THE BLOW MONKEYS are back! The first time I featured them, it was on one of the last days of "The Music Conflux", which is currently still active in order to redirect visitors to my new home over at "The Music Spectrum". 1988's "Whoops! There Goes The Neighborhood" had been the one I had talked about, but the album that has really been in my heart for so long also happens to be my favorite BLOW MONKEYS album of all—1987's "She Was Only A Grocer's Daughter". Just how do they come up with the titles to these albums? Was Dr. Robert in the supermarket one day and had a run in with the owner's daughter while he was standing in the checkout lane? As much as I've been opening myself up to other jazz-pop music from the 80's for about the past week, I needed to come back to this one for a while, because every time I get going with this style of music, THE BLOW MONKEYS and all of my memorable hits from this album rush to my attention and become a constant companion again. There's a trio of hits right now that I have in my 'Feelgood Mix' playlist—"It Doesn't Have To Be This Way", "Some Kind Of Wonderful" and "Checking Out"—but I may as well add them to a new playlist called the 'Addiction Mix' because it seems like every couple of days now, I have to hear at least one of these or I'll experience the symptoms of some sort of musical withdrawal, if that's such a thing. One more time: I have to blame it on the jazz. "It Doesn't Have To Be This Way", whose reprise I forget about near the end of the album in the form of a beautiful 6+ extended remix called "This Is The Way It Has To Be", has a terrific saxophone accompaniment just about for the duration of the entire song.....and just a terrific beat period. In the first four measures (now I'm using that songwriter's terminology), you can tell right away it's gonna be a good one! Same sentiments about "Some Kind Of Wonderful", but right before the blaring jazz sounds of the trumpets explodes to life, there's some cool keyboard rolling leading up to it that adds an exciting flair to the introductory instrumentals. My favorite part of this song are the background vocalists—the group that sings the 'So wonderful' lyrics in the main chorus, then the hearty solo of the guy who sings 'some kind of wonderful' once in the middle of the song and again near the end before he concludes the song with a 'whoa whoa whoa'. And there's so many things I love about Checking Out". The beat, for starters. Then there's the inclusion of the organ, the nifty piano interlude, the way that the ladies on background vocals sing 'check-check-check-check check it out, check it out, baby' in the main chorus and that blaring saxophone again to take the song all the way up to its fade out. And I always forget that the corresponding extended remix to it is Track #13's "The Grantham Grizzler". I have no idea why it's been titled that, because it is somewhat misleading into making the casual listener believe it's a completely different track. Perhaps it was inspired by a bizarre dream that Dr. Robert had about Batman fighting criminals who looked like grizzly bears in Gotham City? I get into all three of those songs so much that, at times, I may neglect many of the other great hits found on this album. Like the slower-tempo tune "Out With Her" (there's something I really like about Dr. Robert's voice in this one), "How Long Can A Bad Thing Last?" (outstanding vocals for this song as well), "Man At The End Of His Tether" (I believe this is the only song I've ever heard where the now-archaic word 'tether' is sung in the lyrics) and another one of those pre-90's dance jams that transported back in time to the 80's, "(Celebrate) The Day After You":
1. It Doesn't Have To Be This Way
2. Some Kind Of Wonderful
3. Out With Her
4. How Long Can A Bad Thing Last?
5. Man At The End Of His Tether
6. Rise Above
7. (Celebrate) The Day After You
8. Checking Out
9. Don't Give It Up
10. Cash
11. Beautiful Child
12. This Is The Way It Has To Be
13. The Grantham Grizzler
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