Have You Heard?: Rough Trade's "FOR THOSE WHO THINK YOUNG" [1981]

This is another one of those tracks that HERC only heard on the radio once on a Sunday Night via "Virgin Vinyl" or "New Music Test Department" or whatever the heck it was called.

The song's music is from Steely Dan's old-school, a kind of electro snazzy jazz. Singer Carole Pope is suitably smoky and worldly sounding, all smart and feisty, challenging the vocabulary of the listener. Behind her, making all the noise is Kevan Staples, the yang to Pope's ying although they used studio musicians to fill out their sound. They hailed from Canada, eh, and had released two albums as Rough Trade before HERC ever heard of them. The album prior was titled Avoid Freud and the duo planned on calling their next one for those who think jung before the label honchos dumbed it down and capitalized it.

HERC picked up this album in 1982, after hearing the title song on the radio one Sunday night, at the college-area record emporium known as Al Bum's which was literally just a few blocks down the same street as his high school so he could walk or ride the city bus if he was lazy. His copy is of the gold-stamped For Promotion Only - Not For Sale variety so keep that bit of info under your hat. They usually stocked such promos for half the price of a still shrink-wrapped new copy of the same album. Through his high school years and his college years - the University was literally right across the street from Al Bum's, which was next door to a convenience store on one side and a sandwich shop on the other side so most lunches were hurriedly eaten so as to have maximum browsing time in the bins.

The entire album is actually a fairly decent slice of new wave-ish pop with slightly dark lyrical undertones similar to Soft Cell's Non-Stop Erotic Cabaret although maybe more highbrow, "guess what we're talking about" rather than red-light district vulgar.  What they were talking about was sexual politics although they probably never dawned on most listeners. Pope was in a relationship with British soul priestess Dusty Springfield at the time and Ms. Springfield provides backing vocals on the album.

HERC's favorite track from the album is "All Touch" which happened to be the first single up in the Great White North (and the only Hot 100 charting single here in the States where it peaked at #58; "For Those Who Think Young" was actually the third single released in Canada. The year before, Rough Trade stirred up a wee bit of controversy with the openly lesbian lyrics of "High School Confidential".

The band's entire six-album catalog is available for streaming on Spotify U.S. though I regret that I cannot speak for other countries. The album For Those Who Think You Young and the 45 "All Touch" were the only American releases from the band though being adjacent to Canada makes it easier to track down the rest of their music on vinyl, including a somewhat hard to find extended remix of "All Touch" as a b-side on a later twelve-inch single. If you missed Rough Trade the first time around like HERC almost did, give them a listen and let HERC know what you think.

A Summer Smoothie Recipe from the intern after listening to the album for the first time: