• AllMyVinyl #37
• Band: Boston
• Album Title: Boston
• Release Date: 25 Aug 1976
• Date purchased: 22 Apr 2020 / 4 Oct 2024
• Location purchased: Amazon
• Color of vinyl: picture disc
• Number of discs: 1
• Links: [ Wikipedia | Discogs | Band Website | Complete album on Youtube ]

Welp, another album that would be one to have a hard time writing about.  The debut album from Boston is one of those landmark rock and roll albums that anyone who is into Rock music knows.  It has been played to death up and down and every direction on rock radio over the decades (Hello WMMR & WYSP in Philly).  This album came out when I was 11.  I perhaps didn’t know it immediately, but given my parents were recently divorced around this time, we didn’t have much money, so the good ol ‘FM radio was still used a lot.  Even THEN this album was played to death.  As the decades carried on, these songs were still played on classic rock radio.  But the album and its songs are SO good, they transcend that and retain their position at the top of the pedestal of this type of rock music.

As I mentioned, I heard a lot of this album on old FM radio back in the day – when it was a real thing and hadn’t degenerated into the near useless cesspool it is these days.  I am 100% positive I never owned it on vinyl back in the day, but I would have bought this on cassette tape – which I don’t have anymore.  I did buy it somewhere along the line on CD (something I still have), but for some reason this album always felt like something it should be played on vinyl, not CD or digital (as much use as I’ve gotten out of those platforms).  Hard to explain, but the debut Boston is something kind of demands it should be played on vinyl.

Which is why when I bought my record player (10 Apr 2020), one of the first ones I bought was this album.  I bought this 12 days after the record player. At that point I was looking for the most legendary albums I either never owned or had to have (Dark Side of the Moon), being a new (again) vinyl owner. So I looked around, as I was prefrerring to buy new.  Oh sure there’s the discogs Marketplace, good old used record stores (but this was the height of covid so physical shopping was an alien thing at this time), but I kind of wanted new for my new record player. So off I looked.  I found what I have – at that specific time, as far as I could tell, the only NEW vinyl copy of the first Boston Record was this release from Epic Records (on their Legacy label).  It’s a picture disc.  Of the couple hundred albums I own, it’s the only one I consider a mistake.  That’s because the quality of the picture disc has deteriorated VERY quickly.  This is only about 4 years old now, and most of this album sounds it’s being played through a pillow. I can still hear every song, but it’s got a muffled sound that makes me want to stop listening before I get too far into side 2.  I really should have held out for a traditional black vinyl copy – which they did end up reprinting the next year in 2021, but I was impatient.  Still, that’s a commentary on this pressing, not the music, of course is as stellar as it’s always been.  One interesting thing about the picture disc is the exterior sleeve isn’t tradition.  It’s cardboard, but entire area where the album’s art is can be seen through on the outside.  The disc itself is stored in a hard plastic sleeve inside a cardboard “shell” so you can see the actual disc art as the outside artwork. I have a picture of this below.

UPDATE 7 Oct: I’m writing this update two days after I wrote the overall review.  When I listened to the picture disc, I could tell the the quality had deteriorated in the four years since I bought that. The first couple of songs didn’t seem to have a problem, but the entire second side certainly did, and “Long Time” did as well – it sounded like I was listening through a pillow.  The picture disc had obviously degraded to the point where I felt I didn’t want to listen to it anymore – I ALMOST stopped, and listened to the second half of the album on Apple Music, but that defeats the point of a vinyl play through.  I did finish it, but instantly went and got a new copy on standard black vinyl – something I should have done first time around.  The picture disc will remain, but probably will never get played again.  Back to the original review…

Before I get to the songs, I wanted to take a moment and talk about “Boston”. While this is known as a band, this could effectively be known as the “Tom Scholz” band.  That’s because for this album, Tom wrote on his own six of the eight songs.  He co-wrote one of the others, and the eighth was written by the singer, Brad Delp. Scholz played nearly ALL the instruments on the album (except drums).  Brad Delp of course sang everything, and the band that went out on tour for the album (and did the second record) had small appearances here, but this really is Tom Scholz’s show.  The thing about that is as much of this album is Tom’s, it’s paired with the absolutely angelic voice of Brad Delp (RIP).  The two of them together produced one of the best sounds ever laid down to vinyl.  Scholz & Delp were an absolutely perfect pair that created a sound that is about as far away from the dictionary definition of “cacophony” as you could possibly get.  It’s such a sweet sound.

