Customer Reviews

Fantastic

5 star:		(17)
4 star:		(11)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Stuck in traffic? Got in a fight with a loved one? Somebody spilled beer on your favorite hotpink t-shirt?

This album will take all of that pain away and more.

Such issues as unemployment and teen pregnancy were never fun to dance to...until now! Say what you will about George Michael, but in my opinion, he is one talented man. Buy this.

Although it's only 8 songs deep, "Fantastic" is simply a fantastic album, I only wish that Wham's later albums would have been as good as this one. What makes "Fantastic" a good album is because it so much seemed to be about having fun and a good time. Songs like "Come On," "Ray of Sunshine," "Love Machine," Club Tropicana," and "Wham rap," just make you want to get up and dance. Although this album was released in the early 80's, it still has a late 70's disco vibe going on. The one ballad on the album, "Nothing Looks The Same In The Light," is classic. If you didn't become a Wham fan until their second album, be sure to check out this one too. It's a bit short but it's very sweet!

This is where it all started. This is the album that made me fall in love with the 'Boys from WHAM!' Althought they would not top the US charts until their next LP, this one still remains my favorite. Featuring the club classics "WHAM! Rap (Enjoy What You Do)", "Young Guns (Go For It)", "Club Tropicana", and the minor US success "Bad Boys", this album never lets the party end.

Besides the four brilliant singles, the album features the Motown classic "Love Machine" (a former hit for the Miracles) as well as the WHAM! classic "A Ray of Sunshine", probably one of George Michael's better pieces of work to date. This album is a must for anyone who loves the party music of the 80's, and for those of us who lived though the era, welcomes a happy return to days where things were so much brighter (could be the florescent colors we all wore back then!!).

The debut album of two Brits set out to be one of the defining pop-bands in the 80's. This was the first vinyl album I bought.

The songs are all great - excellent fun and dance records. Nothing like the serious Georg Michael of today (who shouldn't be embarrassed today that he recorded this album).

I rate 'Bad Boys' and 'Young Guns (Go For It)' as some of the best singles ever released, 'Club Tropicana' is not my personal favorite (but has an excellent video!) and 'WHAM! Rap' is a classic.

But the songs 'Nothing Looks The Same In The Light' and 'A Ray of Sunshine' are classics too! A must for a every fan of '80s pop and dance music!

If you can afford it, try to get a european version of this album, since you will get remixes of 'A Ray Of Sunshine', 'Love Machine' and 'Nothing Looks The Same In The Light', which extends the album to well over 50minutes of fantastic (George and Andrew were quite modest with their title:-)

Wham!'s 1983 debut album "Fantastic" was released when George Michael was just 20 years old, & it demonstrates conclusively that he already had an incredible knack for writing and crafting catchy songs. George and his partner Andrew Ridgeley had a "rebel" image going at this time--admittedly, you'd have to be nuts to take all of the over-the-top "tough guy" posturing on here seriously (something that George Michael himself would be the first to admit), but at the same time, it sure does offer a load of amusement value, and when you add to this the huge hooks and crisp, high energy dance-pop performances (including Michael's enthusiastic vocals) on track after track, the result is an album that, for the most part, is so irresitibly fun it's almost beyond belief. The laugh-out-loud hilarious "Young Guns (Go For It)" and the hilariously anthemic "Wham Rap (Enjoy What You Do)" both put Michael's already excellent falsetto vocals on display, and despite a little bit of grating synth on the former & excessive repetitiveness on the latter, they're both massively catchy. "Wham Rap" is actually a comment on what Michael viewed as a general lack of aspirations/ hopefulness among English people; it's intended to be tongue-in-cheek, encouraging people to, as Michael put it, "get off their asses", & the track really hits the nail on the head. Also massively catchy are "Bad Boys" and "Club Tropicana", the latter of which is still uptempo, but mellower and without the posturing. Wham!'s obvious disco influence comes through on "A Ray of Sunshine" and "Come On"--both of which are really catchy--as well as a rather needless, but respectable cover of the Miracles' "Love Machine". Unfortunately, the album's one ballad, "Nothing Looks the Same In the Light", is quite a drag--musically, it's quite thin with a dull, minimal melody, and it's excessively dragged out--still though, it does have a certain contemplative quality and provides a bit of a hint of the excellent ballads Michael would subsequently deliver. Andrew Ridgeley has been tagged as having been Michael's "silent parter" in Wham!, but to be fair, Ridgeley is credited for co-writing "Wham Rap" and "Club Tropicana" with Michael, plus he played guitar on all but one track. Of course, George Michael evolved a lot in subsequent years--by all means, don't expect to find on "Fantastic" any of the kind of emotionally moving music you'll find on Michael solo records such as "Older". Still, if you've got a sense of humor and can appreciate the catchiness and craft, you'll realize this is a damn good album in its own right.

