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 New wave R&B rocker drops the big one Oct 13, 2009
Graham Parker was always able to write just as smart a tune as Elvis Costello but rarley got the same notice. More loyal to his R&B roots, Parker had difficulty getting the same record deals and crowd appeal as McManus (E.C.) However, it was impossible to ignore this disc which represents Parker at his song-writing best.
Along with some pub rock touches left over from his preceeding albums, Parker branches out into experimental pop territory here. An interesting use of re-verb on Love Gets You Twisted, hook-laden pop with humerous social commentary on Local Girls (also exists as a sardonically funny video), another excursion into reggae influenced pop on Protection with intense lyrics of political overthrow. Parker's previous attempt utilizing reggae touches - Don't Ask Me Questions- and later songs - The Girl Isn't Ready - shows a flair displayed by other R&B and Reggae artists to code switch between the genres as when Bob Marley made the switch from his early covers of R&B hits to reformulating them using reggae rhythms.
Still other songs show great inventiveness in subject matter as on Waiting for the UFO's and Discovering Japan. The record's big moment comes on You Can't Be Too Strong. Some reviewers have narowly interpreted this song as an anti-abortion plea and evidence of his conservatism. But that would be narrow-minded. More likely Parker is referring as much to the universal and timeless idea of the removal of his lover's heart as of her fetus and of the narrator's determination to put the relationship behind him. Besides, how conservative could he be if he sings about making friends with aliens and, later, championing scorned women on The Mona Lisa's Sister cd?
Simply one of the Best Feb 09, 2009
It was the summer of 1978, I was 17 and attending an "Outlaws" concert in the now defunct Cape Cod Coliseum. While waiting for the concert to begin, they were playing in recorded music. On came "You Can't be too Strong" and it was as if lightening had struck me; time slowed and my complete focus was on the song. After all these years, that moment is still vivid in my memory - what a song. The coliseum actually got a little quieter during the song and there was applause and cheers after it was over. No other song got that reaction. I and probably most everyone else at that concert most likely never heard of Graham Parker. My real musical education began that night and to this day, Squeezing out Sparks is my favorite album and every song on it is strong. Highly recommended.
Perfect in all aspects except label support Nov 07, 2008
A sublime album when initially issued, it was raised to an even higher degree of perfection by the inclusion of a complete concert. By doing this, we learned that - while the original disc delivered on the promise that had been dashed by the debacle with `Stick to Me' - the performance expertise of GPR was exposed to an even wider audience. It is amazing how close the studio and live versions of these songs are to each other.
And, the song themselves are exemplary! Ranging from anti-establishment angry and alienation through wisdom derived from the knowledge that love is all that really matters to the most emotional and succinct statement against abortion, there is not a bad one included. Even the encores from the live shows pop off the disc; the Jackson Five's `I Want You Back' forces you to your feet to dance. But, `Mercury Poisoning' makes you rise in anger at the incompetence of Mercury Records, one of the least capable labels to support rock. We'll never know how much that label was responsible for the commercial failure of GPR.
But, Parker survived. Leaving Mercury and Rumour, he went on to a later - in some ways more interesting - career as a grand old man of rock.
0 of 1 found the following review helpful:
The Keys to the Kingdom May 16, 2008
When I first heard this album back in 1979, I was a senior in high school who knew a little about Parker and the Rumour. I was a convert right after I heard the whole album for the first time! The addition of the "Live Sparks" albums makes this one of the best collections.Well worth purchasing.
2 of 2 found the following review helpful:
Sparks create explosions Mar 22, 2008
This is both Graham Parker's best album and a high point of the late seventies. After three exceptional albums of pub-rock and northern R'n'B inflected rock that failed to detonate commercially, Parker took the Rumour and his new work to Arista Records and set out on what he knew was make or break. He'd already seen Elvis Costello make commercial inroads with some of the same concepts he'd been exploring back on Heat Treatment and Howlin' Wind, yet - according to the revealing liner notes - The Rumour was failing to catch fire on the new material until producer Jack Nitzsche told them to get serious and play the songs for what they were.
The result was an album of such brute force that Parker has yet to best it, and it became his breakthrough in the year of Armed Forces and Look Sharp!. Fed by genuine anger and the energy of the ascending New Wave, the songs on "Squeezing Out Sparks" burn everything from Hiroshima ("Discovering Japan"), the drug-infested bar scene and the wanna-be hipsters crawling through it ("Saturday Night Is Dead") to abortion in all its contradictory facets ("You Can't Be Too Strong").
Parker also courses with anger on this album. His disdain for his lack of perceived deserved success doubles as the fuel for such wounded love songs as "Passion Is No Ordinary Word" and "Nobody Hurts You." At one point, he gets so fed up that he longs for the aliens to just get him the heck offa this planet ("Waiting for The UFO's," or as Parker pronounced them "You-foes"). He and the Rumour coated all of these songs with spiky hooks and inventive playing (the twisted riffing on "Japan" in particular), making all of these songs sing-along ready. "Local Girls" even became something of a radio hit, one of the rare moments that radio embraced Parker's music.
The bonus delight comes with another of those moments. Adding the rare "Live Sparks" concert shows Parker and The Rumour on fire, barely venturing from the album arrangements. The extra two songs were live versions of his single "I Want You back/Mercury Poisoning" (which was available as a bonus 45 with the original LP). Remember about that anger? In "Mercury Poisoning," Parker takes an unsheathed shot at his former label, sneering "I've got a dinosaur for a representative; it's got a small brain and refuses to learn." It's a classic punk rock moment, on a par with the Pistol's "EMI."
Great stuff all around. While Graham Parker has made several more albums in the years following "Sparks" (recommended are The Real Macaw, Steady Nerves and the recent Don't Tell Columbus), he began to slowly mellow his music into an almost folk-rock articulacy. As a document of the kind of sea-change that occurred as the 80's kicked in, "Squeezing Out Sparks" is indispensable.
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