas" and Hancock's "Red Chevrolet" are why poets would-be like steel guitars. Mel Tillis is tapped for a sneakily oblique opener. And the rest is the kind of principled professionalism that's made Randy Travis a heartthrob. A-

Gipsy Kings: Gipsy Kings (Elektra, 1988) If they hadn't covered "My Way," maybe the one-worlder in me would adjust his horizons to embrace flamenco guitar and let the rest pass. But there it is, and don't riposte indignantly that "My Way" is a French song--that's the point. Their florid Andalusian emotionalism is Europop's cornball showbiz alternative to soul. I'll take Al Jolson, who invented something. B-

Girlschool: Nightmare at Maple Cross (GWR/Profile, 1987) Since these five females or others of the same name have been doing the old forced march since 1980, I assume the crucial exuberance of their recycled Sweet-metal is something of a simulation. But second-hand cock-rock it ain't--no rape threatened or implied. Just show business. B+

The Gladiators: Symbol of Reality (Nighthawk, 1982) Albert Griffiths has never been a musical fundamentalist--1979's Sweet So Till, the group's first self-produced LP and only previous U.S. release, placed too much faith in synths, and when that didn't go over they went in with Eddy Grant, which didn't go over either--so maybe he's joined the Itals on this roots-conscious label because he's got nowhere else to go. But the same sense of pithy conviction that made Proverbial Reggae a classic album makes this a good one. The revival of the anthemic "Dreadlocks the Time Is Now" is no more impressive than the proverbial "Mister Goose," which unfortunately is the only song about women here that bespeaks as much loving wisdom as the songs about Jah. B+

Philip Glass: The Photographer (CBS, 1983) With its intrusive melodies and who-needs-a-cannon? climax, this is Glass's most obvious record, and I like it that way. After all, which is more likely to touch a rock-and-roller's heart--an opera about an Asian saint, or a multigenre piece about an American artist-gadgeteer who shoots his wife's lover and lives with the consequences? A-

Philip Glass: Songs From Liquid Days (FM, 1986) From Satyagraha to Mishima, much of Glass's recent work has invoked the mood if not the methods of nineteenth-century classical music, a realm of discourse where I'm reluctant to pass judgment, though I will mention that this hardly makes him unique among soundtrack composers. When it comes to vocal production, though, I have my proud prejudices. Without passing judgment on Satyagraha's Douglas Perry, who applies his tenor to one song here, I'll insist without fear of ignorance that he's a less than apt model for the Roches and Bernard Fowler (Linda Ronstadt can do what she wants). Even Suzanne Vega's lyrics read better than they sound. Which may just mean Glass is too spiritually enlightened to set meaningful texts to music. C+

The Go-Betweens: Before Hollywood (Rough Trade, 1983) "I've got a feeling, sounds like a fact/It's been around as long as that," goes my favorite hook of the past few months, which is something of an aberration: in the great tradition of post-modern pop these folky-arty Aussies abjure melody much of the time, though the second side does begin to sing after a few plays, and after much longer the textures on the first assume a mnemonic aura as well. A little static for rock and roll, but as poetry reading goes, quite kinetic. B+

The Go-Betweens: Metal and Shells (PVC, 1985) When what the Brits call pop isn't popular, it's usually rock and roll chamber music if it's any good at all. This U.S. debut, a best-of that highlights the soulful ache in the vocals and the quirky opacities in the lyrics and does what it can for a modest tune sense, honors that suspect notion. It's not stylized, and not static either, but it's pretty subtle, and its half-finished edges and kinetic lyricism are best appreciated in tranquility if not repose. Where it can be expected to unfold for quite a while. A-

The Go-Betweens: Liberty Belle and the Black Diamond Express (Big Time, 1986) The lyrics, which set oblique but never opaque romantic vicissitudes against a diffidently implied existential world-historic, aren't the secret of their lyricism, and why should they be? These Aussies make music, with Robert Forster's intensely sincere vocals and Grant McLennan's assertive but never pushy hooks pinning down the melodies. Granting all reservations about the form itself and with apologies to skillful romantics from R.E.M. to XTC, there are no popsters writing stronger personal love songs. I doubt there are any page poets envisioning more plangently, either. A-

The Go-Betweens: Tallulah (Big Time, 1987) They stick to what they know, and their knowledge increases. The quartet's a quintet now, up one violin, which may not seem like much but does serve to reinforce the hooks that have never been a strength of their understated, ever more explicit tales from the bourgeois fringe. So though I was pulled in by "The Clarke Sisters"--"They sleep in the back of a feminist bookstore"--I soon got involved with every song on the album, with a special rush for "Right Here," where Robert Forster or Grant McLennan, I still have trouble telling them apart, stands by his woman. A

The Go-Betweens: 16 Lovers Lane (Capitol, 1988) The title may portend the worst kind of major-label move, but their worst is pretty good. On the straightest and catchiest bunch of love songs they've ever produced, the likes of "Quiet Heart" and "Love Is a Sign" admittedly cry out for a little tension. But so does "Streets of Your Town" until you notice the battered wives and butcher knives. To put it simply: they ain't the Smithereens. They're smarter, they're nicer, they're tougher. And they're still the romantic poets good popsters ought to be. A-