The pessimistic ballad "Nothing Looks The Same In the Light" touches upon George Michael's pervailing sense of cynicsm in romance, and his streetwise act looks rather campy all these years later. But hey, the music is still quite sleek, stylish and lots of fun. If it leaves one feeling a little empty by the CD's end, take comfort in the knowledge that all this was just Act I in Michael's career and that his level of music substance would strengthen with age(sorta). B-

I wasn't expecting a whole lot from Wham's early days. That was where I was sorely mistaken.

Right from the get-go, this album explodes onto the scene with the hilarious "Bad Boys." You'd never have thought that even George Michael could sing that high (wooo WOOO!). This song indeed sets the tone for the rest of the album.

"Love Machine" was sort of funny as well. I actually like this original "Wham! Rap" better than the '86 version, which seems to go on a bit too long. "Young Guns" was also a personal favorite of mine.

This is one of those albums that you can discover for yourself, and fondly remember your '80s music days.

Not as well known as 1983's smash US breakthrough "Make It Big," this CD is a triumph all its own. Here, George Michael introduces himself to the world through catchy pop/R&B tunes and some inventive songwriting. Here, you'll find everything from rap (Wham! was the first real British white rap group) in "Wham! Rap" and "Young Guns," to the R&B influenced "Bad Boys." Even today, it's hard to find songs that are more fun to listen to than "Club Tropicana" and "Come On." I still pop them into my CD player and get a rush driving down the freeway. They are fun, carefree party songs that are par for the course. However, remember we are dealing with George Michael, one of the best songwriters around. As such, the songs are fun, but not lightweight. The lyrics are still meaty and at times, the tracks tackle things you wouldn't expect on a debut album, espcially one written, recorded and co-produced by a 19-year! -old. Witness "Nothing Looks The Same In The Light," a vastly underrated ballad the quality of which rivals some songs being released today. Also, you'll find "A Ray Of Sunshine" taking a very quick "snapshot" look at being a 19-year-old musician. Even "Wham! Rap" covers things like welfare and unemployment. This is not a throwaway release. This is a CD that shows a brilliant singer, songwriter and producer poking his head out to see what he might be capable of. The result is a youthful, vibrant CD that has glimmers of greatness. It's no wonder George got braver and called the next CD "Make It Big." While this CD isn't the caliber of George's 1987 megaplatinum solo "Faith" CD, it's unfair to compare the two: "Faith" is about a man's growth as a person, and "Fantastic" is about two young boys having fun. In short, if you're looking for "Father Figure," this isn't it. But if you want to ret! urn to the days of your youth in the 80s, in George's words! , "Come on ... everybody... get on ... with your party ... and don't let nobody... say you're wrong..."

Out of the Wham! CD trilogy, FANTASTIC is, well, Fantastic! The 1st Wham! and George Michael release is full of songs about having fun, adolesence agnst with a musical mixture of soul, dance & pop! It even features the 1st white-boy rap song Wham! Rap (Enjoy What You Do)..Bad boys is a great, upbeat synth song..Ray Of Sunshine is a funky dance tune, Love Machine is a top notch remake of the song by The Miracles, Club Tropicana is a song that makes you feel like your at a beach resort with the band, Nothing Looks the Same in the Light is a sultry, sexy ballad, Come on is a latin mixed pop dance track and Young Guns is a cool synth pop rap song.Every song on this album is a jem..The sequence of the album is great, the mix is awesome for an album made in 1983 and is an all around excellent British pop album filled with very dancable and catchy songs...Wish Sony would release a remastered disc though with some bonus tracks like remixes and unreleased tracks...not much needs to be polished up, but some added linear notes, lyrics and extra tracks would be great to get from the classic days of George Michael...You like the 80's, great british pop, this is the perfect cd to add to your music collection along with all the other Wham! and george michael releases!!

It's true that the following years 'Make It Big' was a far

bigger US hit this debut but 'Fantastic!' is far more true to

the bands British R&B roots.While "Young Guns" and the excellent

"Wham Rap" are the hits it's the album tracks that really get

me going."Club Tropicana" is a wonderfully festive example of

catchy,uptempo funky pop and is my favorite track on the album-

VERY,VERY period Kool & The Gang but great none the less!It's

followed by the slow,seductive "Nothing Looks The Same In The

Light",my second favorite here!

If there is one complaint about this album it would

the blatant immaturity of some of the lyrics,especially on the

rap song.But George Michael's delivers them with such authority

that even I buy it,and he wasn't too far off base and nobody got hurt.It's all in clean,youthful fun!A cover of "Love Machine" gives Andrew Rigdley,always in Michael's looming shadow,a chance to shin on guitar a bit.So is this the one Wham!

album to own?Yes it is-it has the most artistic merrit and is

a good treasure from the ol' days of Britosh soul-pop with

early Spandau Ballet and Scritti Politi!So worth it!