.
http://www.rollingstone.com/assets/images/album_review/6a027954488fa9d625266196c9dde571ea778b1b.jpg Cheap Trick

Cheap Trick

Cheap Trick

Rolling Stone: star rating
Community: star rating
5 0 0
December 25, 1997

The full-strength return of the original Fleetwood Mac — the late-'6os British blues gods who made roughneck-pub mayhem out of the Elmore James and Jimmy Reed song-books — would have been a comeback worth celebrating. The Dance is just the Lindsey Buckingham-Stevie Nicks lineup serving microwaved Rumours. For a live album, The Dance runs on low heat, as if the Mac were content to merely revisit the hits rather than truly reinhabit them — and risk going deeper into the emotional dysfunction that inspired the songs. And there are no fresh kicks in the four new originals, certainly none that beat Buckingham's extremely caffeinated rereading of 1987's "Big Love." More than 25 million of you already own copies of Rumours, Tusk and Tango in the Night. Think hard: Do you need this?

 

You may figure you don't need Cheap Trick, either, especially if you're still steamed about those power-ballad records the band made in the '80s. But give this one time and volume; you'll come to love it. The title and black-and-white cover evoke the napalm-in-stereo glories of the original Cheap Trick album, the group's 1976 debut. Yet the dark heart and barbed-guitar snag of this Cheap Trick sneak up on you: the white-knuckle creep of "You Let a Lotta People Down," Robin Zander's shredded-Lennon bellow in "Yeah Yeah." More toxic-guitar ravers like "Baby No More" would have been cool, but that's a minor beef. After all this time, these guys have still got it. You should get it.

prev
Album Review Main Next

ADD A COMMENT

Community Guidelines »
loading comments

loading comments...

COMMENTS

Sort by:
    Read More

    Music Reviews

    more Reviews »
    Daily Newsletter

    Get the latest RS news in your inbox.

    Sign up to receive the Rolling Stone newsletter and special offers from RS and its
    marketing partners.

    X

    We may use your e-mail address to send you the newsletter and offers that may interest you, on behalf of Rolling Stone and its partners. For more information please read our Privacy Policy.

    Song Stories

    “Help Me”

    Joni Mitchell | 1974

    Joni Mitchell wrote and recorded this song for her album Court and Spark, but she had to switch from her regular band to make the song sound exactly the way she wanted. "I had attempted to play my music with rock & roll players," she told Rolling Stone. "They’d laugh, 'Awww, isn't that cute? She's trying to teach us how to play.'" Mitchell switched to a jazz band, Tom Scott’s L.A. Express, and scored the biggest hit of her career in the process.

    More Song Stories entries »