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About The Battalion. (College Station, Tex.) 1893-current | View Entire Issue (Feb. 15, 1979)
Todd Rundgren—Back to the Bars Todd’s latest is a double live collection of some of his best old tunes. Most of the material comes from “A Wizard - A True Star” and ‘ Something/Any- thing,” plus some more recent Utopia songs and some other old favorites. One in particular, from Todd’s “Runt” days, is Range War, which is Romeo and Juliet retold in a sheep-cattle feud context. Despite its pretentious ness, it’s one of the album’s highlights. Another is the medley of I’m So Proud*Ooh Baby Baby*La La La Means I Love You, which spans 10 minutes of mellow nostalgia. Interspersed between all the slow songs are the more raucous Utopia songs such as Initiation and Love in Action. To conclude the album, Todd brings out his pals Hall and Oates and Stevie Nicks to help him out on his biggest hit, Hello It's Me! Overall, this is a fair collection of his best songs done with adequate style and finesse. —Victor Sylvia Alice Cooper—from the Inside I’ve always been a pushover for good concept albums. Ever since the Who’s ‘Tommy” I have known that rock ’n’ roll could be more than just or ganized noise. It could express the fears and de sires that we all share. It could move people, emo tionally and physically. And finally, it could make people think. “From the lnside”gives all this and then some. Alice has scored again with another great concept album. This time he’s trapped inside an asylum, evidently from his years of insane stage antics. That’s certainly a step up from his last venture in “Alice Cooper Goes to Hell,” but it doesn't quite shine as brightly as the introspective “Welcome to my Nightmare.” “From the Inside" gets off to a fast start with the title cut which sets the stage for Cooper’s remake of “Cuckoo’s Nest.” The following songs all depict var ious characters in the mental ward. Wish I were Born in Beverly Hills is a tale of a California girl who buys one Gucci bag too many. The Quiet Room comes next and accommodates those who enjoy engaging in self-slaughter. Perhaps the best song, Nurse Rozetta, follows and deals with a clergyman’s temptations and even tual destruction by a buxom Jezebel with a body that could make a cardinal crawl. “Millie and Billie” are in love, and as we all know, love makes you do funny things. Texas A&M Women’s Gymnastics Team MUSIC Side Two opens with Serious, about a compul sive gambler with the odds against him. How You Gonna See Me Now is about the pains of returning home from the home. For Veronica’s Sake is one inmate’s reason for leaving the institution. Veronica is his collie, who “...can get pretty weird” if she’s not fed. Another high point of the album follows with Jacknife Johnny, about a shell-shocked Vietnam War vet who’s “a tool of the dagger’s drawn world.” Finally the album closes with Inmates (We're All Crazy), which asks the musical question, “Who is crazier, those inside or outside the asylum?” This is an album we can all relate to in some way, either because we are mental pygmies or because we know someone on the brink of lunacy. Whichever the case, if 10CC, Cheap Trick and Peter Gabriel all wrapped up and topped off with the inimitable vocal style of Alice Cooper appeals to your bizarre musical tastes, then “From the Inside” will relax your nerves and have you resting comfort ably. Now get outta here and go buy it, you maniac. —Victor Sylvia Cat Stevens—Bacfr to Earth This is Cat’s best album since “Catch Bull at Four.” With it, he again assumes his rightful place as Mr. Mellow, Sir Sentimental, the Emperor of Em pathy. This is music to snooze by, with occasional glimpses into the soul of an artist torn between se renity and joy. Snips of well-turned phrases emerge from a backdrop of orchestral breezes as Steven’s guitar, like a newborn river, cuts the landscape, ex posing fragrances and evolving new life. Cat is the advocate of the defiant school of non defiance. Take life at your own speed, let no one hurt you and hurt no one, forgive and be forgiven. If life is a dream, then make your reality a fantasy, a wisp of hope, a handful of light. As the title suggests, Stevens has gotten back to earth, back to the fundamentals of existence: life and love and their union as happiness. These will always be, though there will never be another you. So how you experience and interpret them is all that matters. Cat Stevens states this discontinuity of personal experience as a product of those things empirical and their subsequent interpretation: “I was dying, but for you it was just another night.” We spend our lives striving to explain the things we see and do, but the center of our own existences will always only remain as feelings and not expla nations. This new Cat Stevens album makes me feel good and I don’t need to explain it. —Victor Sylvia Toto may be next ‘overnight success’ By Bruce Meyer United Press International The “overnight sensation” was once a rarity in rock ‘n’ roll. Talented new bands and ar tists faced years of spirit-numbing work, in the recording studio and on the road, before they could hope to gain even a taste of the rewards enjoyed by the superstars. But the system seems to be changing. Over the past couple of years, we have seen an increas ing number of bands whose debut albums leap up the sales charts with amazing speed. Bos ton’s first record sold five million copies. Foreigner’s debut sold three million. Now we have Toto, six young West Coast musicians whose first album, “Toto” (Columbia), has al ready achieved “platinum” status for sales of one million copies, largely because of a powerhouse hit single, “Hold the Line.” A sec ond single, “I’ll Supply the Love,” should spark even more album sales. It all came so fast, even the band was surprised. “Things have been happening really quick for us,” says drum mer Jeff Porcaro, who organized the band with keyboardsman- arranger David Paich. “We didn’t expect to be doing so well this soon." Toto’s average age is about 22, but young as they are, these players are studio veterans. Indi vidually they have worked for many top artists, from Boz Scaggs and Alice Cooper to Steely Dan and Barbra Streisand. So they knew what they were doing before the tape started rol ling. “We've all been on platinum albums before, for other people,” says Paich. “But we've also been on albums we thought were going to go big and they just fell away. So making a record is a little like throwing dice. We thought we had something good, but we were still throwing the dice. Fortu nately, the dice came up seven.” But performing live is an entirely different thing. Toto is now faced with the need to create an honest musical rapport with an audience and to relate to one another not as an assemblage of independent musicians, but as a team. And so far, though the play ing is flawless, Toto’s on-stage ef forts leave a bit to be desired. “We were great performers in high school," says Porcaro. “But now the guys are used to being in the studio, behind someone else, or as sidemen. We have to re learn how to get up and muster that professional style on stage.” Otherwise, they’ll just end up as one more group of wealthy woodenheads. TOP TEN AL BUMS 1. Rod Stewart — Blondes Have More Fun 2. Blues Brothers — Briefcase Full of Blues 3. Billy Joel — 52nd Street 4. Neil Diamond — You Don't Bring Me Flowers 5. Barbra Streisand — Greatest Hits, Vol. II 6. Chic — C’est Chic 7. Barry Manilow — Greatest Hits 8. Village People — Cruisin' 9. Earth, Wind & Fire — The Best of Earth, Wind & Fire 10. Eric Clapton — Blackness