AOR Blog: Album Oriented Rock

Like most people I am shocked by the fact that Michael Jackson has died at the age of 50. Although I really wasn’t a big fan, no one can deny the impact he made on pop music. The success of his massive 1982 album “Thriller” changed the course of music forever, becoming the biggest selling album of time (50 million copies), spawning seven top ten singles (including #1s “Beat It” and “Billie Jean”), and breaking the color barrier on MTV. The album crossed genres, from the funk of “Wanna Be Startin’ Somethin”, to the R&B balladry of “Human Nature”, to the rock edge of “Beat it”. Jackson’s talent truly transcended race and musical styles and he will never be forgotten.

Michael Jackson had a few songs cross over to the Mainstream Rock chart, and one that surprisingly did not, even though it was designed to do so.

Beat It – #14 Mainstream Rock

The third single from “Thriller”, “Beat It” hit #14 Mainstream Rock, #1 Pop Singles, and #1 Black Singles in 1983. The track was fueled by a [Read the rest of this entry...]

In 1978, disco was on the rise, and the Bee Gees and Saturday Night Fever were taking over the pop landscape. It was a dark time for rock and roll fans. A bright ray of hope appeared when Van Halen exploded out of Pasadena, California with their self-titled debut album. Van Halen (#19 Pop Albums) is rightly considered a classic, with tracks such as “Runnin’ With the Devil”, “Ain’t Talkin’ ‘Bout Love”, “You Really Got Me (their cover of the Kinks song)”, and Eddie Van Halen’s blistering solo work in “Eruption”. It was an album that inspired a generation of guitar players, and continues to inspire to this day.

Van Halen II (#6 Pop Albums), came out the next year and repeated the party-album feel of the debut, though just not quite as well. The band did land its first big hit on the Pop Singles chart, however, as “Dance the Night Away”, climbed to #15.

Van Halen continued to churn out an album every year or so, getting heavier with Women and Children First (1980) and Fair Warning (1981), and loading up on covers for Diver Down (1982) before achieving massive success with 1984 (1984) and its #1 Pop single “Jump”. It was at this point that conflicts between Eddie and lead singer David Lee Roth boiled over and Roth left Van Halen for a solo career. Of course, Van Halen, the band, survived as they recruited Sammy Hagar to take over lead vocals and continued their rock and pop chart success throughout the 80s and 90s.

Call my a VH purist, but I prefer the party-hearty, showman style of the Roth era over the workman-like pop leanings of the Hagar era. I like Sammy’s stuff, just not as much. While Van Halen has had many hits throughout the years, this playlist is not about the hits, [Read the rest of this entry...]

Lantern-jawed Peter Cetera was the bassist and occasional vocalist of the band Chicago throughout the 1970s and early 1980s.  The band was well known for its  jazz-inflected pop and distinctive horn section (”Saturday in the Park”, “25 or 6 to 4″), but added another wrinkle in 1976, when the Cetera-penned ballad “If You Leave Me Now” hit #1 on the Pop Singles chart.  Another Cetera ballad “Baby, What a Big Surprise” hit #4 in 1977.  

Although still a member of Chicago, in 1981 Cetera decided to show that he wasn’t just the “ballad guy” and released his self-titled solo debut, “Peter Cetera”, an album that went in a decidely more AOR direction. [Read the rest of this entry...]

Based on a novel by Terry Davis, the 1985 film Vision Quest is the story of a high school wrestler and his quest for glory and getting laid. A mash up of a coming of age story with an underdog sports story (ala Rocky), the film starred Matthew Modine, the oddly deep-voiced Linda Fiorentino, and Jake Ryan from Sixteen Candles (Michael Shoeffling). Vision Quest is notable as it is the first movie to feature a pre-”Like a Virgin” Madonna.  She has no lines but performs two songs onscreen — the slower “Crazy for You”, which became a #1 Hot 100 hit in 1985, and the upbeat “Gambler”. The reason Vision Quest is even mentioned on this blog is that it has a great AOR soundtrack, with tracks by Journey, Sammy Hagar, Foreigner, Red Rider, John Waite, and Dio. #1 hit notwithstanding, Madonna doesn’t really fit in.

The Vision Quest Soundtrack kicks off with the driving “Only the Young” by Journey, which hit #3 on the Mainstream Rock chart and #9 on the Hot 100. The song is used to good effect in the film as the backdrop for a running montage.

Next up is John Waite’s “Change“, which hit #16 on the Mainstream Rock chart in 1982 when it was originally released on the former Babys singer’s debut solo album, “Ignition”. When Vision Quest came out, Waite’s popularity was soaring on the heels of his 1984 #1 single “Missing You”. “Change” kept Waite’s momentum going as it climbed to #54 on the Hot 100. [Read the rest of this entry...]