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Pat Benatar – “Heartbreaker”
“Heartbreaker” is easily the heaviest song of Benatar’s whole career. I’m not sure another comes close.
Richard Challen
Jul 13, 202011 min read
1,748 views
21 comments
Toto – “99”
“99” is adult-rock at its most immaculate and expensive. Everyone plays with a light touch; even the syncopations sound like laughter.
Richard Challen
Jul 10, 20209 min read
2,150 views
9 comments
Linda Ronstadt – “How Do I Make You”
“How Do I Make You” is the sound of SoCal’s prom queen letting her hair down—or, more accurately, chopping it all off.
Richard Challen
Jun 26, 202010 min read
902 views
7 comments
Pink Floyd – “Another Brick In The Wall (Part II)”
An improbable blockbuster that distilled one man’s psychodrama down to three minutes of pseudo-disco performed by schoolchildren.
Richard Challen
Jun 22, 202016 min read
1,156 views
9 comments
Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers – “Refugee”
“Refugee” is a fight song with the potency of a powder keg, a love song with serrated edges, an anthem in the shape of a bruise.
Richard Challen
Jun 19, 202011 min read
1,273 views
8 comments
Electric Light Orchestra – “Last Train To London”
“Last Train” flits casually between disco and new-wave, combining the bubbly pulse of the former with the mechanical remove of the latter.
Richard Challen
Jun 1, 20206 min read
1,119 views
5 comments
John Stewart – “Lost Her In The Sun”
“Lost Her In The Sun” brought an end to a remarkable commercial blip in an equally remarkable career.
Richard Challen
May 29, 20208 min read
1,013 views
5 comments
Cheap Trick – “Voices”
“Voices” winds up being pretty but vacant, an oddly faceless turn portending further facelessness to come.
Richard Challen
May 6, 20209 min read
1,002 views
4 comments
Santana – “You Know That I Love You”
How do you go from “Black Magic Woman/Gypsy Queen” to a song as faceless as “You Know That I Love You” in less than a decade?
Richard Challen
May 4, 20205 min read
596 views
6 comments
Styx – “Why Me”
If “Why Me” didn’t exactly save Styx, it certainly delayed their demise for a good half decade.
Richard Challen
Apr 29, 20207 min read
1,265 views
8 comments
Led Zeppelin – “Fool In The Rain”
Strip away all the classic rock baggage, and “Fool In The Rain” might be the band’s most gutsy—and successful—stylistic swing ever.
Richard Challen
Apr 24, 20209 min read
1,566 views
6 comments
Tom Johnston – “Savannah Nights”
When Johnston finally came back, it wasn’t with the Doobies. It was with a 1979 solo single that sounded a whole lot like his previous band.
Richard Challen
Apr 22, 20206 min read
801 views
5 comments
Queen – “Crazy Little Thing Called Love”
Queen had never attempted to record a rockabilly song. But damn if they didn’t nail a perfect approximation on their very first try.
Richard Challen
Apr 17, 20208 min read
758 views
7 comments
Blackfoot – “Train, Train”
“Train, Train” is folklore and Appalachian tradition colliding with Marshall-stack ferocity on the floor of a ruffneck bar.
Richard Challen
Apr 10, 20203 min read
913 views
4 comments
Steve Forbert – “Romeo’s Tune”
The great paradox of “Romeo’s Tune” is how much work it took to create something that sounds so effortless.
Richard Challen
Apr 3, 20204 min read
1,420 views
6 comments
Foghat – “Third Time Lucky (First Time I Was A Fool)”
Foghat made their bones playing unrepentant Neanderthal blues for stoned teenagers, but their second-biggest single was pure country.
Richard Challen
Mar 25, 20203 min read
971 views
5 comments
The Alan Parsons Project – “Damned If I Do”
At some point, probably when an entire orchestra crashes in on top of the synthesized trumpets, it all becomes a bit too much.
Richard Challen
Mar 23, 20205 min read
879 views
4 comments
Fleetwood Mac – “Sara”
The mystery surrounding “Sara” isn’t a barrier to entry. The mystery is what makes “Sara” a masterpiece.
Richard Challen
Mar 20, 20208 min read
2,228 views
11 comments
Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers – “Don’t Do Me Like That”
It's as clean and direct as anything in Petty’s notably clean-and-direct catalog, buoyed by an arrangement that’s all accents.
Richard Challen
Mar 13, 20206 min read
851 views
4 comments
Jefferson Starship – “Jane”
“Jane” is gloriously stupid trailer-park rock’n’roll at its finest, no apologies necessary.
Richard Challen
Mar 2, 20205 min read
1,551 views
12 comments
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