Joan Armatrading - do i ever need to listen to her?

Joan is a badass boss and her singles ruled my childhood

Still feel like I'm hearing her influence on the new Nilüfer Yanya single. Time to try coining "Armatrenaissance" again :)

Happy birthday to her.

I'm familiar with Love and Affection and Drop the Pilot but only just started listening to her albums - if there's twenty better tracks than Down to Zero off her self titled then, well I look forward to them!

"I'm Lucky" and "Woncha Come Home" should (imo) be higher, Alfred

you're right

making my way through her albums and really wondering how she went so far under the radar in the US? shocked she wasn't more popular. everything sounds great (even for the era), the singles are fantastic, and even the lesser the songs are interesting. her voice is fantastic. the bands she put together are all stacked. totally ripe for a revival/reappraisal/whatever-you-want-to-call-it.

in answer to the thread's original question: yes!

“Back To The Night” has a constant for me over the last few months...a lovely warm 70’s production, superb musicianship and a great set of songs

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z7dZ9vdHsxU

classic video

Whoa...this is fantastic!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WWRt6TYDIpY

the version of "Love and Affection" in that concert is just ~beautiful~

so i just made my bi-monthly browse over to pfork and i see that her self-titled got the archive review this past sunday. which one of ya'll was it?

(haven't read the review yet, btw)

(but i'm sure it's great)

now let's petition for a full week of reviews, four per day

average normie pfork reader upon seeing that:

"can i get these on vnyl?"

The Weakness in Me is so good. Her voice as she sings “make me lie” and when she sings “I mean to hold you / tightly”. Wow.

an interesting tidbit from that review:

Joan Armatrading was still adoringly received: It went gold within a year, remained on the U.S. charts for 27 weeks, and the UK music paper Sounds named it the album of the year over Bob Dylan’s Desire and Joni Mitchell’s Hejira.

no idea she that kind of impact in the uk. i always just figured she was a cult figure everywhere.

looking up that list... and Sounds were right on the money that year, because another album is in front of Desire too

1. Joan Armatrading - Joan Armatrading
2. Hejira - Joni Mitchell
3. Royal Scam - Steely Dan

(yes, the review is great btw)

she was huge in England through the mid '80s.

i was in single digits then, so my memory's hazy.

new album's out, curious if the whole thing will be as earworm-y as the singles -- only heard them once but they still run through my head at random times. didn't love the first one but "Like" is kinda rad.

Rob Sheffield interviewed her for Rolling Stone.