Looking back and listening again now to ‘Talk is Cheap’ it clearly and completely swats way any of Jagger’s solo work with seemingly very little effort- the songs are just better and Richards sticks to the basics – it’s not an album that tries to be cool, like Jagger so wanted to be, it’s an album that’s about substance over style. Of course back in the day the album was one that was really born out of Richards’ frustration with Jagger who had effectively put the breaks on the Stones to prioritise his solo tour rater than the rather patchy (if I’m honest) ‘Dirty Work’ which suffered from 80’s production values and which the star by far had been the hard-edged nature of Richards’ guitar. It sounds like an album of songs made for someone writing purely for their own enjoyment. There’s a real swing and swagger to it, a wonderful freshness and a feeling that both the gloves and the shackles are off. Remastered from the original tapes by Richards’ collaborator, Steve Jordan, this re-release sounds just as fresh as it did that day. To mark its 30th anniversary ‘Talk is Cheap’ has been reissued in five formats, the most limited of which being housed in a Fender-built case made from the identical ash wood as Richards’ Micawber Telecaster. In the stash that day were also the Belinda Carlisle album ‘Runaway Horses’ that had come in the same day and Lenny Kravitz ‘Let Love Rule.’ At the time though I was obsessed with ‘Pump’ the new Aerosmith album which had been out a few weeks and I’d snapped up the album along with the Leather Cover limited CD. I remember picking this one up on vinyl (it had to be vinyl!) at my local store on 3rd October 1988 the day of release thinking how cool it was that it had taken decades for Keith to release a solo record. Entering a record store I was just as likely to come out with a range of Blues, Punk, Goth and Old School Rock as I was the latest releases from the City of Angels. 31 years ago while I was listening to, loving and digesting the cream of the The Sunset Strip I was already without knowing it quite esoteric and rather broad in my listening habits.
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