TODAY’S TOP TEN ALBUMS OF THE ‘80s (by Thomas Liam Palmer) 1. Hats - The Blue Nile. 2. Closer - Joy Division. 3. Technique - New Order. 4. The Unforgettable Fire - U2 5. The Queen Is Dead - The Smiths. 6. Stop Making Sense - Talking Heads. 7. No Sense Of Sin - Lotus Eaters. 8. Disintegration - The Cure. 9. Steve McQueen - Prefab Sprout. 10. Strange Times - The Chameleons. ‘I choose Hats as No. 1 for many reasons,’ says Thomas Liam Palmer from the Wirrall. ‘Aside from musically and lyrically being a work of stunning beauty, it’s the ultimate heartbreak album; when you split with someone this album becomes your rock. There is a strange uplifting quality about such sad songs, letting you know youre not the only one. The album reflects a couple’s journey throughout one night out and just drips with the romance of simple things throughout the evening. It was late ‘89 when it came out, a big party year for me and this was the party come down.’ Thomas nominates Ian Doyle to do his Top Ten 80s Albums chart. Message, don’t post, us your Top Ten Albums of the 80s in order and if you could mention why you chose your No. 1 that would be great. We guarantee to post every one we receive. Also, if you’d like to nominate a friend or friends to do the Top Ten challenge, please be our guests. Oh, and let them know if, by some incredible chance, they’re not friends of Flexipop!. The aim is to produce the Ultimate Flexipop! Top 40 Albums Of The 80s Chart. Ten points are awarded for your No. 1 choice down to one point for your No. 10. So get those thinking caps on… Hats, released on 16 October 1989, was the second album from Glaswegian band The Blue Nile. The album is considered to be one of the best albums released in the 1980s. After a prolonged delay in which an entire albums worth of work was scrapped, The Blue Nile released Hats to rave reviews, including a rare five-star rating from Q magazine. In 2000, the same magazine placed it at No.92 in its list of the 100 Greatest British Albums Ever and six years later the same mag put it at No. 38 in its list of 40 Best Albums of the 80s. Hats is also The Blue Niles most successful album, reaching No. 12 on the UK album charts, and spawning three singles: The Downtown Lights, Headlights On The Parade, and Saturday Night. Having finished promotion work for their debut album A Walk Across the Rooftops, the groups record company Linn were keen to have a follow-up record, and in early 1985 they sent them to the town of Gullane near the Castlesound Studios where the previous album had been made. However, the new record hit problems almost immediately. The band did not yet have enough material to make another album, and with the group forced to share a house and having to spend all their time in close proximity with each other, arguments developed. After almost three years in the studio which produced virtually nothing, having begun and scrapped several songs, the group was forced to vacate Castlesound. However, when they returned to Castlesound in 1988, the ideas for an album were already in place and according to singer Paul Buchanan, ‘we knew exactly what we were doing. We actually recorded the rest of Hats super quick... Honestly, half of Hats was, like, a week.’ The album was released in October 1989 simultaneously in both the UK and the US. As the band were essentially unknown in the US, their Stateside label, A&M, took out a full-page ad in Billboard magazine offering a free copy of the CD to anyone who called a toll-free number. Hats peaked at No. 108 in the US. The reaction to the album was positive. Melody Maker said, ‘Only the laziest ear would confuse this crystalline perfection with the hygiene and polish of plastic pop... All seven songs here are chips off the same sublime block. Each begins as a stately procession, through sheer surfaces that have more in common with the pristine otherworldliness of systems music than rock, before building steadily, plateau after plateau to an almost unbearable pitch of elation, midway between hope and desperation... This is BIG music that leaves you feeling very small, very still and very close to tears.’ Sounds: ‘On first, second and third listens Hats seems to be absolutely superb. Sounding not a zillion kilometres from the first album back in 84, both in terms of technology and moods aspired to.’ NME: ‘It is tempting to go on about how this record evokes rainy city nights, solo journeys home and the pull of love, but given half the songs are called things like that, itd be a bit obvious. The thing with the Blue Nile is that most of what you can say about them is obvious. They make incredibly simple-sounding, emotional records about the stuff that fascinates them.’ Hats made No. 8 on Melody Makers albums of the year list, and No. 18 on NMEs list. Side one 1. Over The Hillside 2. The Downtown Lights 3. Lets Go Out Tonight Side two 1. Headlights On The Parade 2. From A Late Night Train 3. Seven A.M. 4. Saturday Night The Downtown Lights was released as a single in September 1989 and peaked at No. 67 in the UK. Melody Makers placed it at No. 15 on its singles of the year list. The song was covered by two artists in 1995 - Annie Lennox (with whom The Blue Nile worked on her debut album Diva) on her the Medusa album and Rod Stewart on his album A Spanner In The Works.
Posted on: Mon, 17 Nov 2014 16:32:59 +0000