If you want to know what the '80s really sounded like, take a listen to Bourgeois Tagg's eponymous debut album from 1986. This is where all the disparate trends of the early '80s came together to create the sound of mid- to late-'80s mainstream rock: there's the remnants of pre-MTV arena rock, the synths of new wave, the post-Rundgren blend of power pop and stadium anthems, and the immaculate studiocraft of mainstream pop, where it was possible to hear every individual drum in Phil Collins' 11-piece kit. There are lots of synths, lots of basslines played on synths, lots of clean, post-funk rhythm guitars, breathy vocals, and big hair on nearly every member. It's the kind of record that sounds like nothing was actually was made by a human, outside of (perhaps) the lead vocal. This wouldn't be a bad thing if the songs were even recognizably melodic. Instead, the songs get buried beneath the studiocraft, which reigns supreme through the nine songs. But that's what mainstream album rock radio sounded like in the mid- to late-'80s, and perhaps that's why this is so emblematic of its era; it relies entirely on studiocraft, so that's all that can be heard, thus it winds up sounding of its era. And that's why this is quite a curiosity for those pop fans who like records just because they sound like their time. (By the way, Bourgeois Tagg got a whole heck of a lot better the next time around, delivering an album that was the polar opposite of the debut -- an album that captured everything that was right about mainstream album rock in the '80s instead of everything that was wrong.) ~ Stephen Thomas Erlewine