God and the State: Ruins: The Complete Works of God and the State (Happy Squid, 1985) They played a typical minimalist grunge-funk in L.A. in 1983. The guitarist now studies philosophy in Toronto, the bassist architecture in Italy; the drummer has sold his kit. And on the cover they're considerate enough to provide their own review: "The record was produced in ten hours, for $200 (US). There are a lot of jokes in the songs; but some listeners don't think they're funny, and others don't even think they're jokes, rather symptoms of spiritual decay. There is an intended message of hope, of finding power in yourself against domination and power's corruption; but some find the songs cynical and as glib as the clever people they occasionally denounce." B+

Scott Goddard: Your Fool (Enigma EP, 1984) Though the former Surf Punk is in it strictly for laughs, "I know it's been done before/All my songs about boring stuff" is as close as these six tracks some to a quotable joke. Though he varies his singing comedian's monotone with the occasional inflection or preverbalism, delivery isn't his secret either. And though the generically catchy, vaguely apt arrangements can make me smile all by themselves, I couldn't tell you why. Maybe there's something intrinsically funny about Southern California. B+

The Go-Go's: Beauty and the Beat (I.R.S., 1981) Unlike so many groups who live and die by the hook, this one's got hooks, and when you pay attention to the lyrics it seems possible that they don't live and die by the hook at all--"Tonite" and "Skidmarks on My Heart," to choose but two unprepossessing examples, work subtle twists on teen fatalism and obsession, respectively. When you don't pay attention to the lyrics, which isn't hard, you begin to think they live and die by the hook after all. And you're probably right. B+

The Go-Go's: Vacation (I.R.S., 1982) Bizzers will no doubt rend their overpriced garments when this fails to follow Beauty and the Beat into Platinum City, but all its failure will prove is that you can't build a wall of sound (much less an empire) out of tissue paper. The uniform thinness of the non-Kathy Valentine songs here does clear up the mystery of why virtual non-writer Belinda Carlisle gets to play frontwoman--her voice fits the image. B-

The Go-Go's: Talk Show (I.R.S., 1984) Pop is such a plastic concept that to call this a pop comeback just confuses things--with its clean, bold, Martin Rushent sound and confident basic chopswomanship, it shares less with Beauty and the Beat than with, oh, Sports (and less than Bananarama does, too). In other words, it's an AOR move (with top-forty goals assumed). Lyrically, it represents a retreat--no place for sly subcultural anthems among these straightforward love songs (really relationship songs), which while sensible enough are never acute or visionary (or thematically consistent/complementary). And having peeled away several layers of resistance, I find the record thrilling. Its expressive enthusiasm gives me the same good feeling I used to get from their musical godmothers in Fanny--a sense of possibility that might touch women who are turned off by more explicit politics, and that these women are strong enough to put into practice. A-

The Golden Palominos: The Golden Palominos (Celluloid/OAO, 1983) This cacophonous avant-funk expedition was masterminded by master drummer Anton Fier for Bill Laswell's label (and basses, and on one cut scratching), and it's their pulse that keeps it going. But as an incorrigible content freak, I regard it as an excellent source of Arto Lindsay, who sings or plays on six out of seven cuts and helped compose five. It's not as funny or demented as the best DNA, but it's funny and demented enough that unless you liked DNA you probably won't consider Lindsay much of a singer or player. I never put it on at bedtime myself. A-

The Golden Palominos: Visions of Excess (Celluloid, 1985) As formal experiments go, this packs quite a wallop, and not just because a drummer supervised the mix--Anton Fier clearly loves and understands that much-mocked arena-rock megawattage. But a formal experiment it remains, because neither guitars not voices carry meaning of their own. Jody Harris has always had a weakness for the genre exercise (as has Mike Hampton, for that matter), and the five stellar singer-lyricists sound like they were brought in to finish the tracks. Even in arena-rock that's not how it's done. B+

The Golden Palominos: Blast of Silence (Celluloid, 1987) It was thankless enough conceptualizing arena-rock, so what gave Anton Fier the bright idea of adding country to the synthesis, as he probably calls it in the privacy of his own cerebration? Did he meet T-Bone Burnett at a party? Fight with Syd Straw about her roots? Or just think it would sell? Anton, get this straight: especially as you approach country, sincerity sells. Sincerity soulful, sincerity stupid, sincerity ironic, sincerity faked if necessary. Not this cold shit. B-

Steve Goodman: Affordable Art (Red Pajamas, 1983) Finally free of the spend-money-to-make-money fallacy, a likable cult folkie puts together his most modest and most likable album. True, he's too sentimental when he's serious; even when he's funny he's too sentimental. His natural lyricism is a palliative, though, and when he's funny (about half the time) he's funny."Vegematic" and "Talk Backward" and the cruelly antinuke "Watchin' Joey Glow" may be easy jokes, but I ask you, why did the chicken cross the road? Hope he sells at least ten thousand. B+

Steve Goodman: Santa Ana Winds (Red Pajamas, 1984) Recorded shortly before Goodman died in October, this is a fitting testament to a likable artist who often went soft around the edges. Goodman's intelligence never quelled his appetite for bathos, be it honest ("I Just Keep Falling in Love"), parodic ("Fourteen Days"), or stupid ("The Face on the Cutting Room Floor"). He liked to laugh ("The Big Rock Candy Mountain"), but though he was a clever satirist ("Hot Tub Refugee"), his targets were rarely original ("Telephone Answering Tape"). And oh yeah--he did love music ("You Better Get It While You Can (The Ballad of Carl Martin)"). Since he never made an altogether convincing album, now would be the ideal time for the indie label he founded when the majors said bye to put together a big fat compilation. Wanna help out, Asylum? Buddah? Yeah sure. B

Peter Gordon: Innocent (FM, 1986) Gordon's affectless downtown tone sticks in my craw even though I've learned to have fun with it in other versions. But at least his new mewzick isn't deliberately cheesy. It's kitsch, but it's not cheap kitsch, not factitious so-bad-it's-good; in another time, snobs might have branded it middlebrow, meaning dolts like you and me think it has substance. As a here-disco there-jazz everywhere-semiavant soundtrack to life in media central, kind of fun--though more resistant than fun, or mood music, should ever be. B+

Peter Gordon: Brooklyn (FM, 1987) On side two he's up to his usual tricks if not regressing a bit--first three cuts no better than the schlocky instrumental disco-rock they postmodernize, last cut no better than the pretty kora exotica it exploits (which if you're following means it's literally pretty--very, in fact). But side one, how about that, has real words--which are, it took me months to accept this, evocative ("Brooklyn"), romantic ("'Til We Drop"), and funny ("Red Meat"). In an oblique way, but Gordon's problem isn't that he's oblique, it's that he's too oblique. The right dose of oblique can be tonic in this crash-boom world. B+

Robert Gordon: Bad Boy (RCA Victor, 1980) As our increased familiarity and his increased facility reduce his dependence on ironic context, he becomes unnecessary--totally unnecessary, I mean. Sure he uses his excellent voice better than genre loyalists give him credit for. But that makes him either a "real" rockabilly or an interpreter with moldy-fig tastes--competition for either Ray Campi or Roomful of Blues. I mean, like wow. He was more interesting, and more emotionally effective, as a joke with no punch line. C+

Robert Gordon: Too Fast to Live, Too Young to Die (RCA Victor, 1982) A shame Brian Setzer beat him to it, I suppose. But given his by-now veteran status and RCA's failure to beef things up with the rockabilly ballads that have always set him apart from the other cats, this compilation has four too many words in its title. B-

Grandmaster Flash: They Said It Couldn't Be Done (Elektra, 1985) I was and am rooting for Flash, Creole, and Rahiem--they have good hearts, and from the Fats Waller cover and the way "Iko Iko" sneaks scratch-style into the lead cut, you can tell they're trying. But Creole isn't powerful enough for a lead rapper, Rahiem's crooning is wimp ordinaire without bombast for ballast, and sometime Herbie Hancock vocalist Gavin Christopher not only isn't anywhere near as funky as the Sugarhill gang (which I assume everyone knows) but has none of the pop production flair that might move them into Rick James territory, assuming that's even a desirable destination any more. And the words! "Sign of the Times" is the kind of confused protest you could hear on sucker twelve-inches a year ago, "Jailbait" isn't so fucking good-hearted, and "Girls Love the Way He Spins" is the claim that's supposed to make the competition hang up their mikes and go home. Why do groups break up? It's enough to make you lose your faith in capitalism. C+

Grandmaster Flash: The Source (Elektra, 1986) Their original-is-still-the-greatest message might seem more original if they weren't still using some of the rhymes they introduced back when they and their brother Mel were number one. Imagine Wings getting back at John for "How Do You Sleep?" with a concept album and you'll have some idea of how thoroughly they waste these beats. C

Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five: "The Birthday Party" (Sugarhill 12-inch, 1981) The most spectacular of the Sugarhill crews on stage is also the hookiest on record, thanks to Flash's spinning--he can make his turntables give forth like a horn section of kazoos or electric soprano saxophones. But if "Freedom," their Sugarhill debut, made aural graffiti-writing seem like a political act, here they remind us of its nuisance potential--it's fun to hear the Five's birthdays, and nice that each of us has one, but the idea is thin and so is Flash's hook. Next: "The Rent Party," in which we all get to shout our addresses. B+

Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five: The Message (Sugarhill, 1982) Their belated first album tries to be commercial, to touch a lot of bases with a broad demographic, but it's anything but formulaic. On the contrary, it's an act of self-expression--they do consider Rick James a hero--and thus experimental like albums used to be. The only instant killer is the opener, a borrowed funk showpiece featuring calisthenic bassist Doug Wimbish and three-handed drummer Keith LeBlanc. But in the end every experiment justifies itself, from the one Rahiem wrote for and performs like Stevie Wonder (he can actually sing, thus distinguishing himself from Kurtis Blow, Joseph Bowie, and the entire population of the United Kingdom) to the vocoder number to the idealistic Spinners-cum-Edwin-Starr impression to the one Rahiem wrote for God and performs like a believer. A-

Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five: Greatest Messages (Sugarhill, 1983) Establishing vocal individuality without entering the cartoon territory that is funk's comic blessing and romantic/realistic curse, they locate rap somewhere to the left of the hardest hard funk tradition, James Brown circa "Sex Machine" and "Mother Popcorn," rocking the body by pushing the beat (like Trouble Funk or the Treacherous Three) rather than teasing it (like Spoonie Gee or Soul Sonic Force). This almost athletic physical excitement, this willed and urgent hope, has been the core of their real message no matter what party slogan or all-night boast they've set it to. It's a disgrace that Sylvia Robinson's latest attempt to cash in their rep fades away to the forty-five edits that never did a thing for them--even "The Message," which doesn't lose a word except its coda, surrenders an unbearable tension along with its instrumental breaks. Culturally depriveds who don't own such twelve-inches as "Birthday Party," "It's Nasty," and "The Message" itself are advised to settle if they have no choice. B+

Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five: On the Strength (Elektra, 1988) Like a big band that costs too much to put on the road, their fluid five-man rat-a-tat-tat is a throwback to a more innocent era; their attempts to keep up--their "boyee"s, their samples, their Steppenwolf cameo--are depressingly flat. And despite an amazing "I have a dream" cover, Mele-Mel's return doesn't do all that much for their moral fervor. A "Gold" worthy of the subject wouldn't slip past miners and murders on its way to the IDs, and to hear onetime love man Rahiem make pimp jokes is to wonder just how he'll get by after their next label drops them. C+

Grandmaster Melle Mel and the Furious Five: Grandmaster Melle Mel and the Furious Five (Sugar Hill, 1984) When he's most original, Melle Mel's political chops are startling: "Hustler's Convention" closes with a right-on analysis, "World War III" resists thanatos and reminds Vietnam vets that they were dumb to go. But with Rahiem and Creole and Flash gone, idealism and romance are totally perfunctory, and original clearly ain't where they're heading: from the Prince rip to the Run-D.M.C. rip--both expert, enjoyable, even a little innovative--they come off as 1984's answer to the Sugarhill Gang, pros whose aim in life is to make more than chump change off whatever's on the street. Also, they can't sing. B+

Eddy Grant: Killer on the Rampage (Portrait, 1983) There's an expediency to Grant's songwriting--try "Latin Love Affair," or the equally routine "Funky Rock 'n' Roll," or a rhyme like "My heart does a tango/I love you like a mango"--that makes it hard to believe he's a hero. Instead of drawing some Caribbean analogy, I'd compare him to the Isley Brothers--artist-entrepreneurs with good intentions and a good assembly line. Of course, there's a ramshackle quality to the assembly line that saves even its most expedient product from slickness, and this is far from that--except on the hard-to-find Live at Notting Hill import, his good intentions have never been more out front. B+

Eddy Grant: Going for Broke (Portrait, 1984) Though it pains me to put it in black and white, Grant is half hack, and pop gambles are by their very nature never as all-or-nothing as his brave title pretends. The dance cuts don't walk on sunshine, the rockers sow no special feel for that beat, and as a ballad singer he's such a born belter it's amazing he brings off even the charming "Blue Wave." C+

Grateful Dead: Go to Heaven (Arista, 1980) Not counting the lovely revamped "Don't Ease Me In," the best song here is a Garcia-Hunter trifle called "Alabama Getaway." It grieves me to report that it isn't about dope dealers fleeing the troopers. 'Cause without hippiedom, they're lost. Utter wimp: new keybist Brent Mydland. C

Grateful Dead: Reckoning (Arista, 1981) I know you're not going to care, but I've played all of this live-acoustic twofer many times and felt no pain. Sure it's a mite leisurely, sure Jerry's voice creaks like an old floorboard, sure there are remakes if not reremakes. But the songs are great, the commitment palpable, and they always were my favorite folk group. B+

Grateful Dead: In the Dark (Arista, 1987) Despite the hooks, highlighted unnaturally by do-or-die production, this is definitely the Dead, not Journey or Starship. But only "When Push Comes to Shove," a ruminative catalogue of paranoid images that add up to one middle-aged man's fear of love, shows up the young ignorami and old fools who've lambasted them as symbols of hippie complacency since the '60s were over. One problem with the cosmic is that it doesn't last forever. C+

Grateful Dead: Built to Last (Arista, 1989) Though the hookwise production values are even more obtrusive, this still sounds like the good old Grateful Dead. Except for newish guy Brent Mydland, who sounds like Don Henley. Survivors have to stick together. C+

Great Plains: Born in a Barn (Homestead, 1984) Even though Ron House's whiny monotone gravitates toward the same melody no matter the song, each folk-punk arrangement stands out, and the lyrics show a sense of Americana worthy of a band from Columbus, Ohio--college town, state capital, boondock. Ever since high school I've been waiting for a rock and roll song about Mark Hanna, and I didn't even know it. B+

Great Plains: Great Plains Naked at the Buy, Sell and Trade (Homestead, 1986) If they don't quite live up to titles like "Chuck Berry's Orphan," "Dick Clark," and "Fertile Crescent," who could? If their organ-drenched four-four jams are objectively boring, they'll make you hum and pat anyway. If the organ-hooked "Letter to a Fanzine" is the sole masterstroke, hard-to-resists are almost legion. And if "Why do punk rock guys go out with new wave girls" is part of the parody, I bet these punk-wavers know the answer from experience. B+

Great Plains: Sum Things Up (Homestead, 1987) Here Ron House follows through on his titles, sum of them bigger and better than the one on the cover--the projected J.C. Mellencamp cover "Alfalfa Omega" and definitely "Martin Luther King and Martin Luther Drinking," both of whom Ron counts as heroes. Fact is, this English major is bidding to become a Tom Waits or August Darnell of the garage, which could use some lit. Since his thrift-shop finds are purchased to cover rather than adorn his nakedness, his adenoids will never follow Frank's frog to Broadway or Creole's tail to Carnegie Hall. So you'd better catch him at his practice space. Watch out for oil stains. A-

