Sunday, December 31, 2023

The Meteors - Teenage Heart (1980 PVC)

One more for 2023.  This is the first LP from Dutch denizens, The Meteors, a six-piece no less.  Released in their homeland in 1979, Teenage Heart didn't land on Yankee shores until a year later, with a considerably re-sequenced tracklist, yet surprisingly a far superior album sleeve. If this one gives off classic, vintage power-pop vibes you're about half right. Their songs weren't necessarily of seminal stock, but nonetheless, the Meteors managed to steep Teenage's eleven cuts in a steady amalgam of pub rock, new wave and numerous variations thereof, never quite breaching into a straight-up punk threshold.  One of the two or three mouthpieces sounds like a dead-ringer for Murray Head, and while the band isn't necessarily distinctive the tunes are for the most part satisfying, especially the rambunctious "(One Hand) On the Wheel" (actually titled "My Balls Ache" on European versions of the record). Seriously, they honestly thought American audiences were that sheltered and sensitive?  Two more Meteors albums followed, Hunger and Stormy Seas, neither of which have made it to my turntable.

01. It's You, Only You
02. Hold Me Tight
03. Everything I Touch Turns Into Gold
04. Berlin
05. Orbit
06. (One Hand) On the Wheel
07. Wired
08. Teenage Heart
09. Action
10. Blitzkrieg
11. Nina

3 comments:

Aaron said...

Solid choice, this one. Picked it up at a great record shop in Columbia, MO a decade or so ago and, while, as you say, it’s not exactly a work of unparalleled genius, there is a lot of charm in their ragbag interpretations of their influences. “mein schmerz!”

Josef Kloiber said...

Thank you for this unknown dutch band.

art58koen said...

Thanks, this brings back some memories! Lene Lovich covered successfully It’s You, Only You and even had a hit with it!