a-ha - Scoundrel Days POLL

"The Swing of Things," the end.

Hmm. I love 'The Swing Of Things', but while it's undoubtedly part of a fuckin' excellent one-two punch that opens this album very strongly, it's not one of the six (six!) songs that I'm trying to narrow down to my final choice!

For me, it's between: 'Scoundrel Days', 'I've Been Losing You', 'Manhattan Skyline', 'Cry Wolf', 'The Weight Of The Wind' and 'Soft Rains Of April' (for some reason 'Soft Rains Of April' sounds like it could have been a late-period Smiths song... there's something about Harket's voice on the track that sounds Morrissey-like to me)

'Maybe, Maybe' probably my least favourite song here.

That opening one-two-three punch though

please nooooooooooowwwwww
talk to me!
tell meeeeeeeeeee
things I could find help-fuuuuuuullllll

This album is perfect IMO

xxpost:

Actually, yeah, it is a one-two-three punch isn't it?

I love it how the synth line at the beginning of the title track reminds me of Depeche Mode's 'Black Celebration'... Scoundrel Days was only released over half a year after Black Celebration, so I can't help wondering if it was a direct inspiration.

I love 'The Swing Of Things'...it's not one of the six (six!) songs that I'm trying to narrow down to my final choice!

Weirdo.

This album is perfect IMO

― I Am Curious (Dolezal) (DJP), Wednesday, September 9, 2015 4:26 PM (26 seconds ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Agreed! For me, this is easily their masterpiece and it's frustrating that it's the first album that gets the most attention because as a start-to-finish album experience, Scoundrel Days is leagues ahead IMO. Hunting High and Low has its fair share of peaks, don't get me wrong, but I think Scoundrel Days is far more consistent.

This whole album is a stunner, but c'mon for real...The Swing of Things is like a gift from the universe to humans.

"The WEight of the Wind" is the only annoyance imo. Not that fond of the metallic guitars in "Manhattan Skyline" either.

"Maybe Maybe" is lovely: proto Saint Etienne.

my nomination for not-as-good-as-the-rest is "October"

(a rare instance where the song that falls entirely in my vocal range is NOT my favorite on the album)

Not that fond of the metallic guitars in "Manhattan Skyline" either.

lol that was my way in for this album back in 1987 or 1988 (whenever I bought it as a cutout). I was listening along thinking "hmm, there's nothing on here as good as Take on Me or The Sun Alwaya...OH HELLO!" This is because I was 14 and dumb, of course.

I still think that part adds a key bite to the song.

Weirdo.

― Johnny Fever, Wednesday, September 9, 2015 4:32 PM (2 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Hey man, this isn't the Brotherhood poll! :D

Don't get me wrong - as I said, I love 'The Swing Of Things', just there's other tracks on the album I love more!

The tonal/meter shift in "Manhattan Skyline" is the single most important moment on the album.

OK fine I'll play it again

Yeah, JF completely OTM about the guitars on 'Manhattan Skyline', I think that the contrast between the verses and the choruses are part of the character of the song and without the "bite", as JF put it, it just wouldn't be anywhere near the same. I remember being very surprised by it when I heard it for the first time. I've since found out that 'Manhattan Skyline' was the result of sewing together two different songs by two different writers - Furuholmen wrote the verses, while Waaktaar was responsible for the chorus.

I've just given the whole album yet another listen and still can't decide what to go for.

How come this album hardly, if ever, shows up on "best albums of the '80s" lists or whatever, anyway?

Well it never clicked in the US, so that's a whole lot of cultural air missing on the Net in general. (After all, over here they're still really only known for "Take On Me.")

Not that fond of the metallic guitars in "Manhattan Skyline" either.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=otuVawEShi4

Voted for 'I've Been Losing You', simply because that chorus has firmly wedged itself into my brain to the point that I've found myself singing it at random intervals today.

I love that the songs that end both sides feature meter shifts between the verses and chorus (plus the rhythmic subdivision in "Soft Rains of April" hit the ear as 12/8 initially before the vocal line comes in)

basically I'm a rhythm nerd

I understand the appeal, though! :D It's one of the reasons I love Pet Shop Boys' 'Yesterday, When I Was Mad', and I wish more synthpop songs featured meter shifts.

oh god YES

That meter shift is 100% the reason why YWIWM the only Very single where I like the original mix more than any of the remixes.

Yup, I completely agree - the album version is the definitive version for me and the other versions of the track I've heard feel like they weaken the track a bit.

Anyway, I've just found myself watching quite a lot of a-ha footage/interviews on Youtube from around the time of Scoundrel Days and a couple of things...

Firstly, christ did these guys do a lot of lousy UK TV shows of the type that, say, Depeche Mode wouldn't have been seen dead on in 1986 (and they weren't exactly choosy about which shows they appeared on in their earlier days either, there's some incredibly cringeworthy and/or embarrassing footage in the archives, though they'd definitely learned from it by the time Anton Corbijn entered the picture) ... That a-ha were marketed to teenagers is hardly a surprise to me, but it's still a bit of a shame to see them participating in these incredibly slight interviews where the focus is more "LOL, check out these Norwegian teen idols" than on their music. Personally, I can't help but think when I watch this stuff "hang on, they've made a really great record here, why aren't you talking about that?" ... The band seem a little bit uncomfortable/embarrassed with it all, particularly Paul, and I wonder how much the promotion of the band around this time was down to the management/label, or whether or not it's something that the band themselves actually wanted.

Secondly, Magne Furuholmen comes across as an extremely down-to-earth and funny guy, and out of the three of them is quite possibly the best spokesman for a-ha. He strikes me as the one member of a-ha that it would be the most fun to hang out with. Paul, even though the "main" songwriter in a-ha, is so quiet that you could easily forget he's there half the time in those '80s interviews, although he definitely seems to have become more comfortable in an interview situation in recent years and I can't help but think that this is down to the fact that people tend to talk about the music more nowadays.

Absolute class.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uab7G15MSrc

I discovered this album thanks to ILM's proselytizin' three years ago.

My contribution:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XZhy1JHg1x8

I love that part in 'Cry Wolf' where Morten's voice suddenly gets a bit raspy: "You can start but you cannot stop/you give in but you CAAAAAAN'T give up" - there's also a meter shift in that song too, but a far more subtle one where there's the occasional bar of 2/4 thrown in post-chorus.

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

For me this was between 'Scoundrel Days', 'The Swing of Things', 'I've Been Losing You', 'Manhattan Skyline' and 'Soft Rains of April'. Eventually went with the title track, mainly because it made such an impression on me as a youngster. I don't think I've ever been so in love with a song since. But could easily have voted for any of the others.

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

did "Cry Wolf" get any American MTV play? It did next to nothing on the Hot 100.

I don't know, but here in the UK, a-ha were still very much faring well on the charts - 'I've Been Losing You' and 'Cry Wolf' were both Top 10 hits and the album made it to #2 on the album chart. 'Manhattan Skyline' missed the Top 10, though. It's one of the reasons I'm so surprised that the album isn't as highly regarded as I feel it should be, because it wasn't as if Scoundrel Days was a flop here and you'd think it would be highly regarded by British listeners/critics, but for some reason or other it doesn't seem to be and the record is as much of a cult favourite for British listeners as it is for American ones.

Cry Wolf got a lot of play in the Twin Cities

Bumping this because I am listening to this album right now and it still rules

The opening trio! My god.

I don't actually remember how "October" goes now, lol (currently on "I've Been Losing You" which is still genius)

Indeed to all of this.