White Animals - In the Last Days (1987, Dread Beat)

The fittingly titled parting shot for Nashville mainstays the White Animals, didn't find them going out on a crescendo, but by the mid '80s their returns were gradually diminishing anyway.  In the Last Days is perhaps the least essential album in their catalog, but not without saving graces in the from of ringing guitar pop tuneage like "You Bring the Best Out in Me," and "She's Gonna Break It."  White Animals subscribed to the most linear variant of power pop, and even that categorization was loose to begin with, but they long resisted the temptation to indulge in the souped-up studio gloss and tricky of the era.  The only exceptions to this rule might be on Last Days two covers, namely David Essex's "Rock On" and Marley's "Could You Be Loved," both of which suffer from uncharacteristic "embellishment" to put it politely.  Nothing intolerable mind you, with the latter being kinda enjoyable in modest doses.  You can check out my previous writings on 1984 Ecstasy and their penultimate self-titled disk which arrived two years later. 

01. Don't Treat Me Like a Dog
02. You Bring the Best Out in Me
03. Last Five Years
04. You Don't Know
05. Rock On
06. Lonely View
07. She's Gonna Break It
08. Could You Be Loved
09. I Thought That
10. A Prison Song

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