I.R.S. Greatest Hits Vols 2 & 3 (IRS Records/1981)

I.R.S. Records was one of the most influential American record labels of the New Wave era. International Record Syndicate was the brainchild of Miles Copeland III (older bother of Police drummer Stewart). Copeland founded the British record labels Illegal Records and Faulty Products in 1977 and 1978, respectively. He had previously established a relationship with A&M Records and in 1979 along with Jay Boberg and Carlos Grasso, made a deal with them to distribute IRS Records.

I.R.S. was responsible for exposing the general public at large with the likes of The Go-Go's, The Cramps, R.E.M., The Fleshtones, Wall Of Voodoo, The Buzzcocks, Oingo Boingo, The Fall and countless other alternative music acts of the late 1970's and 1980's.

Released in 1981, I.R.S. Greatest Hits Volume 2 & 3 is a double-album sampler of then-current recordings, released on the label. It personally introduced me to several bands when I first heard it. Namely The Cramps, The Fleshtones, The Buzzcocks, The Damned and The Stranglers. The album features two songs by Stewart Copeland's pseudonym while he was in The Police, rare single tracks from both Squeeze and The Police. It features notable entries from somewhat obscure acts like Humans, Fashion, Skafish, Payoloa$ and Patrick D. Martin. It also features curiosities from ex-Velvet Underground cellist John Cale, ex-Damned guitarist Brian James, ex-Squeeze keyboardist/BBC personality Jools Holland, and BBC6 personality Tom Robinson. It contains great songs by The Buzzcocks, The Damned, The Fall, The Stranglers, The Cramps and The Fleshtones.

The album is inconsistently excellent and overall is a pretty good representation of the music that I.R.S. Records. It was a pretty important album in shaping my own musical tastes growing up. There can't be too many better albums of it's kind. It's a great alternative music sampler of the early 1980's.  

Highly Recommended!

Here's the video review (including an awesome K-Tel-esque commercial) :

I.R.S. Greatest Hits Volume 1 (IRS Records/1981)

I.R.S. Greatest Hits Volume One was a sampler of material by artists on I.R.S Records. It was available via an offer that came with copies of I.R.S. Greatest Hits Volume 2 & 3. It is quite possible that this album was the Doing Time On Vinyl compilation album that was scheduled, but never released. It was released in a plain white sleeve with a orange sticker indicating the name of album and the slogan “A sampler of tunes you want to hear over and over again”. The copyright date is 1980, but considering it was only released via an offer from an album that came out in 1981, me thinks this didn't actually see the light of day until 1981 as well.

It features great singles from Klark Kent and The Buzzcocks, two tracks from both Oingo Boingo and The Stranglers and a rare single by Berlin with Virginia Macolino on vocals, before Terri Nunn joined the band. It also features Henry Badowski's first appearance on a US LP, Chelsea's fine cover of The Seeds' “No Escape” and Payola$ excellent “China Boys” single.

It's a nice little alternative new/wave compilation album. I've only seen this album two times, tops in the record shops. So, it's a semi-rare release. Recommended.

Here's the video review:

The Police: Certifiable: Live In Buenos Aires (A&M Records 2008)

 For the first-half of the decade The Police were the biggest, most-popular & most commercially successful new wave band of the 1980's. Basically, they were The Beatles of the new wave/punk movement. They had as many female admirers as they did male fans and they were respected by the critical community and fellow musicians alike. They began their career with faux-punk songs and reggae-infused pop songs and over the course of eight years, twenty-singles and five albums became a more worldly and experimental pop band. Then at the peak of their career they called it a day.

Then in January of 2007, Stewart Copeland, Andy Summers and Gordon Sumner (known more colloquially as "Sting") announced they would be reuniting for a world tour to celebrate their thirtieth anniversary. The tour - sponsored by Best Buy - commenced in May of 2007 and ended in August of 2008. To say it was successful would be putting it mildly; the tour earned upwards of 350 million dollars and became the third highest-grossing tour of all-time. The Police were the world's most top-earning musicians for both 2007 & 2008. The band even reunited with original Police guitarist Henry Padovani (who hadn't played with the band since 1977) joined the band for an encore when they played Paris. Thankfully, the tour was also well-documented/recorded and the band released the Best Buy exclusive Certifiable: Live In Buenos Aires (recorded live at River Plate Stadium in December of that 2007) in November of 2008. There was a home video of the performance released as well on  both DVD & Blu Ray. The DVD was packaged with the CD release of the show.

A rare four-man band shot (with Henry Padovani on the far right) at the Mont de Marsan Punk Festival, Paris, France, August 5, 1977.

There was also a nice triple-vinyl release as well. The gatefold packaging itself that houses the three vinyl discs is on the thin-side and leaves a bit to be desired. It's difficult getting the records comfortably in and out of the sleeve. You'd think that considering the amount of money generated from the tour, A&M - or whoever was ultimately responsible for packaging - would have made sure that the packaging was of a higher-quality. But surprise, surprise they did not.

 But beyond the shoddy packaging, the records and the recording itself is excellent and a must-have for any Police fan. The performances are great as well; the band has always taken liberties when it came to performing the songs live. For example the band has rarely, if ever, performed "Roxanne" the same exact way live as they did when they first recorded the "hit" studio version from Outlandos d'Amour. With age Sting's voice has slightly deepened and so, occasionally a hit version from 1980 that was in a one key is now in another or sung in a lower octave. A few songs ("Don't Stand So Close To Me" and "Voices Inside My Head") have appeared to live lives of their own and now have fairly different arrangements altogether.

Andy Summers is finally given plenty of room to stretch out and solo as much as he wants (in their heyday he was previously given a four-eight bar maximum) and the band sounds completely confident and relaxed. You'd never know this was a band that had not played together (regularly) since 1984. Sting is still a strong vocalist and is an incredibly nuanced and nimble bassist. And Stewart Copeland still sounds as vital a drummer as ever. The band has streamlined their sound but they basically still sound like The Police, and not like Sting and a pick-up backing band as some might have feared.

The nineteen-song release is a virtual greatest hits collection plus a few fan-favorites (i.e. "Hole In My Life", "When The World Is Running Down...", and "Next To You"). If you're a Police fan of any kind this will make for an interesting and very entertaining - and for the out and out Police fan - an historic listen.

Here's The Video Review!:

Special Thanks To: A&M Records & Denver Gillette.