Well, we were just another band out of Boston
On the road and tryin’ to make ends meet,
Playin’ all the bars and sleepin’ in our cars
And we practiced right on out in the street.
—from “Rock & Roll Band,” Boston
Why is it that so many of the greatest albums are debuts?
It’s no mystery. In
that long gestation before
an artist or group gives
birth to a first record,
whole lifetimes of musical
growth have likely
transpired. Influences are
absorbed, sonic
predilections sifted.
Songs are written and
scrapped. And the songs
that stick around get honed—performed
and improved along the way
until they’re
burnished to a high gloss.
All those lifetimes burst
forth on great debuts.
Before they finally got
into a studio, The Beatles
played hundreds of hours
live (in Hamburg between
August 1960 and May 1962
they played three sets a
day six days a week.) They
recorded their first LP in
one day (which is why John
Lennon’s voice
sounds ragged on the final
take, Side 2’s last
cut, “Twist and
Shout.”) Similarly,
Led Zeppelin recorded
their first album in
roughly 36 hours.
Diamonds need
pressure—ambition,
competition, adversity.
They also need time.
Here’s a time for you: August 25, 1976. Ah, that date! That’s the day
the self-titled album by a group called Boston began enriching the
world. It’s hard to imagine a time before it.
When Boston unleashed its euphonic flood over the airwaves I was
nine, just old enough to be an avid radio listener who had recently
discovered the other, much better sounding bandwidth on the dial:
FM. The Summer of ’76 gave this kid so much joy. While my Mets were
moribund, the Yankees (along with the arsonists) were setting the
Bronx on fire. Every 4th of July promised the pleasures of illicit
fireworks, but the Bicentennial set a new standard. And much of the
fireworks that summer took the form of music, with no album more
pyrotechnic than Boston.
The record execs chose the opening track, “More Than a Feeling”, for
the first volley; guaranteed, it’s playing somewhere right now on an
American Rock radio station. Nearly 50 years later, the whole album
sounds so uncannily fresh that it’s hard to convey just how “new” it felt
back in 1976—the rich textures of its guitars, the sweetness of its lead
vocals and harmonies, the accomplished complexity of its songs. In
short order, Rock radio stations started spinning every tune on the
album, one lapidary hit after another:
Side 1
More Than a Feeling
Peace of Mind
Foreplay/Long Time
Side 2
Rock & Roll Band
Smokin’
Hitch a Ride
Something About You
Let Me Take You Home Tonight
On their debut, Boston was Tom Scholz on lead and acoustic guitars,
bass, organ, and keyboards; Brad Delp on lead and harmony vocals
and rhythm guitar; Barry Goudreau on rhythm and lead guitars,
particularly the solos on “Long Time” and “Let Me Take You Home
Tonight;” Fran Sheehan on bass guitar; and Sib Hashian on drums and
percussion.
More than anyone, though, Boston is Tom Scholz. He wrote or co
-wrote all the songs (except “Let Me Take You Home Tonight,” written
by Brad Delp.) Famously, Scholz graduated with a bachelor’s and
master’s degree in mechanical engineering from the Massachusetts
Institute of Technology and had always been a tinkerer. So, along with
co-producing Boston, he recorded most of the tracks in his own studio
using devices he engineered himself. (He parlayed his patented
gadgetry behind “the Boston sound” into Scholz Research &
Development, Inc., a company that developed and made guitar
amplifiers, attenuators, compressors, and monitors.)
Let me put it another way: if you’re familiar with The Beatles and their
studio team, in Tom Scholz Boston had the equivalent of George
Harrison, George Martin, and Geoff Emerick in one person.
But then there’s that voice! Brad Delp’s singing truly merits the
accolade soaring. His voice is freakishly great, capable of sustained
strength at vocal altitudes where others would wither from hypoxia.
It’s shot through with an essentially American tone and accent. More
than that, his voice is effusively youthful; I can’t imagine the wielder of
those vocal cords ever growing old, let alone dying, which, sadly, Delp
did in 2007.
Any way you slice it, Boston is an audiophile’s delight: the musicians’
virtuosity, the breathtaking vocals, the technical production, and,
finally, the mastering of the LP and pressing on one of the best labels
when it comes to sound, Epic Records.
Let me offer a few personal barometers of how deeply this album
matters:
1. I have three copies of Boston, a pristine vinyl LP and two CD
pressings, one of which permanently resides in my ’67 Mustang, as
essential an automotive component as the tires or the steering wheel.
2. Boston is Life Soundtrack; its songs range from exuberant to
transcendent, mellow to melancholy, ass-kicking to soul-soothing. This
record has informed countless moments—and enhanced them.
3. If music could somehow become encoded in one’s genes through
repeated listenings, then all the tracks on Boston are surely woven into
the strands of my DNA.
4. If I hike one day to the top of Mount Olympus at the invitation of
the gods, I won’t be surprised in the least if they’re listening to “Long
Time” or “Hitch a Ride” when I finally arrive.
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