Great White: Twice Shy (Capitol, 1989) Sucked into the business when their girlfriends took them to see This Is Spinal Tap, they're the most physically unprepossessing glam boys in history except Kiss, and beneath the red satin and airbrushed navels are workaday attitudes, riffs, and yowls. The Ian Hunter-penned hit puts their artistic achievement in perspective--closest they come to a detail like "And the heater don't work" is "Hiway lights/Freeway sights," closest they come to a metaphor like "Before he got his hands/Across your state line" is "Let the small head rock her." No smaller than the one on your shoulders, dude. C

Boris Grebenshikov: Radio Silence (Columbia, 1989) Closely akin to the early-'70s progressive rock that evolved into AOR, this sort of Romantic claptrap made Grebenshikov an underground hero in the U.S.S.R., which proves only that totalitarianism forces you to take risks for the most toothless banalities. Granted, some of the fast ones are vaguely visionary in a rockpoety kind of way, and the eclecticism is total--this is a guy who listened with bated breath to every silly piece of contraband he could get his ears on. Probably he writes better in Russian; possibly Dave Stewart's unironic production gloss creates the wrong impression. But his art-folk filigrees and art-rock ostinatos, not to mention the Aching Lyricism of his voice itself, are more deja vu than anybody with access to media should be asked to stomach. C

Al Green: The Lord Will Make a Way (Myrrh, 1980) Think of it this way: he knew that sex was running out of inspiration for him, so he moved on to God as his source of ecstasy--an ecstasy he approaches most readily in what he really lives for, music. I might end up praising God myself if He or She gave me the most beautiful voice in creation and then let me keep it when I descended into purgatory. As it is, I'll praise Al for his lead guitar, which lends such a down-by-the-riverside feel to these rolling gospel tunes that you hardly notice the violins. B+

Al Green: Tokyo . . . Live! (Cream, 1981) You can tell when Green is bad live because he doesn't sing, often deserting mike or even stage for emphasis, which would be hard to render on disc. So his in-concert double had to be pretty strong. Like Otis's Live in Europe, it captures a sensitive soul man at his toughest and most outgoing. But unlike Live in Europe it offers no ecstatic epiphanies to make up for the forced crescendos--"I Feel Good" is louder in this version but wilder on The Belle Album. And speaking of loud, somebody fucked up the drum mix. B+

Al Green: Higher Plane (Myrrh, 1981) Meek and mild, The Lord Will Make a Way was Green's sincere attempt to bend to gospel tradition, but on this record it's tradition that bends. He exerts himself with such fervor that I don't even mind when he and Margie Joseph (a lame pop singer anyway) desecularize "People Get Ready." I've always believed angels should sing like they still have something going down below. And if there are rhythm sections like this in Heaven (praises be to new drummer Aaron Purdie), the place may be worth a stopover after all. A

Al Green: Precious Lord (Hi/Myrrh, 1982) Couldn't figure out why I found myself basically unmoved by this exquisitely sung collection of hymns, four of them familiar to me since my days in the First Presbyterian Church of Flushing. Then I realized that the Memphis groove of Al's first two Myrrh albums had somehow turned into rote tent-gospel timekeeping. Then I read the back of the album and learned that it was cut in Nashville, with all that implies. Which may also be why I know the material from First Pres. Going "sacred" on us, Al? Crossing over to the other side? B

Al Green: I'll Rise Again (Myrrh, 1983) This isn't great Al--it doesn't come through with the spiritual charge of a Call Me (secular) or Higher Plane (religious). But it is good Al, and after much soul-searching I've stopped worrying about what kind of gospel music it might be. If Green wants to attribute his positivity to romantic bliss, either, though I did find it easier to suspend disbelief. And while Christ and Eros are both more rewarding objects of faith than music, my guess is that at this point music is Al's bottom line--his very personal road to religious and secular glory glory. A-

Al Green: Trust in God (Myrrh, 1985) Al shouldn't let his originals out of Sunday school these days, but he's always had a way with the covers. "Lean on Me" and the rushed, simplistic "Ain't No Mountain High Enough" are too obvious, but elsewhere he's his usual catholic self (that's a small C, Al--look it up); here he takes over "No Not One," which he found in an old church, and there "Up the Ladder to the Roof," which he found on an old Supremes album. And the uptempo country rollick he makes out of Joe South's "Don't It Make You Want to Go Home" is up there with the downcast urban plaint he made out of the Bee Gees' "How Can You Mend a Broken Heart." B

Al Green: He Is the Light (A&M, 1986) It's not that Al's reunion with Willie Mitchell makes no difference--the difference is fairly striking when you listen for it. What's striking when you think about it, though, is that you have to listen for it. Leroy Hodges's famous bottom keeps the record flowing like none of Green's other Jesus LPs, but it's still songs that make or break--and in this case do neither. B+

Al Green: Soul Survivor (A&M, 1987) His boyish delicacy and mellow insouciance have roughened slightly with the years, but he can still muster that high moan, and here he bids to connect with unbelievers once again. The key's the covers, and those who consider "He Ain't Heavy" bad company for "You've Got a Friend" and vice versa should pause to recall "How Can You Mend a Broken Heart": just as the shameless yet muted poignancy of that homage dramatized the poignancy of Al's crossover dreams, the low-down show of agape he makes of these two universalist-humanist war-horses transports his Jesus fixation into the realm of schlock, where it fits in real nice. A-

