Customer Reviews

One Night In America

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

 

 

As Peter Case indicates in the liner notes to this CD, you just need to hear the Plimsouls live to really appreciate how good this band really was. This show, from a 1981 gig (Cleveland?), highlights the band at its raw best - live in concert! It wouldn't do this disc justice to mention highlights as the ENTIRE disc rocks from start to finish, including my personal favorite "A Million Miles Away". Concerned about how good the quality might be from a show that was taped 24 years, ago? Don't be? The sound quality is excellent and the rawness of the sound makes you feel like you're right there in the front row. If you're a Plimsouls fan or a fan of the L.A. punk scene of the early 80's, get this CD now. You will NOT be disappointed. Turn the dial up on this baby. This thing cranks!

And to top things off, Peter indicates there's another disc coming next year. Next year can't come fast enough.

Somewhere on Tour, Maybe Cleveland, One of Many,Many Nights that all flow into One. The Plimsouls were on a Stage. Well, we got lucky at last !!! The Energy of One of those Nights, is Captured Right here on CD. YAAAH !!!

This was the 80's that Nobody told you about, the Smelly, Sweaty Nights of Live Rock Bands that played in these Dark Little dives for Lot's of Fame but little Fortune.

And the Songs: "A Million Miles Away", "Time Won't Let Me", "Hush, Hush", "In this Town" ...This Music is PURE and it's American. This Music was Played in 1966 and somebody will be out there in 2026 Playing it all over again, thank you Peter, Lou, Eddie and David-O for letting us Peek into your World...

This is a very Cool CD...

If you were a complex multi-celled being in the early '80s (i.e., more than just a sperm and egg), you probably recall "A Million Miles Away," the most ubiquitous radio and movie soundtrack (Valley Girl, The Last American Virgin) hit from The Plimsouls. But like The Knack, Cheap Trick and other guitar rock bands lost in the sea of synthy '80s new wave, The Plimsouls were best heard live. So here's your chance until the boys down in the lab get the flux capacitor into the Delorean to send you back to 1981.

This is the long-overdue cd issue of the plimsouls live album.
In short, this release is the release that fully does the Plimsouls justice. Purchase this album.

As for Mr. Eric Brown - who seems to feel the need to express the same "Paul Collins-is-amazing" sentiment on an any Paul Colins related project (even asking why Paul Collins is NOT on the release if he's not included on a random power pop comp?!?)-
why not just start a Paul Collins page instead of cutting and pasting the same generic Paul Collins piece about his acheivments, blind to the release you you're (not) critically commenting on.

I don't think you've ever commented on any of these releases except noting what Paul Collins has done. And that he was in
The Nerves with Peter Case of The Plimsouls.

It's one of the great mysteries of Plimsouls' history, well, maybe for Plimsouls completists, anyway. In the liner notes to the 2005 reissue, Peter Case says he thinks it was recorded in Cleveland, but that's all there is. Which got me to wondering ... .

I'm pleased to report that this album was most definitely recorded at the Phantasy Nite Club in Lakewood, Ohio, a near-in suburb on the west side of Cleveland, on a coldish, rainy night, probably in the fall of 1981 or perhaps in early 1982. The theater was formerly a restaurant that had a pirate's ship built into it--which survived the transition to a music venue. I saw "A Hard Day's Night" there in 1964 when it was the Homestead Theater and visited the Phantasy a number of times to see/hear live music.

So how do I know this is THAT show? It was broadcast live on a program called "Rock Around the Block," over one of Cleveland's FM stations, WWWM--M105. I taped it on my cassette deck that night since I couldn't get to the show, which was only a couple of miles from my house at the time.

The show was taped while the band was promoting its self-titled first album, and well before the second album was recorded based on between-song banter from Peter Case to the crowd. In fact, in introducing "A Million Miles Away," he says, "This isn't on a record or anything...." The song was later released as a single before appearing on "Everywhere At Once" in 1983.

I've treasured and played that old cassette pretty regularly for 30 years now. My tape includes "Every Day Things," "Women" and "Zero Hour" from the first album that didn't make it to this CD, and the song order on the CD is tweaked just slightly from the actual show. Their encore that night was a great, unexpected cover of Elvis' "King Creole." I'm happy to say that the 2005 reissue sounds LOTS better than my old tape and represents what a hot, ripping show this really was. The overall dynamics and gritty edge to those crunching dual guitars, especially, make this newer version literally jump from the speakers. Louder is definitely better here.

Don't know if the band knew it, but their inclusion in this set of the Outsiders' classic, "Time Won't Let Me," was a great shout out to this hometown band, which charted this song nationally (#5) in 1966.

This CD is a must-have for all Plimsouls fans and anyone who loves raw and hard, swinging, live rock n' roll. It's a great testament to the energy and enthusiasm that was rebirthing rock--post New Wave--in the late `70s and early `80s, while mining some of the great tunes that inspired the band. It's highly underrated and unknown to most but stands as one of the best live rock albums ever.

LA's short-lived but glorious run of The Plimsouls is documented by this loud and proud, high energy concert recording, made in 1981 and left in a bag in guitarist Eddie Munoz's closet. It runs through 13 songs, mainly from the band's Planet Records' debut album, four covers and an early version of The Plimsoul's signature "A Million Miles Away."

"One Night In America" offers evidence of the excitement that the whole LA's New Wave burst of the late 70's brought to music and just why so many fans wait crazy for the energy generated there. The band plays its heart out, Peter Case howls and yowls like a pop/blues man on fire (at his best on "I Want What You Got"), and the fans cheer in classic bar-appreciation style. When you hear the stinging hooks of songs like "Now" or "This Town," you have to wonder why The Plimsouls never broke out.

The Oglio re-issue of the import Fan Club CD is a sonic upgrade from the somewhat harsh original, and adds a bonus track, "Sorry." Peter Case adds new liner notes and a promise of more to come (One can hope for maybe his solo work, as well!). Well worth the upgrade.