Chapter 69: We Got the Beat (May - December 1981)

15 May 1981

The Clash - Sandinista!

Released: 15 May 1981

Recorded: February - August 1980

Producer: The Clash and Mikey Dread

Track listing[1]

Side A

The Magnificent Seven

Police on My Back

The Leader

Charlie Don't Surf

The Call Up

Somebody Got Murdered

Side B

Rebel Waltz

Let's Go Crazy

Junkie Slip

Up in Heaven (Not Only Here)

Washington Bullets

Broadway

The Clash's fifth album, Sandinista!, was the sister album to last year's Something About England, recorded during the same sessions as the 1980 album. In contrast to England's wildly experimental tone and various guest musicians, Sandinista! was seen as a bit more traditional. It topped out at #3 in the United Kingdom and #5 in the United States and was preceded on 10 April with "The Call Up"/"Stop the World" (#33 UK). The follow-up single, "The Magnificent Seven"/"Radio One" (#20 UK, #17 US), was released 19 June. The only other release by the Clash in 1981 was the non-album single "This is Radio Clash"/"Radio Clash" (#38 UK, #14 US), released 20 November. At the moment, they were working on their sixth studio album, due for release next year.

10 July 1981

Electric Light Orchestra - Time

Released: 10 July 1981

Recorded: Early 1981

Producer: Jeff Lynne

Track listing[2]

Side A

Twilight (Prologue)

Yours Truly, 2095

Ticket to the Moon

When Time Stood Still

The Way Life's Meant to Be

Julie Don't Live Here

Another Heart Breaks

Side B

Rain is Falling

From the End of the World

Lights Go Down

Here is the News

21st Century Man

Hold on Tight

The Bouncer (Epilogue)

The Electric Light Orchestra's first official studio album of the 1980s centered around a man from 1981 who finds himself in the year 2095 where he is confronted by the dichotomy between advanced technology and longing for a long dead romance. Time briefly hit #1 in the United Kingdom for two weeks in the midst of the Beatles' big reunion with Quadruple Fantasy, while in the United States, it topped out at #10. Reviews ranged from mixed to positive.

Unlike ELO's usual orchestral sound, Jeff Lynne chose to focus on electronics, hence the use of synthesizers to give the album a futuristic sound. It became the second album to not involve Mik Kaminski (violin), Hugh McDowell and Melvyn Gale (cello), all of whom had not partaken on Discovery or the songs featured in Xanadu. The core for ELO had now been reduced to Lynne himself, drummer Bev Bevan, pianist Richard Tandy and bassist Kelly Groucutt, although Mik Kaminski would rejoin for the tour supporting Time, lasting from September 1981 to March 1982.

Summary of single releases from Electric Light Orchestra's Time

• "Hold On Tight" / "When Time Stood Still" - 17 July 1981 (#2 UK, #4 US)
• "Twilight" / "Julie Don't Live Here" - 10 October 1981 (#9 UK, #15 US)
• "Ticket to the Moon" / "Here Is the News" - 11 December 1981 (#17 UK)
• "Rain Is Falling" / "The Way Life's Meant to Be" - 15 January 1982 (#86 US)

August 28, 1981

Elizabeth Peña, the first actress to portray Wonder Woman on the big screen, 1980s. Her performance earned her an Academy Award nomination for Best Actress in 1982.

Following the success of the first Superman movie directed by Richard Donner and starring Christopher Reeve as the titular hero, plans were being made to produce other films starring other DC superheroes under a single banner that would be labeled by fans the Appleverse. A film featuring John Travolta as Batman and directed by Martin Scorsese was intended to become the third entry, but due to various rewriting going around along with work on a planned sequel, Wonder Woman - starring Elizabeth Peña as the titular heroine, Raquel Welch as her mother Hippolyta, John Schneider (The Dukes of Hazzard) as love interest Steve Trevor, and for the villains, Sigourney Weaver (Alien) as Baroness Paula von Gunther and Ian McKellen as Ares, god of war - ended up becoming the third entry in the Appleverse instead, and was released to critical acclaim. Wonder Woman was directed by Ivan Reitman and the script was co-written with Tom Mankiewicz[3], with the score by James Newton Howard. Pat Benatar's "Hit Me With Your Best Shot" also played during the end credits.