Al Green: I Get Joy (A&M, 1989) By now he's B.B. King or Ray Charles--his genre exercises are more joyful than lesser mortals' great leaps forward. Only Al is more consistent, and he shares his genre with Amy Grant: pop songs addressed to God. What distinguishes this exercise is unflinching formal exposition--no Supremes or James Taylor ringers. Even the electrofunk belongs. B+

Al Green: Love Ritual: Rare and Previously Unreleased 1968-1976 (MCA, 1989) Cut one wild night in early 1975, the polyrhythmic title track was hot enough to lead Al Green Is Love and lend its name to a misbegotten 1978 compilation before Colin Escott ever dreamed of remixing it, but that's not to say it isn't even wilder with strings censored and voice and percussion up front. Livin' for You's "So Good To Be Here" also thrives, and the rest is as advertised--singles and outtakes originally deemed too eccentric for general consumption, many of them unadorned uptempo jams with the eternal Hi Rhythm Section. Willie Mitchell was no fool--"Strong as Death (Sweet as Love)" and "I Want To Hold Your Hand," which were released, top "Mimi" and "Ride Sally Ride," which weren't. But Escott is no fool either, and in retrospect these songs of mysterious origin cohere into a phonogram as desirable as Greatest Hits Volume II. A-

Green on Red: Green on Red (Down There EP, 1982) Dan Stuart and friends are as hooky as the L.A. trash aesthetic gets, with Chris Cacavas's organ the nugget. But though lots of New York bands ought to wish they'd thought of "Aspirin" first, Stuart would be easier to take straight if he didn't favor the B-movie imagery so prevalent in the film capital of the world. B

Green on Red: Gravity Talks (Slash, 1983) Static on stage, its records diverting but ephemeral, L.A. neopsychedelica is yet another nostalgic, romantic, "commercial" extension of/reaction to an uncompromising rock and roll vanguard; it bears the same relation to slam-pit hard core as New York neopop did to CBGB punk. Since psychedelica was fairly silly even in the '60s, I'm agin it, at least in theory. I must admit, though, that the dumb tunes on this album not only stick with me but grow on me, in their gauche way. Just wish I knew whether I was laughing with them or at them. And when the verse about the dead dad follows the verse about the dead dog, I suspect the worst. B+

Green on Red: Gas Food Lodging (Enigma, 1985) They used to be fun, partly because you couldn't tell whether they knew how risibly their wacked-out postadolescent angst came across. So now they unveil their road/roots/maturity album, which extols heroic dreams and revives Americana--drunks, murderers, husbands who've "passed away." Fun it's not. And in addition to the melodies thinning out, as melodies will, the playing's somehow gotten sloppier. B-

Green on Red: No Free Lunch (Mercury EP, 1985) Dan Stuart's not so much an acquired taste as an arbitrary one--though I find his phony drawl kind of cute, I understand those who find it kind of hopeless better than those who consider it the essence of populist substance abuse. But his booze roots aren't ready for the mulch pile quite yet, and after too many plays I was surprised to conclude that his second Americana move was far catchier and more good-humored than number one. If you think it's hopeless, though, I won't argue. B+

Green on Red: The Killer Inside Me (Mercury, 1987) In which yet another pseudoauthentic unlocks the cellar door of the American psyche, revealing--gasp! horror!--the violence that dwells within each and every one of us. What horse manure. C+

Green on Red: Here Come the Snakes (Restless, 1989) Just when you thought he'd wandered off into dipsomania, Dan Stuart reemerges on Jim Dickinson's shoulder as Neil Young and Mick Jagger fried into one bar singer. With Chuck Prophet playing the blues and Dan wailing about careless what-have-you, this is the Crazy Horse album Neil hasn't had the jam to toss off since Somoza. B+

Nanci Griffith: The Last of the True Believers (Philo, 1986) Among the signifiers jammed into the back-cover portrait are an acoustic guitar and a Larry McMurtry novel--not just a folkie, a literary folkie, from Texas, get it? Yes, we see. We see auburn hair in a French roll, white shawl thrown casually over antique flower-print dress, eyes demurely downcast. A mite precious, all told, with songs to match. Bet she reads Bobbie Ann Mason, too, but there's just no prose in her. What's amazing is that she almost gets away with it. On "Lookin' for the Time (Workin' Girl)," about a prostitute who can't afford a heart of gold, she does get away with it. I think it's the melody. B-

Nanci Griffith: Lone Star State of Minid (MCA, 1987) Band's the same, and there's not a whole hell of a lot of distance between Jim Rooney, a marketwise old folk pro, and Tony Brown, a principled neo country pro. Yet Brown's production provides the soupcon of schlock that turns the raucous "Ford Econoline" into a landmark of country feminism as well as saving "Trouble in the Fields," about noble victims selling the new John Deere to till their family farm with their own sweat and sinew. Too often, though, she's still a folkie playing just folks. B

Nanci Griffith: Little Love Affairs (MCA, 1988) For Griffith, the notion that the past was better than the present isn't just a bias, it's a worldview--consider "I Knew Love" ("when it was more than just a word") or "Love Wore a Halo Back Before the War" (WWII, she means). And with Tony Brown pushing her ever more firmly toward such marketable cliches as the raunchy growl and the pedal-steel whine, she's one neotraditionalist with a future. If you can forgive "I Knew Love"'s purism, first side doesn't quit--the regrets of "Anybody Can Be Somebody's Fool" and "So Long Ago" are as permanent as they come. Second side's got John Stewart as Waylon Jennings and real country songs by the auteur. B+

