![]() The perspective is again nearly if not fully mono, which increases the importance of the instrumental separation and clarity. The album's final few songs are lyrically unfocused, or rather, inconsequential relationship observations as if Jackson's attention span on the subject was spent-though "Amateur Hour" features a lovely melody.Īgain, this Intervention reissue smokes the original in all of the ways that matter on a drum'n'bass'n'guitar driven record: sharper, cleaner transients, greater dynamic slam, and bass that digs all the way down. At the end his bitterness sharply pokes through his observational stance as he hints at his own predicament: "And the Playboy centerfold leaves me cold/And that ain't 'cause I'm a fag". ![]() scene from his particular point of view, again as an outsider. In "Don't Wanna Be Like That", Jackson paints a negative picture of the L.A. ![]() Later on "The Band Wore Blues Shirts", which has in parenthesis (a true story), Jackson paints an empty picture of being a musician in a nightclub house band. "Kinda Cute" again cuts too close to the bone of an Elvis Costello song. In "Geraldine and John" Jackson cynically observes a cheater and a break-up. The album opens with "On the Radio", a sweet revenge song that also indicates the production has softened and warmed somewhat the debut album's hard and bright edges. Jackson's follow-up I'm The Man features a cover showing Jackson as consummate flim-flam man and while the title song is about a material goods salesman, it can also be seen as Jackson getting ready to slough off the Get Sharp! "musical hula-hoops" image, though the title tune may be Jackson's pinnacle as a hard rocker. Plus the pressing quality helps produce blacker backgrounds. Cymbals chime smartly, Graham Maby's bass lines are tautly drawn, and Dave Haughton's drum kit produces slam the original blunts. It preserves a pulsing energy the original softens and diminishes. If you like the original, you'll love the reissue, which offers sharper, cleaner transients, improved transparency and focus and greater dynamics. Look Sharp! was simply but cleanly recorded in what sounds like mono. ![]() Jackson knew how to modulate the dynamics and exhibited a musical sense that indicated he was low-balling his abilities to fit the time's stripped down '50's derived musical fashion. Overall, his social commentary lacked focus and bite, while his relationship songs came across as bitter. On the Reggae rhythmed "Fools in Love" Jackson is a cynical outsider looking at love from a particularly jaundiced and needy point of view. More importantly, the music and especially the lyrics seemed derivative but boy, could the band play and cut those sharp-edged rhythms! Songs like "Sunday Papers" covered familiar territory but the hook on "Is She Really Going Out With Him?" dug in and the songs were generally tightly sprung and well crafted though "Happy Loving Couples" sounded way too much like "Less Than Zero". The picture of Jackson on the back cover of his debut Look Sharp (IR-005) just wasn't convincing. Elvis and Graham had already been there and done that. Joe Jackson's "angry young man" stance came late in the cycle and so at the time was less than fully convincing. ![]()
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