That takes us to the songs..  The first side of the album is made up of three songs.  More than a Feeling, Peace of Mind, & Foreplay/Long Time.  ALL OF THEM are absolute rock perfection.  To me it’s a single 18 minute long song.  Absolute perfection in every way these songs.  For such stellar music, you’d think I’d have more to say, but there’s not much TO say.  Just listen to these songs, they explain it themselves when you listen.  I don’t want to hear whining about them being overplayed by FM radio.  These songs are so good they leave that criticism in the dust and are still fucking rocking all these years later.

Side two isn’t quite as lofty as Side 1, but in no way should they be considered bad.  In fact, I’ve heard nearly all of Side 2 on radio through the years – perhaps not played as much as Side 1 was, but there’s gold here too.  Rock & Roll Band is more a straightforward rock song – 3 minutes with a fast riff.  This song also said in lyrics they’re from Boston, and for some reason I always got a kick out of hearing the city of Hyannis in lyrics – despite having zero connection to there.

Smokin’ – it’s a great fast song that doesn’t let up – the speed keeps going from start to finish and mixes in a lot of keyboards, kind of Deep Purple style. ha.   This is the one song that’s credited to Delp & Scholz.

Hitch a Ride – after the speed on the album to this point, Hitch a Ride is brought in to slow things down a bit.  It’s by far not a ballad, it’s something that sounds very much at home on FM radio  (but then the entire album does).   The guitar solo is anything BUT slow, it’s quite loud, but the rest of the song isn’t.  It’s a nice dynamic.

Something About You – This is probably the song that is the least known (but it *IS* popular – just not as stratospheric as perhaps “Feeling”).  I always loved the chorus, and I adore the delivery of the lyrics of “It isn’t easy, I know”.  The word “know” is extended out to have something like 20 syllables.  The guitar solo I found most interesting listenign tonight as it’s the one that’s least burned into my brain, so that was nice.  As much as I enjoy the music on this album it is something that I know QUITE well. This song wasn’t as much.

Let Me Take You Home Tonight – the only song not written by Scholz. This one was written by Delp on his own. This one is more a slow burn, it starts off slower, akin to Hitch a Ride, but it doesn’t end there.  By the time we get to the last verse, it’s just the same line of lyric over and over again “Let me take you home tonight”. That works here.  It closes out the album well, I thought – a nice exit for this majesty of an album.

As I said before this album came out when I was 11 years old, and I was several years away from starting to go to concerts.  The next album from Boston came and went then too (1978).  However, the third album came out in the prime of my concert going life back in Philly.  I saw Boston with Brad Delp one time – it was in 1987 on the Third Stage tour, and it was everything I had hoped for.   I did see Boston again much later on 30 Jun 2017 in Dallas, when the only one left from back then was Tom Scholz. It wasn’t Delp of course, but I still enjoyed it.

To close this out, as I wrote a lot for an album I thought I was only gonna write a couple hundred words for.  This album remains as good today as it always was, and I write this on the 4th of October 2024, it occurred to me that in 689 days (14 months give or take), this album will turn FUCKING 50 on 25 Aug 2026.  And at half a century old, it will still sound as fresh then as it did back in 1976.

“It’s more than a feeling
When I hear that old song they used to play”….

UPDATE OCTOBER 7: I’m writing this update two days after I wrote the overall review.  When I listened to the picture disc, I could tell the quality had deteriorated in the four years since I bought that. The first couple of songs didn’t seem to have a problem, but the entire second side certainly did, and “Long Time” did as well – it sounded like I was listening through a pillow.  The picture disc had obviously degraded to the point where I felt I didn’t want to listen to it anymore – I ALMOST stopped, and listened to the second half of the album on Apple Music, but that defeats the point of a vinyl play through.  I did finish it, but instantly went and got a new copy on standard black vinyl – something I should have done first time around.  The picture disc will remain, but probably will never get played again.