Nanci Griffith: Storms (MCA, 1989) Having gained her precious country credibility, she promptly released a live acoustic best-of. Now she asks the never-say-die Glyn Johns to . . . what? Turn her into Suzanne Vega? I don't know. But I expect she thinks it has something to do with art. C+

Albert Griffiths and the Gladiators: Country Living (Heartbeat, 1985) There's nothing progressive and plenty idiosyncratic about Griffiths's quest for naturality, which is fine--in reggae, idiosyncrasy makes all the marginal difference. The interested will thrill to the sweetness of the gutturals, the placement of the harmonies, the shifting center of the groove. The bored will remain so. B+

Albert Griffiths and the Gladiators: On the Right Track (Heartbeat, 1989) More than any other rootsman I'm hearing, Griffiths keeps his spirits up. Though it's no longer in JA's cultural mainstream, there's tremendous life and variety to this music--falsetto play and jazzy interactions and catchy dubs, even an Elvis cover. "It's Now or Never," in case you were wondering. And if you're still interested, it may just be definitive. B+

The Gun Club: Fire of Love (Ruby, 1981) Mix slide guitar with loose talk about sex, death, and, er, Negroes, and pass yourselves off as the Rolling Stones of the nuevo wavo. Wish I could claim absence of merit, but in fact it has its tunelessly hooky allure. No matter how seriously Jeffrey Lee Pierce pretends not to take it, though, I'll take it less seriously than that--and more. B

Guns N' Roses: Appetite for Destruction (Geffen, 1987) It's a mug's game to deny the technical facility claimed by one-upping crits and young victims of testosterone poisoning--not only does Axl cruise where other "hard rock" singers strive, but he has a knack for believability, which in this genre is the most technical matter of all. When he melds scream and croon on the big-beat ballad, you understand why some confused young thing in an uplift bra is sure it's love sweet love. But Axl is a sucker for dark romantic abstractions--he doesn't love Night Train, he loves alcoholism. And once that sweet child o' his proves her devotion by sucking his cock for the portacam, the evil slut is ready for "See me hit you you fall down." B-

Guns N' Roses: G N' R Lies (Geffen, 1988) Axl's voice is a power tool with attachments, Slash's guitar a hype, the groove potent "hard rock," and the songwriting not without its virtues. So figure musical quality at around C plus and take the grade as a call to boycott, a reminder to clean livers who yearn for the wild side that the necessary link between sex-and-drugs and rock-and-roll is a Hollywood fantasy. Anyway, this band isn't even sex and drugs--it's dicking her ass before you smack up with her hatpin. (No wonder they want to do an AIDS benefit.) "One in a Million"--"Immigrants and faggots/They make no sense to me/They come to our country/And think they'll do as they please/Like start some mini-Iran/Or spread some fucking disease/They talk so many goddamn ways/It's all Greek to me"--is disgusting because it's heartfelt and disgusting again because it's a grandstand play. It gives away the "joke" (to quote the chickenshit "apologies" on the cover) about the offed girlfriend the way "Turn around bitch I've got a use for you" gives away "Sweet Child o' Mine." Back when they hit the racks, these posers talked a lot of guff about suicide. I'm still betting they don't have it in them to jump. E

Gwen Guthrie: Good to Go Lover (Polydor, 1986) "No romance without finance," she announced on the song that made her self-produced album possible. And on the seven others she compensates for this pride and avarice by making herself available sexually and emotionally, no credit check necessary if you'll just give her that johnson. C+

Woody Guthrie: Dust Bowl Ballads (Rounder, 1988) [CG80: Rock Library: Before 1980]  

Guy: Guy (Uptown/MCA, 1988) Until you absorb the beats and focus in on Aaron Hall, Teddy Riley's main band sound like almost arrogantly anonymous light funksters. Riley would always rather insinuate than overwhelm, and Hall lacks the chops and the inclination to soul anybody out--learned his main shit from the Gap Band and Stevie Wonder. He often sounds like he's winging it. But where Bobby Brown and Al B. Sure! play the love man falsetto straight, Hall adds depth by straying toward the manly emotionalism of the church. And unlike most light funksters, Riley doesn't aspire to slow ones. A-

Buddy Guy: Stone Crazy! (Alligator, 1981) With or without Junior Wells, Guy hasn't put so much guitar on an album since A Man and the Blues in 1967, and if anything this is wilder and more jagged. Which is great if you like your blues straight, without Otis Spann stitching a groove. I prefer mine on the rock. B+

Buddy Guy & Junior Wells: Drinkin' TNT and Smokin' Dynamite (Blind Pig, 1982) I assume this 1974 live-at-Montreux was finally released because it features Bill Wyman, who does seem to know the parts, but saints be praised, he's not the star. Saints be criticized, neither is Wells, who was once a sharper, tighter singer. He's plenty soulful, though, especially on harp, and Guy picks up the slack--listen to him think on "Ten Years Ago." B+

G: Compilations

Get Crazy (Morocco, 1983) This soundtrack to a barely existent Allan Arkush movie may look tempting in the cheapo bins, so Ramones and Marshall Crenshaw fans should know that these tracks are for completists only. Music fans should know that Lou Reed's "Little Sister" could turn into a forgotten masterpiece if somebody isn't smart enough to put it on a compilation soon--or later, if necessary. C+