Set in the early to mid-1940s, during World War II, United States army pilot Steve Trevor lands himself in Paradise Island[4], a segregated land of women, and meets one of its residents, Diana, the daughter of Queen Hippolyta. After explaining that the world of man is under war, Steve brings Diana to the world outside of Paradise Island, the latter believing that the god of war Ares is responsible for the cause of the war. Along the way, Diana encounters Baroness Paula von Gunther, a cold-blooded Nazi spy for Hitler, who pretends to ally with her and Steve so she can kill them; unknown to everyone, however, she is a pawn in Ares' game to exterminate Diana, who is later revealed to be the daughter of Zeus and Hippolyta. In the end, the Baroness and Ares are killed, and the war comes to an end following the collapse of Nazi Germany. In the present day (1980, according to the film), Diana reunites with an elderly Steve Trevor, and they see a bat-shaped signal in the sky, with Diana going off to see what it could mean.

November 10, 1981

Kiss - Music from "The Elder"

Released: November 10, 1981

Recorded: March - September 1981

Producer: Bob Ezrin

Track listing[5]

Side A

Fanfare

Just a Boy

Odyssey

Only You

Under the Rose

Dark Light

Side B

A World Without Heroes

The Oath

Mr. Blackwell

Escape from the Island

I (Finale)

Things had changed drastically for Kiss at the turn of the decade. Their 1979 album Dynasty sold fairly well, backed by the hit single "I Was Made for Lovin' You", although their 1980 follow-up, Unmasked, did not do as well commercially or critically. For Paul Stanley, Gene Simmons, Ace Frehley and Eric Carr (Peter Criss, the original drummer, had left the band in May with Carr taking over three months later), this next album would either salvage Kiss as a commercial force, or they would implode on themselves.

ACE FREHLEY: "It was an in-between; Kiss didn't really fall apart, but they didn't quite bounce back either. Peter had left, Eric came in, and Paul and Gene had taken over the band by that point. I felt like a man out of place by that point." (1996)

Music from "The Elder" was a concept album, fronted mainly by Stanley and Simmons, and there were hopes that it'd bring the band back to their roots. Bringing in producer Bob Ezrin, having co-produced Roger Waters' The Wall the year prior, they also included medieval horns, strings, harps and synthesizers, making it sound more like progressive rock rather than hard rock. Frehley was constantly frustrated during the sessions, feeling that his voice (and guitar) wasn't being heard during voting decisions.

The lineup for Kiss, 1981. Eric Carr replaced Peter Criss, going by the persona, The Fox. He would remain the band's drummer from that point on, save for reunions with Criss in the late 1990s and early 2000s.

The story of "The Elder" was that a young boy had been recruited by the Council of Elders belonging to the Order of the Rose, an unknown group whose main goal was to combat evil. Elderly caretaker Morpheus guides the boy on his journey, whose feelings are described in the album's lyrics, overcoming his initial doubts and finally getting ready to undertake his odyssey. Spoken dialogue was included in between the songs to provide exposition and further clarify the story.

GENE SIMMONS: "People were pretty divided about "The Elder"; some loved it, some hated it, and some were very mixed, feeling like it wasn't any better or worse than Unmasked." (2011)

Music from "The Elder" peaked out at #75 in the United States compared to Unmasked's #35, while in the United Kingdom, the former reached #51. Critical reaction was overall divisive, and the album's sole lead single released November 17, "A World Without Heroes" (#55 UK, #56 US), got lost in the crowd. By the end of February 1982, Music from "The Elder" was all but forgotten about, and Ace Frehley, arguably the most beloved member of Kiss, would leave following the release of next year's Creatures of the Night, leaving half of the founding lineup intact. In Ace's place was Vinnie Vincent, formerly of Black Satin and the Hitchhikers, who had partaken in the recording of Creatures of the Night. Once again, personality clashes would rise between the members...

