We're Not Who You Think We Are
Album: I’m The Man
Year: 1979
Fuck yeah, “I’m The Man!”
It goes without saying that my favorite Joe Jackson song is the raver that that gave his second album not just its title, but its reason for existing.
With guitarist Gary Sanford frantically throwing out chords while drummer David Houghton and all-time killer bassist Graham Maby lay down cover fire, Jackson sets himself as the “I Write The Songs” guy of useless ephemera.
[Read more…] about Certain Songs #793: Joe Jackson – “I’m The Man”
Album: Look Sharp!
Year: 1979
When Look Sharp! debuted, Joe Jackson was almost instantly compared to Elvis Costello, not just because they were both U.K. singer-songwriters who flirted with punk rock without ever fully crossing over, but also because they wrote barbed-wired songs about relationships.
As their subsequent careers showed, of course, they weren’t anything at all alike, but in the late 1970s, I guess we could be excused for trying to sort it all out by lumping them in together. If Jackson wasn’t quite as narsty as Elvis the C, he still sported still a pretty decent lyrical edge in songs like “Fools in Love,” “Sunday Papers,” “One More Time,” and the stone cold classic “Is She Really Going Out With Him?”
[Read more…] about Certain Songs #792: Joe Jackson – “Is She Really Going Out With Him?”