Various - Just Say Yesterday (Vol. VI Of Just Say Yes) mp3 album

The Sire "Just Say" series could be very good or very mediocre, depending on which acts they wanted to push at the time. This one, being material from the vaults, was cherry-picked New Wave classics that were if not completely absent from cd, darned hard to find. As such, it is an exemplary collection. The only mis-step here is including Specimen's "Kiss Kiss Bang Bang" instead of "Returning From A Journey." All of the songs are so good, it's hard to pick favorites, but here goes. The 12" version of "Nowhere Girl" has a great Ultravox feel that this band was never ashamed of pursuing - lush and dynamic. I collect Stephen Duffy and the US remix of his first single, "Kiss Me" is fey synthpop at its finest. He's since written vastly superior material but this track is undeniably catchy. Compilations like this are just meant to house loose tracks like Tim Scott's groovy "Swear" that would otherwide be lost to time & memory. Aztec Camera's acoustic cover of Van Halen's "Jump" turned a lot of heads in the day and I would imagine, it would continue in that vein today. The Undertones "Teenaged Kicks" was John Peel's favorite single and I can see a lot of people still concurring with that sentiment! Songs and performances like this were simply the reason Rock & Roll was invented! The last two cuts are actually both the same guy, Mute Records founder Daniel Miller, playing under 2 different alias. The Normal's "Warm Leatherette" was the first and best attempt to set J. G. Ballard's seminal "Crash" to music and that takes into account much of John Foxx's [my favorite artist] entire career! Phew! Brutally minimal synthpunk doesn't get much more minimal than this!http://postpunkmonk.wordpress.comFor more ruminations on the Fresh New Sound Of Yesterday