Perhaps more than at any other time, established bands chose the transition from the ’70s to the ’80s as a golden opportunity to reinvent themselves.
This era is when rock opted for less emphasis on guitar riffs, guitar-dominant songs, and big acoustic drums, instead preferring keyboards and synths, and drum machines. Production was also a major part of it. The advent of digital delays, reverbs and digital sampling replaced the manual, analog approach of the previous decades. Musicians had to create sounds that engineers could mic and record — manipulating those sounds with different microphone choices, mic placement, pre-amp and compression, use echo chambers and plate reverbs, not to mention the acoustic characteristics of the room in which it was recorded. Digital technology allowed production staff to simulate these things with the push of a button. As a result, there is less variance. A lot of records — even by different bands — sound quite similar. It got even worse when digital sampling replaced things like real drums. Instead of hitting a snare, musicians or production staff would “trigger” a snare sample. The result is every snare hit sounds exactly the same — and you could hear the same snare hit on countless songs by countless bands. So the whole industry becomes much more narrow in the scope of its sound.
But, it was au courant. A lot of bands felt pressure to stay relevant in the face of all the new bands breaking through each week. This is why they adapted their sound. I’ll give you a cool little playlist at the bottom of this article, but meanwhile — here’s some examples of bands who found fame in the ’70s, but really embraced a so-called ’80s sound:
King Crimson
Blondie
Genesis
Yes
David Bowie
Rush
Alice Cooper
Queen
ZZ Top
The Who
Chicago
Jefferson Airplane/Jefferson Starship/Starship
These are all pretty well-known, well-established examples. But I just picked up a record by a band which I didn’t even know made an album in the ’80s — Atomic Rooster. Headline News (1983) is a pretty fascinating artifact.
I’ve written about Atomic Rooster before, as it’s a band loaded with interesting footnotes. For example, one of their seven different drummers was a guy named Ric Parnell. In 1982, Parnell got the gig as the drummer in fictional band Spinal Tap, after telling Christopher Guest, Michael McKean and Harry Shearer that he used to be in a band called “Atomic Rooster.” This is a band which also boasted Carl Palmer and Ginger Baker among those seven drummers.
Atomic Rooster started in 1969 after Arthur Brown split with his backing band. The group formed around drummer Palmer and keyboardist Vincent Crane. Initially they had designs on starting a band with Brian Jones, who had just been turfed from The Rolling Stones. Presumably, they were interested in his name recognition and multi-instrumental abilities, because Atomic Rooster — like The Crazy World of Arthur Brown — didn’t bother with a guitarist, at least not initially. They managed to get a heavy, progressive sound through arrangements of Palmer’s drums, Crane’s keys, and the bass and lead vocals of Nick Graham. The band’s self-titled debut initially had no lead guitar on it when it came out in the U.K. in February 1970. Guitarist John Du Cann joined a few weeks later and overdubbed parts on three songs, which were slated for release on the U.S. version of the album.
The second album, Death Walks Behind You, hit the shelves by September 1970 with a new drummer, different lead vocalist and now, no bass player. Palmer quit to form Emerson, Lake & Palmer, and Graham quit because he was butthurt about Du Cann being brought in and taking over his lead vocal role. So now they were a power trio, with Crane playing bass on keys, Ray Manzarek-style. This lineup produced the band’s best-loved albums, though the next one — In Hearing of Atomic Rooster (1971) — features Pete Finch on lead vocals. Everyone but Crane was gone by the time the next album, Made In England, came out in 1972 — now featuring Chris Farlowe on vocals. Nice ‘N’ Greasy (1973) was the band’s last album until the ’80s, and featured a different guitarist. Steve Bolton had been the guitarist on Made In England, but was replaced with Johnny Mandala for Nice ‘N’ Greasy.
For those keeping score at home, that’s five albums featuring four different lead vocalists, three different lead guitarists, three different drummers, and only one album with a bass player. Crane was the only constant.
Seven years later, Crane convinced Du Cann to come back and be part of a reunion album and tour. They put out a self-titled album in 1980, but Du Cann left again before work on a followup began. Crane saw this as an opportunity to do something different with the Atomic Rooster name. Headline News is essentially a Crane solo album. It is somehow both excellent and ridiculous, both controlled and self-indulgent, and both catchy and awkward.
I have an OG Canadian vinyl pressing on Passport Records, an American label which also put out albums by FM and Judas Priest. The U.S. version was on PVC, which was a subsidiary of Passport. The U.K. original was on Towerbell Records, which appears to have had guitarist Snowy White as its biggest customer. There were also a slew of CD reissues, two of which saw the album renamed for some reason. Dutch label MCP put it out in 2004 as Future Shock and in 2005, German Ambitions repackaged it with the compilation The First Ten Explosive Years, as a two-CD set called Rebel With A Clause. These versions have bonus tracks not found on my copy — and the album is not available on Spotify. You can hear it on YouTube, though:
Crane handles lead vocals on every track, in addition to keyboards and synths and synth bass. The only other member of Atomic Rooster on the album is drummer Paul Hammond, who last recorded with Crane on the classic albums Death Walks Behind You, and In Hearing Of Atomic Rooster. Otherwise, the album features a handful of session players and guest musicians — most notably, Pink Floyd’s David Gilmour on four of the album’s nine tracks. There’s no missing him, in full 1978 solo album form.
To be part of the album, Gilmour would have needed to go to Crane’s house in Maida Vale, West London. This is where it was recorded, on a mobile unit run by Tom Newman, who also did Mike Oldfield’s Tubular Bells. This is a much better record, FYI. Gilmour was recording Pink Floyd’s The Final Cut during this same time period, and probably looked forward to the Rooster sessions. He and Roger Waters were no longer getting along and the tense, fractured sessions led to the two men working on their parts separately, with different engineers. His next project would be his sophomore solo album, 1984’s About Face.
The other guitarists on the album are John Mizarolli (Ginger Baker) and Bernie Tormé (Gillan, Ozzy Osbourne). Hammond plays Yamaha electronic drums — early days of the gear, developed by Yamaha, Roland and Pearl after Simmons launched the first commercial version of the technology in 1978. Crane’s wife Jean is on the record, too — providing some backing vocals, but mostly lyrics for three of the tracks.
In the end it sounds like something which wouldn’t seem out of place on the soundtrack for the animated film Heavy Metal. There are some Ultravox-like moments, but really it sounds pretty unique — and nothing like Atomic Rooster. This sounds like a man making his debut studio album, rather than what was actually his eighth. This was it for Atomic Rooster as a studio band. Crane’s next project was joining up with Fleetwood Mac founder Peter Green in Kathmandu, and then a stint in Dexy’s Midnight Runners. He died of an overdose of painkillers on Valentine’s Day, 1989 — just 45 years of age.
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Area Resident is an Ottawa-based journalist, recording artist, music collector and re-seller. Hear (and buy) his music on Bandcamp, email him HERE, follow him on Instagram and check him out on Discogs.
