Men at Work: Business as Usual

Good lord, I haven't listened to this whole album since I was probably in 6th grade.  And at that time I only had it on cassette tape.  I remember being in college at the Vermont Public Radio Record Sale and they were trying to get rid of all the unsold albums that they were left with after the sale.  I was so excited when I found

Men at Work: Business as Usual

Granted, I also found "Cargo" and whatever their third album is called, I was excited to find all of them. 

I really came into my own musically when I was in the 4th grade.  I had a babysitter named Lisa who was a big Men at Work fan and that made me a Men At Work fan.  I got both Cargo and Business as Usual for Christmas that Christmas and with it came a Panasonic Slim Line RQ-2735 Portable Cassette Player/Recorder (remember these?)

I would play my Men at Work tapes but would also use the recorder to get songs off the radio that I liked.  I had a cassette tape full of half copies of Land of 1,000 Dances, Ghostbusters, Eye of the Tiger and anything by Huey Lewis and the News.  They were half copies because I would never catch the song at the beginning.  I would always scramble to get my recorder ready, tape in the right place and so often my recording of the song I wouldn't start until the second verse.  Sometimes the stars would align and I would be sitting there just as a song came on, my tape would be all cued up and I would catch it sooner than I had on a previous recording.  I wouldn't go back and erase the first copy of the song because it would be in the middle of the tape and I wouldn't want to accidentally record over anything else.... phew... my life was hard.

It's hard to say which MAW tape I would play the most. I even had a hard time deciding which one to listen to today.  It's not like the difference between Boston's debut and subsequent follow-up, I've always liked both albums the about the same.  I suppose this one won out because when I read the title "Who Can It Be Now" I immediately got the song in my head and it's still there now.

I really liked setting this down on the turntable and giving it a spin.  Even without the visceral nostalgia effect it was really interesting to hear this album with another 28 years of listening to and making music under my belt.  I had forgotten that much of the music of MAW involved saxophone and flute (what is it with Aussie bands and saxophone?  MAW, INXS, maybe it was just the 80s, Huey Lewis, anything from Lethal Weapon...).  Besides the usual "Who Can it Be Now" and "Down Under" the first side also has "I Can See It In Your Eyes" and "Underground".  I think I first became aware of vocal harmonies with Underground as I would often try to sing with the higher vocal on the chorus.  I had much more success this time.  Also love the harmonic minory bass/guitar riff on this one.  Still remember all the words I thought went to the song but most likely aren't actual lyrics.  I never could figure out what Colin Hay was saying. 

The one odd track on this side, even when I was a kid was "Helpless Automaton" which was sung by Greg Ham, the instrumental heavyweight behind Men At Works music (think sax part for Who Can it Be Now, flute part for Down Under and keyboard parts for everything).  It's a fun tune, very phrenetic with inventive instrumental parts.  It also screams 80s sci-fi, Blade Runner and the like.

The second side on this album got less play in my day.  "People Just Love to Play with Words" was always a fun listen but "Be Good Johnny" was my favorite.  I had forgotten how cool the intro was and I must not have been the only one for the intro to the final School of Rock song with Jack Black was based heavily on the Men At Work song.  Listen to them back to back and you'll see what I mean.

The other three tracks on this side, "Touching the Untouchables", great slow groove ala first Dire Straits album with a great sax/guitar descending line, "Catch a Star" sort of a slow groove reggae type of thing (again, very 80s), and "Down by the Sea", kind of a trippy tune that is very well crafted but the three songs here are filler when it comes to the stronger tracks of Who Can it Be, Down Under and Be Good Johnny. 

Wanting to fully relive my trip back to 4th grade I'm going to want to pull out Cargo and give that a listen as well but the kids have friends over, are using Sculpey clay and I'm going to have to save that one for another day.