It seems like the days of flipping through vast vinyl, cassette, or CD collections is a thing of the past. And while there’s no denying the convenience of having all your favorite albums on a mobile device, it’s becoming more common for recordings to get lost in the shuffle and/or completely forgotten about.
Author/journalist Greg Prato is willing to provide some assistance, with his 12th book overall, Overlooked/Underappreciated: 354 Recordings That Demand Your Attention. Inside, you will find countless albums that you may have completely forgotten about or perhaps have never even heard of before.
Starting with AC/DC’s Flick of the Switch and wrapping up with Zombi’s Surface to Air, countless styles of music are represented in between – rock n’ roll, hard rock, heavy metal, alternative, new wave, punk, hardcore, grunge, jazz, fusion, psychedelic, prog, folk, blues, funk, soul, rap, spoken word, power pop, big band, glam, experimental, instrumental, soundtracks…the list goes on and on. But the selections stay strong!
Greg Prato is a Long Island, New York-based journalist, whose writing has appearing in Rolling Stone, among other outlets. He is also the author of several acclaimed books, including Grunge is Dead: The Oral History of Seattle Rock Music, A Devil on One Shoulder and an Angel on the Other: The Story of Shannon Hoon and Blind Melon, The Eric Carr Story, and MTV Ruled the World: The Early Years of Music Video, among others.
Now available as paperback ($12.99, 256 pages), Kindle ($9.99, 287 pages), and Nook.
($9.99, 256 pages) versions.
114 Responses
RAVEN-ROCK UNTIL YOU DROP,BUDGIE-IN FOR THE KILL,TYGERS OF PAN TANG-WILD CAT,PAT TRAVERS-GO FOR WHAT YOU KNOW(live and just killin’ it!) FASTWAY-DEBUT,KICK AXE-VICES,EXTREME-PORNOGRAFFITI(NUNO BETTENCOURT IS ONE OF THE FEW THAT CAN MAKE EDDIE VH. SWEAT! JUST A MONSTER ON GUITAR,RIFFS AND SOLOS!!!!!!) non-hard rock artist’s to check out=REPLACEMENTS!!!! LITTLE FEAT, JOHN HIATT, BUDDY GUY, KENNY WAYNE SHEPHERD, ROBERT CRAY, BONNIE RAITT, LOS LOBOS, THE MAVERICKS, SOUL ASYLUM, BLASTERS,JAYHAWKS,NEIL FINN AND CROWDED HOUSE,VERVE,TERENCE TRENT D’ARBY,ANGIE STONE,MAXWELL,TORI AMOS,BUZZCOCKS,NEW BOMB TURKS,STONE ROSES,BIG STAR,THE MIGHTY CHEAP TRICK,ROCKET FROM THE CRYPT,KILLING JOKE,POSIES,JOE BONAMASSA,WORLD PARTY,THE LA’S,BADFINGER,HUSKER DU …..
Holy shit! Don’t leave anything to chance.
How about the first four albums from Armored Saint. Great albums and great live band. These guys never got any love.
Also, have to throw in Junkyard. The first two albums were terrific.
OH MY MR. TANC! Still stunned that Armored Saint didn’t get the love they deserved! Although,John Bush’s voice sure got some attention-love those Anthrax albums he sang on! Yes siree bob-the first four Saint’ albums contain ALL the ingredients for a stellar metal meal! Guaranteed to make your speakers sweat! Great call out from TANC!!!
Fastway/self titled debut
Love/Hate/Blackout In The Red Room
Judas Priest/Point Of Entry
Coverdale/Page
Motley Crue (John Corabi album)
Saigon Kick/The Lizard
Anthrax/Volume 8
Armored Saint/Revelation
DAN HALEN (real name? ) if so,you’d better be playing guitar RIGHT NOW! Very cool you listed the Corabi Motley Crue album! I immediately dug it then and still crank it up loud from time to time.Love the production on that one and a very HEAVY album for the Crue! Also,Saigon Kick is a band I am finally discovering and “THE LIZARD” is absolutely filled with smokin’ rockers,tuneful ballads,awesome harmonies all over the place,intelligent lyrics…..HUGELY UNDERRATED,THIS BAND!
It’s always interesting to read about the unheard gems & maybe discover something you missed along the way. It’s simple math really. The labels released far more records in a given time knowing that only a few would stick. It’s too hard to predict a hit vs. a flop, so it’s like throwing a handful of darts hoping for that one that makes a dent somewhere. Heavy handed promotion only goes so far. You can’t force crap down peoples throat (although they’ve tried).
Sometimes it’s a track that catches fire from an in store play sampler & then it’s arm twisted into radio ect. rotation & then you’ve got a hit. Often though there’s plenty of great bands that are just as good as the hit ones that just never get the chance to be heard.
What is kinda cool is discovering one or two many years later. Then you’ve found something new-to-you that has the familiar sound you like.
