Huey Lewis And The News – Sports (1983/2013) [Official Digital Download 24bit/192kHz]

Huey Lewis And The News – Sports (1983/2013)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/192 kHz | Time – 37:41 minutes | 1,50 GB | Genre: Rock, Pop, Blues
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © Capitol Records (CAP)

After two mildly successful, vaguely new-wave albums, Bay Area bar band Huey Lewis and the News (several of whose members had backed Elvis Costello on MY AIM IS TRUE) hooked up with mega-selling producer Mike Chapman and released 1983’s SPORTS. The album dominated both AM and FM radio throughout 1984, aligning it with THRILLER, PURPLE RAIN, SHE’S SO UNUSUAL, and Madonna’s early singles as definitive pop music of its era. SPORTS is genial frat-boy rock at its finest. Singles ‘The Heart of Rock and Roll,’ ‘Heart and Soul,’ ‘I Want a New Drug,’ and ‘If This is It’ comprise half of the album, and these songs have stood up to repeated listens. Hearing SPORTS today, the album still sounds surprisingly fresh, all the more remarkable when one considers how poorly other hits of the day have fared.

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Huey Lewis And The News – Small World (1988/2021) [Official Digital Download 24bit/192kHz]

Huey Lewis And The News – Small World (1988/2021)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/192 kHz | Time – 45:04 minutes | 1,93 GB | Genre: Rock
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © Capitol Records

Small World was another platinum hit for Huey Lewis & the News, but the album was noticeably weaker than their previous three records. Lewis tries to position himself as a socially conscious rocker — no less than three tracks have the word “world” in their title — writing songs about the perilous state of the environment and urging everybody to live together peacefully, since “there ain’t no livin’ in a perfect world.” Such sanctimonious and simple lyrical platitudes would be acceptable if the band had written a set of catchy pop to support them. Instead, the group decided to stretch out, exploring rootsy American music like the zydeco of “Bobo Tempo” and the bluesy “Old Antone’s.” None of the musical diversions work as well as the bouncy Top Ten hit “Perfect World.” However, “Perfect World” is the only song that ranks with the group’s best material — as “Give Me the Keys (And I’ll Drive You Crazy)” proves, the News fail to come up with hooks that rival their earlier hits. – Stephen Thomas Erlewine

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Huey Lewis And The News – Huey Lewis & The News (1980/2021) [Official Digital Download 24bit/192kHz]

Huey Lewis And The News – Huey Lewis & The News (1980/2021)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/192 kHz | Time – 31:21 minutes | 1,28 GB | Genre: Rock
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © Capitol Records

On their eponymous debut, Huey Lewis and the News essentially act as a pub rock band, turning out hard-driving covers and originals in a workmanlike fashion. While that usually makes for great club gigs, it only occasionally makes for great records, and the debut suffers from an uneven selection of material and a somewhat stiff production, mainly because the group can’t quite reproduce its sound in the studio. Even with such flaws, the album shows signs of promise, particularly in the charging “Some of My Lies Are True (Sooner or Later).”

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Huey Lewis And The News – Fore! (1986/2021) [Official Digital Download 24bit/192kHz]

Huey Lewis And The News – Fore! (1986/2021)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/192 kHz | Time – 37:33 minutes | 1,55 GB | Genre: Rock
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © EMI – EMI Records (USA)

Sports was one of the rare mainstream pop/rock albums where everything worked — the songs were catchy, the sound was inviting, and it all sounded perfect on the radio. It would have been tough for Huey Lewis and the News to match its quality with the follow-up, Fore!, and it comes as little surprise that Fore! suffers from an overdose of the very things that made Sports nearly irresistible. Where the songs on Sports were so straightforward that they seemed inevitable, much of Fore! sounds labored, particularly when the News try to write a middle-class anthem. It’s one thing to celebrate “The Heart of Rock & Roll,” but it’s quite another to proclaim it’s “Hip to Be Square,” especially if you’re supported by a chorus of football players. And “Hip to Be Square,” as well as “Stuck With You,” where a married yuppie couple can’t divorce because it would simply be too much hassle, makes Lewis’ complacent tendencies all too clear. That wouldn’t be a big problem if the songs were as catchy as “If This Is It” or “Heart and Soul,” but they aren’t, and the sound of the record is so sterile that the News no longer sound like a working band. Fore! is a reasonably enjoyable facsimile of the pleasures of Sports, yet it lacks the gleeful sense of fun that made that record, as well as portions of Picture This, so enjoyable. – Stephen Thomas Erlewine

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