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BACKBEAT Records

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Jagger. Watts, and Wood: somebody lit a fire

Nils liofgren: Night Fades Away

Jeflfrey Baxter, producer Backstreet BSR 251

Since 1970. when he pul the now-defunct Grin band logelher. Nils Lofgren has seemed poised on the brink of rock & roli stardom. He has all the right attri-butes: The boyish. surly good looks; the easy. eloquent voice: and the musi-cianship of a real live guitar hero. Flur-ries of sound pour forth from his instrument with a dcxterity and energy that can be truły amazing. But despite all the good signs, despite the facl that he once moonlighted as Neil Youngs right-hand man. he hasn't achieved even a modicum of success. And his new LP. “Night Fades Away.” probably won’t change that.

The title track is a m id tempo rocker with crisp, cascading guitar lines. Lofgren sings in a smooth. willowy voice, “Empty backstreets bring new life,” per-haps in homage to his new Backstreet la-bel. (He had been with A&M for seven years.) lt’sa satisfying, commercial num-ber. and for awhile it sounds like Lofgren finally has gotten it all together. But then things fal! apart—immediately and ironically with Peter and Gordon’s ’60s hit / Co (o Pieces. Although Del Shan-non. the lune’s aulhor. joins Lofgren for a vocal duet, the song gets an uninven-tive. Hat reading. The albunTs other cover. the Beatles' Anytime at All, is equally flaccid. The choice of these two Anglo pop gems indicates good taste: the performances indicate a severe lack of imagination.

Lofgrens main problem hasalways been his own materiał. Once again his songs rarely rise out of the cliched world of broken hearts. beautiful girls, and the glories of rock & roli. Empty Heart re-calls twenly other forlorn love songs that he has recorded over the past decade: In Motion offers some hackneyed and em-barrassing guitar-as-phallic symbol im-ages; Ancient History is an overlong James M. Cain scenario done to a

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bouncy rock beat.

Thanks to guitarist/producer Jef-frey Baxter. ‘‘Night Fades Away” has a sharp. focused sonie clarity. The guest spots by keyboardist Nicky Hopkins and trumpeter Chuck Findley were a good idea. And even on the weariest of com-positions, Lofgren’s guitar breaks. solos. and embellishments resound. In fact. the naturę of his talents suggests that he is best suited to a group format, where there are other songwriters and players to bounce off of. If he continues to go it alone, chan ces are Lofgren will vanish into rock oblivion. - STEVEN X. REA

Rolling Stones: Tattoo You

Glimmer Twins, producers Rolling Stones COC 16052

This limę the Stones aren't fooling around. The opening six minutes of “Tattoo You” just might get you jumping around the room pretending you're Keith Richards. which is what all greal Stones rockers should do. And there are enough inspired moments throughout the rest of the LP to put to rest all accusa-tions of premature sen iii ty. Of course. al-most every time the band is about to tour (’69. '72, 78), they rally to get some hot tracks on the radio, so the qualitative leap from “Emotional Rescue” doesn’t come as too much of a shock.

Those ftrst cuts—Start \1e Up and Hang Fire-dTC the key. The former, an ode to a girl so gifted she can make grow n men ery. is an amalgam of at least three past Stones hits, with tumbling chords. unflappable drumming, and a garbled vocal; Hang Fire is a brief. fierce piece of hard rock. The commitment is palpable. It carries over to such songs as Black L.imousine. a city blues number that tinds Mick Jagger molding his vow-els the way he did in ’65 (“baybeh”). to the blistering babble of fteighbors and to much of the slower materiał (No Use in Crying. Worried About You) that makes up Side 2.

It isn’t all so honorable: Lit tle T & A

HIGH FIDELI I Y