In a recent smackdown bitch slap Chartburn discussion that will be published tomorrow, we had cause to discuss the merits of “She’s a Beauty” by the Tubes. I won’t disclose the consensus, because we’d rather all of you read the post and not rely on my Dose-opedia version. Suffice it to say that I suddenly had an urge to revisit the band’s work. I avoided the earlier and — some would rightly say — weirder stuff like “White Punks on Dope,” and aside from a solitary spin of my vinyl version of The Completion Backward Principle (1981), I didn’t swim too far into the dangerous waters where the deadly David Fosters lurk (even though that’s where all their best material is floating).
First up was the Todd Rundgren-produced Love Bomb, a recording that is wildly uneven, even for a band that prided itself on unevenness. (”Wild Women of Wongo”? “Attack of the Fifty Foot Woman”? Issues, anyone?) There wasn’t much to say about the album. I liked the tune “Piece by Piece,” but you could get that on the Tubes’ 1992 best-of compilation, so memory lane tends to be awfully unkind to ol’ Love Bomb.
