Album of the Week

I like Van Halen as much as the next guy, but I've never been a die-hard fan. Still, out of the entire VH catalog, this is the album I first became intimately acquainted with, having bought it when it first came out 22 years(!) ago and subsequently playing it to death on my Walkman® throughout my junior year of high school. I pretty much forgot about it all these years, as I never did pick it up on CD. Too busy discovering/exploring the harder stuff. Napalm Death, anyone? Right. Anyway, I happened upon a vinyl copy recently, and as I examined the cover and the condition of the record, the memories came flooding back of just how fucking ROCKING this album was. "Definitely Vinyl-Worthy" I thought, and scooped up this bit of teen nostalgia for a paltry 5 bones. And damned if it 'aint as completely balls-to-the-wall bad ass now as it was back in 1988. This one's a classic, kids, a venerable smorgasbord of perfectly poppy tunes (When It's Love, Feels So Good) sandwiched in between electrifying hard rock anthems (A.F.U. (Naturally Wired), Sucker In A 3 Piece). And just FYI, I (unfortunately) downloaded a track off the album from iTunes, impatient as I was to get the wax ripped into my hard drive, and have found the sound quality on the vinyl to be far superior to the mp3. Duuuuuh. Whatev, Francis, lighten up and crank it!