Ghostbusters II (MCA, 1989) My daughter having commandeered the thing a hundred times in the past six months, I've come to admire (nay, love) the candor and minimalism of Ray Parker's original "Ghostbusters"--making no bones about its own silliness, it does its job with efficient good humor, where Bobby Brown's "On Our Own" bogs down in plot-hyping talk of proton packs and children's parties. Though not all the entries here are equally egregious, the movie dominates the cross-promotion. It's almost like 10 different versions of "Ben," albeit with better music--and also worse. B-

Go Go Crankin' (4th & Broadway, 1985) If one measure of George Clinton is that he's spun off the finest franchises since Colonel Sanders, another is that he's inspired such staunch nonimitators: New York's rappers and the happy feet mob of Chocolate City. This D.C. dance compilation evokes the endless party groove of a P-Funk concert better than any Clinton vinyl, yet it's definitely a go go record--maybe even the go go record, given the style's all-the-way-live commitments. The cowbells and timbales share one rhythmic language, and by gleaning prime cuts from five bands who make a habit of spacing out their peaks, the collection achieves a concentration suitable for the medium--these aren't singles, they're album tracks. A-

Go Go Live at the Capital Centre (I Hear Ya EP, 1988) Visuals don't make it a mythic live music--certainly not visuals the much longer accompanying video has the chops to convey. Spirit does, a spirit the harmonica-synth version of E.U.'s signature "Go Ju Ju Go" captures more boisterously than most crowd recordings. So does a groove that translates with ingratiating naturalness to the sonic limitations of live recording. B+

The Go Go Posse (I Hear Ya, 1988) Three-four years after not becoming the next big thing, the groove is as indomitable as ever--a groove more steeped in black history, in swing and jump blues and Afro-Cuban, than any dance rhythm of the past three decades. But the optimism has lost a lot of its spritz--what passes for crazee on this multi-artist compilation is an anticrack rap with D.C. Scorpio as Captain Kirk and a reminder that D.C. doesn't stand for Dodge City. Not becoming the next big thing can take its toll. So can black history. B+

Good to Go (Island, 1986) Live albums are one way to finesse go go's refusal to organize itself into discrete, hooky, recordable compositions. Anthologies are the other, and despite soundtrack illustrations of the synthy adaptability of the D.C. groove from Sly & Robbie and Wally Badarou, this one may even steal a beat on Go Go Crankin'. But do you love "Good to Go," "We Need Money," "Drop the Bomb," and "Movin' and Groovin'" enough to buy 'em twice, no matter how hot the remake? For James Brown completists and other rhythm connoisseurs. B+

The Goonies (Epic, 1985) As I hope you've figured out, the New Soundtrack is no such thing: it's a cross-promotional concept that permits record bizzers and movie bizzers to exploit each other's distribution. But because the film comes first, the music pros work to order whether or not their songs function thematically or appear in the movie at all. So even when the resulting albums don't suffer from the hodgepodge effect that afflicts all compilations and goes double when music is slotted into vastly disparate moods and locales, they still breed hackwork. Which is why this one is such a relief. First of all, it's no hodgepodge: high-register vocals predominate, dance beats mesh. And not only do Teena Marie, Luther Vandross, and Philip Bailey come in at peak form, but REO Fucking Speedwagon produces an actual anthem. John Williams's scion Joseph contributes a nifty pop-funk tune, and Dave Grusin himself strolls sweetly under the closing credits. Bless music consultant Cyndi Lauper, whose two good-to-excellent tracks almost get lost by comparison. B+

The Gospel at Colonus (Warner Bros., 1984) Gospel music without Jesus? Sounds like heaven on earth, doesn't it? Well, though I feel like a sorehead saying so, the formalization of ritual in both Greek drama and choral gospel can be a little distancing in its grandeur, or maybe grand in its distancing. That's probably just what Lee Breuer and Bob Telson want, but I'm greedy enough to prefer my pleasures and my truths a little more direct, as in the Thom Bell rip, or every time Clarence Fountain steps up front--especially on "Stop Do Not Go On," which has a hook. B+

Greatest Rap Hits Vol. 2 (Sugarhill, 1981) The first volume was a charming concatenation of oddities foreshortened for long-player; this melds six terrific full-length twelve-inches, including two of the greatest singles of this or any year ("Wheels of Steel" with a boisterous new coda), into one all-time classic funk album, unified by the superb Sugarhill house band (Doug Wimbish! Doug Wimbish!) and the pervasive smarts of Grandmaster Flash & Co. In its way, rap's up-and-at-'em sex-and-money optimism is as misleading as the willful down-and-outism of L.A. punk--joke-boast tradition or no, kids who find they can't go at it till the break of dawn may not need a Darby Crash to inspire thoughts of ending it all. But the way these fast talkers put their stamp on a cultural heritage both folk and mass is the most masterful pop move to hit Communications Central since the Ramones. A

The Great Rap Hits (Sugarhill, 1980) Well, not exactly. This expedient collection is why Sugarhill changed over from fabrications like Sequence and the Sugarhill Gang itself to street-dance kids like the Funky Four Plus One, half of whose Enjoy debut, "Rappin and Rocking the House," brings up side one. The slight shift of gears is almost startling--the real party people stay a split second ahead of the beat, while such creatures of the sixteen-track as Super Wolf and Lady B. lag cunningly or uncomprehendingly behind. Still, not a one of these six cuts is without charm--by mining the dozens and God knows what else for boasts, insults, and vernacular imagery, Sylvia Inc. could convince anybody but party people that rap is really about words. A-

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