Girlschool – The Singles
A helluva collection from this rockin’ 80’s all-female band, with tons of their own great tunes and collaborations with the likes of Motorhead, Gary Glitter and Slade!
Starting with two tunes from their debut single on City Nik (?) Records, the girls sound young and snotty on “Take it All Away” and “It Could Be Better”. Produced like a late 70’s punk single, these tunes aren’t quite as heavy as the band would become, but still a super cool intro to the group and a couple of hot songs.
The follow up single, released prior to their debut album, contains their original, “Emergency”, which I always thought was a Motorhead song. Apparently, Motorhead covered this as a return favor to these chicks for covering “Bomber”. The sound is already much improved and this gives a real promise of the power to come!
There are a number of cuts from their terrific Hit and Run album as well as a couple from their debut, Demolition, plus some live tracks. This disc is absolutely fantastic from start to finish.
Disc 2 has some later stuff which I am not thrilled with due to 80’s production (“Breaking All the Rules”, “Like It Like That”, “Surrender”), though I do think that some of the songs sound better on this comp than on the original record (in the case of the Play Dirty cuts).
It starts with a roar on “Wildlife” – a great blast of a shouter. “Don’t Call It Love” is quite melodic, but still rockin’. There are a couple of alternative versions of previous songs, but they are not wildly divergent. A number of covers are featured as well - this comp includes the Headgirl single, “Please Don’t Touch” (originally by Johnny Kidd and the Pirates), takes on ZZ Top’s “Tush”, T Rex’s “20th Century Boy” (which sounds to me like a rawer mix than on the Play Dirty album), Slade’s “Burning in the Heat” (produced by Holder and Lea from Slade) and Gary Glitter’s “I’m the Leader of the Gang”, which has the man himself trading vocals with Kim on a high-energy version.
The set closes with a couple of early demos, bringing the comp around full circle!
While this isn’t 100%, even the tunes that I don’t love aren’t bad – they’re just not as good as the band is capable of. But the greatness far exceeds the mediocrity and this is a hot collection that is well worth the price!
PS – and yes, by following my reviews you can see (sometimes) how I go from one record to the next. The Hellacopters reminded me of Motorhead, which caused me to pull out the Stiff collections and also got me listening to my Girlschool albums again, which caused me to buy this collection. But sometimes it is arbitrary, as well!
Starting with two tunes from their debut single on City Nik (?) Records, the girls sound young and snotty on “Take it All Away” and “It Could Be Better”. Produced like a late 70’s punk single, these tunes aren’t quite as heavy as the band would become, but still a super cool intro to the group and a couple of hot songs.
The follow up single, released prior to their debut album, contains their original, “Emergency”, which I always thought was a Motorhead song. Apparently, Motorhead covered this as a return favor to these chicks for covering “Bomber”. The sound is already much improved and this gives a real promise of the power to come!
There are a number of cuts from their terrific Hit and Run album as well as a couple from their debut, Demolition, plus some live tracks. This disc is absolutely fantastic from start to finish.
Disc 2 has some later stuff which I am not thrilled with due to 80’s production (“Breaking All the Rules”, “Like It Like That”, “Surrender”), though I do think that some of the songs sound better on this comp than on the original record (in the case of the Play Dirty cuts).
It starts with a roar on “Wildlife” – a great blast of a shouter. “Don’t Call It Love” is quite melodic, but still rockin’. There are a couple of alternative versions of previous songs, but they are not wildly divergent. A number of covers are featured as well - this comp includes the Headgirl single, “Please Don’t Touch” (originally by Johnny Kidd and the Pirates), takes on ZZ Top’s “Tush”, T Rex’s “20th Century Boy” (which sounds to me like a rawer mix than on the Play Dirty album), Slade’s “Burning in the Heat” (produced by Holder and Lea from Slade) and Gary Glitter’s “I’m the Leader of the Gang”, which has the man himself trading vocals with Kim on a high-energy version.
The set closes with a couple of early demos, bringing the comp around full circle!
While this isn’t 100%, even the tunes that I don’t love aren’t bad – they’re just not as good as the band is capable of. But the greatness far exceeds the mediocrity and this is a hot collection that is well worth the price!
PS – and yes, by following my reviews you can see (sometimes) how I go from one record to the next. The Hellacopters reminded me of Motorhead, which caused me to pull out the Stiff collections and also got me listening to my Girlschool albums again, which caused me to buy this collection. But sometimes it is arbitrary, as well!
posted by rich @ 2:19 PM
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