I’ll put (The) Riverdogs into that category. This trio featuring Vivian Campbell released their ST album in 1990 & it pretty much vanished. I’ve never heard it till very recently & it’s a damn good album full of melodic hard rock.
I’ll also mention Kick Axe as well. It’s a goofy name, but they put out 3 very good hard rock albums back in the 80’s.
I’ll add my thumbs up to AC/DC’s Fly On The Wall as well. It’s a damn good album that most ignore. But that’s OK. I’m so sick of hearing Back In Black & all the other beat to death tracks that it’s good to have stuff that still sounds fresh when I want to hear it.
The BACK IN BLACK comment is what I’m talking about. I’d rather hear FLY ON THE WALL as well ’cause YOU SHOOK ME……BACK IN BLACK and HELLS BELLS are all played out to the point thay they are annoying to hear. The less played out inferior stuff gives you a fill of AC/DC from that era that is somewhat fresh sounding. BORN AGAIN by SABBATH is the best example of something not very good that became a novelty item. Listen to it enough and you accept it because it is comforting to hear a signature sound less than at its best.
I maintain FLY ON THE WALL is a great album in and of itself, and not just because of the novelty of it being overlooked and underplayed. I certainly haven’t underplayed it – it’s an album I’ve listened to regularly since its release and continue to come back to. In fact, it’s one of my Top 5 Favorite AC/DC albums – for the record, here’s my Top 10:
1. HIGHWAY TO HELL
(Their very best. Beating Around The Bush was the song that made me an AC/DC fan)
2. BACK IN BLACK
(Yeah, it’s overplayed, but folks, there’s a REASON for that – it’s awesome)
3. FOR THOSE ABOUT TO ROCK WE SALUTE YOU
(Talk about underrated! No one ever mentions this album apart from the title track, and the whole thing is great – LET’S GET IT UP! INJECT THE VENOM! C.O.D.! C’mon, people!)
4. FLY ON THE WALL
(See my initial earlier post – I LOVE this album!)
5. IF YOU WANT BLOOD YOU’VE GOT IT
(Despite the notable absence of T.N.T. and Sin City, this is otherwise a near-perfect Best-Of the pre-HIGHWAY Bon era – with better versions to boot)
6. POWERAGE
(Down Payment Blues & What’s Next To The Moon should be regarded as classics way more than they are)
7. DIRTY DEEDS DONE DIRT CHEAP
(The international version with Love At First Feel, not to mention the gorgeous blues of Ride On)
8. FLICK OF THE SWITCH
(Everyone else has pretty much covered why this is here)
9. T.N.T.
(The original Australian album, filled with classics and a killer version of Chuck Berry’s School Days)
10. THE RAZOR’S EGDE
(Not so much for the hits as the others, like Fire Your Guns, Got You By The Balls & the title track. Plus, Mistress For Christmas should be a holiday standard LOL )
All just my opinion, of course 🙂
LET THERE BE ROCK and BLACK ICE are better than your 4,5,8,9 and 10. That list is very good and you get an A+ for good grammer so God be with you my friend.
Go Down and Dog Eat Dog are undeniably fantastic, but when it comes to the songs that they share, I personally don’t think LET THERE BE ROCK even comes close to IF YOU WANT BLOOD. The live versions of Rosie, Let There & Hell Ain’t all absolutely SMOKE the studio versions IMO. Rosie just isn’t the same without the “Angus!” chant, and it’s always bugged me the way Bon mixes up the “light & sound” lyric on the title track in the first verse, saying “sound” first where “light” should be – it just doesn’t sound right. For me, IF YOU WANT BLOOD is one of those live collections that completely obliterates the studio originals, becoming the definitive versions of those songs, like Kiss’s first ALIVE, Purple’s MADE IN JAPAN and Cheap Trick’s AT BUDOKAN (people sometimes forget it was the LIVE versions of Rock And Roll All Night, Smoke On The Water & I Want You To Want Me that all became hits). Another example would be Priest’s UNLEASHED IN THE EAST – I think everything on there sounds better than its original version.
On the other hand, I totally agree with you that Black Ice is a great album too, but in a Top 10 list, I only had room for 10 LOL! In truth, their only weak albums for me are Blow Up Your Video and Stiff Upper Lip (and even those have a few songs each that I like as well). Bottom line: AC/DC are just AWESOME. Take care, Richman 🙂
Overllooked albums right?
Pretty obscure, but a band called Airborne (their debut in ’79, awesome), 707’s “Mega Force,” first couple of albums from Ronnie Montrose’s band Gamma, Roxy Blue’s “Want Some,” and the first three albums from Shooting Star.
Hey Doug! I just bought the Airborne album you mentioned(awesome melodic rock with cool guitar and vocal harmonies from Heaven) and Roxy Blue’s “Want Some” which rocks like a mutha and WHO IS PLAYING THOSE LEADS? WOW! Huge thanks,Doug,for those two gems!!!!
I love Airbourne!! I think I might have turned Doug R. on to them too. Spread the word and “live it up.”
Dana from ET.com 🙂