Boston: Don't Look Back

Finally, one in keeping with the intent of the project. I know I skipped a couple of days, I was on a camping trip.  Having to listen to extra albums to make up for lost time isn't realistic, especially since I also have to add watching Blade Runner to my list while watching the kids and renovating the house.  I did finally sit down and grab a record, I decided on one that I've never actually sat and listened to all the way through.  I was very excited to do so as I was inspired by an earlier listening.  I sat and listened to

Boston: Don't Look Back

Boston's second album had its issues.  For one thing it had to follow one of the most amazing debut albums of all time.  Second, Epic records was pushing really hard for a sequel, harder than Tom Scholz was willing/able to work.  Boston's debut album had basically been written over the course of 10 years or more, Boston's second outing was forced out of Scholz in only two years.

Although the album spawned one of Boston's biggest hits (and a great tune that really gets stuck in your head) Don't Look Back, the rest of the album is really pretty good, just not very memorable.  I think that I used to play the first track on the album and then let the rest run out while I was doing other things.  It would then end up back in its sleeve and back in the collection.

So I made myself sit down and listen to it.  Open ears, open mind and nothing else to do to distract me.  It really is a good album.  I happen to think that if I hadn't heard Boston's first album and had a chance to listen to this one on its own for a while it may be an album that would be on the top of my play list.  Sadly though, as Scholz puts it, you can't lose your virginity twice.  The album is good but doesn't have the same kick and genius as the first.

The song Don't Look Back is one that Scholz had on the back burner already, it came from the era of the original songs for the debut album and it sounds it.  It's fresh and original, it has its own sound.  Each of the other songs on this album don't have that same sound, they tend to re-hash riffs and motifs from the first album just arranged in different ways.  Again, without having listened to the first album I may have really liked this one.

This album gives us Boston's first slow song, A Man I'll Never Be.  The second song on the album, The Journey, is apparently Scholz's favorite, I'll have to give it another couple of listens before I feel the same way.  Just like Smokin' on the first album, Party was written by both Delp and Scholz and much like Let Me Take You Home Tonight, Used to Bad News is the only purely Delp penned tune on the album.  Let Me Take You Home Tonight is one of my favorite tracks on Boston, again, it will take me a couple more listens of Used to Bad News in order to feel remotely the same.

Some bands release one album with one decent song on them and are never heard from again.  Boston could have released Don't Look Back only and have been listed among the great one-hit-wonders.  The title track and the very cool album artwork is worth the price of the album alone (for me the price was $0 as this is another I received from my mother when she ditched her collection).  While I didn't listen to the album much as a kid, I used to sit and stare at the album cover and insides forever (it's a gatefold cover though it is only one album). 

But this was not a one hit wonder band.  This is one of America's greatest Rock and Roll Band and deserves their spot in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.  I think the best use of this record is to put it on immediately after listening to the first, not as a second album but as a continuation of the first.  Think of them together as Boston's double album and you've got yourself a good hour and a half of listening bliss.

I thought I had Boston's Third Stage lying around somewhere but I can't find it.  I do hope to track it down as I would like to see how much Scholz's writing changed in the 10 years between that release and the first album.  But I'll have to leave that for another day.