Rob Nichols

In this episode, we take a first listen to the new album from Mitch Ryder, called With Love the latest chapter in the career of the rock and soul icon. With the release of his 21st studio album, Ryder calls it one of the most honest works of his career—raw, autobiographical, and packed with his grit and soul. Produced by Don Was, the album marks a 2025 moment in Ryder’s decades-long career. We’ll also hear Ryder’s roots—from fronting The Detroit Wheels in the mid-60s with hits like “Devil with a Blue Dress On” and “Jenny Take a Ride!” to his … Read more

Rockpile?  The band?  How were they well-known in roots rock music circles and not so much with radio listeners and album buyers?  Or were they, and we just didn’t realize it? Rockpile began as the name of the first solo album by Dave Edmunds, released in 1972. Edmunds plays almost all the instruments except for bass and backing vocals, The album included a 1970 single, “I Hear You Knocking” – a #1 song in Britain He billed his band as Dave Edmunds and Rockpile.  It eventually included  Edmunds (vocals, guitar), Nick Lowe (vocals, bass guitar), Billy Bremner (vocals, guitar), and … Read more

Here’s my background. Love Bryan Adams. He did “Cuts Like a Knife”, one of the great rock tracks of eighties radio. “Straight from the Heart”, one of the great ballads of rock radio, and the windows down, summertime, turn it up loud, catch a little buzz, rock and roll of Reckless. His eighties work is the foundation. And then he went into the nineties and worked with Mutt Lange and had a huge album. And then worked on some soundtracks, went ballad-heavy, and then lost his way. Now I saw him live, would have been 1987.  The Hooters opened. It … Read more

Examine the post-1970’s output of Aerosmith, because the path that they traveled was unlike how things usually and eventually play out in a career in a rock band. What was it, really? There’s roughly three stages to the Aerosmith career:  First, a nearly decade-long run in the 1970s as a party, blues-rocking, Stones-emulating live band with rock radio stone-cold classics. Secondly, a late 1970s into the early 1980s drug-hazed, hit-empty period that caused a fallout that cost them both guitar players, with the grind stretching into 1985 with a less-than-great (“Done With Mirrors”) comeback album. Then, for the third act, … Read more

Is Billy Idol a couple of hits and not much else? Is his career more than the peak “Rebel Yell”, “White Wedding”, and “Dancing With Myself”? Surprises?  I found some. The hits?  Fewer than you might think. He did have four top ten songs, but even they aren’t what you might think initially.  But he had some tunes that weren’t big but did rock. We dig into a couple of those. Was he a pioneer in blending punk attitude with mainstream rock and pop appeal, bringing a sneering, rebellious edge of punk to MTV?  Or was he a jump-on-the-bandwagon pop-punker? … Read more

Radio friendly, some heartland authenticity, and a bit of Philly attitude.  Remember The Hooters? “I don’t think we really fit into the ‘80s mold,” said lead singer and guitarist Eric Bazilian. “But we sure do show up on a lot of ‘80s playlists. If anything, I think we were a ‘70s band who had survived into the ‘80s.” And you can hear a little in the first album – their major label release Nervous Night. In the United States, they had three decent hits off that album. In 1985, the band played at the Live Aid benefit concert in Philadelphia … Read more

This is the 50th episode of Rock, Pop, and Roll.  In honor, here are, of the 100’s of 45’s I owned, the 16 that I think shaped my musical journey. It’s what resonated. The building blocks of what I liked.  Straight emotion – with no judgment of what was cool.  It’s what made me move.  Made me think and feel stuff I didn’t quite yet understand.  Bubble gum. Rock of the 50s and 60s. Some 70s country.  A lot of hits.  A few that weren’t.  And records I bought because I heard them on AM radio. Really, it’s the 16 songs … Read more

Daryl hall and John Oates made lots of albums.  And had a strong run of early hit singles.“Wait For Me”“Sara Smile”“She’s Gone”“Rich Girl” What was the Hall & Oates heyday? The string of albums that they created at their career pop-rock apex?  It came in the 1980’s: Voices. Private Eyes. Big Bam Boom. Rock and Soul Part 1.  Maybe even Live at the Apollo.   Were they great albums? Early on, as artists tend to do, Hall & Oates had trouble clearly defining their sound, alternating among folk, soul, rock, and pop.  None of their early albums—Whole Oats, Abandoned Luncheonette, and … Read more

The rise and slide of the Simple Minds – one of the most successful and influential bands in the UK during the 1980s. A mix of new wave, post-punk, and rock. Multiple UK Top 10 hits. But it took “Don’t You (Forget About Me)” to break them big in the US.  They rode that stand-alone single into one hit album here in the States. When Once Upon a Time was released in 1985 – without “Don’t You” on it. “Alive and Kicking” was the lead single – essentially the band’s 2nd American single. It went to #3 on the Billboard … Read more

We play just five songs from an artist’s catalog – from all the albums, the singles, the live albums. The music game is called “Play Me 5”. Can we hear a band or performer in five songs, and find the reason – a bit of the understanding – as to why they are who they are and why they matter in the rock and roll continuum?  That’s it.  Let’s go. This episode, it is Bryan Adams.   Why does Adams, a rock and roll singer from Canada, have a place in rock and roll history?  Or does he? Reckless was a … Read more