18 December 1981

Lindsey Buckingham - Tusk

Released: 18 December 1981

Recorded: Winter 1980 - Summer 1981

Producer: Lindsey Buckingham, Richard Dashut and Ken Caillat

Track listing[6]

Side A

Suma's Walk

The Ledge

Save Me a Place

What Makes You Think You're the One

Book of Love

That's All for Everyone

Not That Funny

Side B

Empire State

That's Enough for Me

Oh Diane

I Know I'm Not Wrong

Goodbye Angel

Tusk

Eyes of the World

Throughout the winter of 1980 all the way up to the summer of 1981, Lindsey Buckingham was kept incredibly busy following his isolation from Fleetwood Mac. In fact, with producer Richard Dashut, he had recorded enough material for a double album, but it was decided to release two individual albums instead.

The first of these, Tusk, consisted of Buckingham's material from the failed 1979 Fleetwood Mac album as well as new material. Tusk reached #3 in the United Kingdom and #8 in the United States and received positive reviews. The title track was released as a single with "Not That Funny" (#6 UK, #8 US) in November 1981, while the following single, "Oh Diane" / "Teen Beat" (#9 UK, #35 US), would come out in February 1982.

The follow-up album, Law and Order, while recorded during the same sessions, would be released in November 1982.[7] In between solo album releases, Buckingham would find himself mending fences with his former bandmates.

Footnotes

1. All tracks are sourced from OTL's Sandinista!.
2. All tracks are sourced from OTL's Time. In addition, the track listing is based upon the original double album track listing, although "When Time Stood Still" and "The Way Life's Meant to Be" have swapped positions, and "The Bouncer" is moved towards the end, being combined with "Epilogue". Likewise, "Prologue" and "Twilight" are combined into a single track. "Sad Affair" and "Time Transporter" currently remain unreleased.
3. In OTL, Ivan Reitman was attached to direct a Batman film written by Tom Mankiewicz, starring Bill Murray as Batman, David Niven as Alfred, William Holden as Commissioner Gordon, and David Bowie as the Joker. Reitman later left the project following the deaths of Holden and Niven as well as various rewrites to the script; Joe Dante then entered the project, but the film was cancelled altogether. In the mid-1990s, Reitman was attached to direct a Wonder Woman film, but that too never saw the light of day.
4. Paradise Island (sometimes called the Amazon Isles) was the original name to Themyscira, Wonder Woman's home island. The current name of Themyscira was given in the first issue of Wonder Woman Vol. 2 in February 1987, and it originated from an ancient Greek town in northeastern Anatolia. According to Greek mythology, it was the capital city for the Amazons.
5. The track listing is based upon the intended order; when Music from "The Elder" was first released, the order was rearranged so both sides would start with the songs that Casablanca Records wanted to be singles, explaining why the story on the American edition made no sense. The 1997 reinstates the songs in the proper order.
6. Tracks are sourced from The Alternate Tusk and outtakes and early versions from Mirage.
7. In OTL, Lindsey Buckingham's Law and Order was released on October 3, 1981, the month before Fleetwood Mac started recording for Mirage.

Author's Comments

Man, this chapter took longer to write up than I was expecting; the stories for Something About England, Time and Tusk both came out fine (although the album cover to the latter did leave a bit to be desired; then again, I've made far worse), but it was the Kiss and Wonder Woman parts of this chapter that kept it from being finished earlier. I had little to no idea what to do with either of them, the latter more so as coming up with fictional movies and their plotlines, cast and crews is difficult, as I soon found out. I wanted to utilize actors who were well known or just starting out during that time, just to keep things as authentic as possible. Hopefully it all came out okay.

I promise that the next chapter will be better and won't come off as a bit half-baked, especially since it'll be the 70th of the story.