''Beat Crazy'' is the third album by
Joe Jackson, released in October 1980 and credited to the Joe Jackson Band.
It was a relative disappointment commercially, peaking outside the
Top 40
In the music industry, the Top 40 is the current, 40 most-popular songs in a particular genre. It is the best-selling or most frequently broadcast popular music. Record charts have traditionally consisted of a total of 40 songs. "Top 40" or " con ...
in both the UK and the United States, with its
singles
Singles are people not in a committed relationship.
Singles may also refer to:
Film and television
* ''Singles'' (miniseries), a 1984 Australian television series
* ''Singles'' (1992 film), written and directed by Cameron Crowe
* ''Singles'' ...
failing to
chart
A chart (sometimes known as a graph) is a graphical representation for data visualization, in which "the data is represented by symbols, such as bars in a bar chart, lines in a line chart, or slices in a pie chart". A chart can represent tabu ...
.
One reason for the reduced sales in the U.S. may have been that the group did not tour to support it there.
Nevertheless, the Joe Jackson Band was successful and
toured
''Toured (A Live Album)'' was a live album by Huntington Beach pop punk band Big Drill Car. The concert was recorded live at New York's CBGB's on September 3, 1991, at the beginning of a nineteen-week tour known as ''The Batch World Tour'', in su ...
extensively.
This would be the last studio album released by the Joe Jackson Band's original line-up until 2003's ''
Volume 4''.
Background
''Beat Crazy'' was intended to be a stylistic departure from Jackson's first two albums but as he recalled, the band lacked a clear direction during the recording. Jackson later stated that he felt the record "didn't really work".
He explained,
Musically, the album saw the band take in reggae and ska influence as seen on songs such as "In Every Dream Home", "
Mad at You", and "Pretty Boys".
Track listing
All songs written, arranged and produced by
Joe Jackson.
Personnel
; Musicians
*
Joe Jackson – vocals, keyboards,
melodica
The melodica is a handheld free-reed instrument similar to a pump organ or harmonica. It features a musical keyboard on top, and is played by blowing air through a mouthpiece that fits into a hole in the side of the instrument. The keyboard usual ...
*
Graham Maby
Graham Maby (born 1 September 1952), is an English bass guitar player. He has recorded and toured with Joe Jackson since his first album, appearing on most of Jackson's albums and tours. He has continued to record and tour with Jackson even w ...
– bass, vocals, lead vocal on "Beat Crazy"
* Gary Sanford – guitars
* David Houghton – drums, vocals
; Production
* Joe Jackson -
arrangement
In music, an arrangement is a musical adaptation of an existing composition. Differences from the original composition may include reharmonization, melodic paraphrasing, orchestration, or formal development. Arranging differs from orches ...
s,
producer
* Norman Mighell -
recording engineer
An audio engineer (also known as a sound engineer or recording engineer) helps to produce a recording or a live performance, balancing and adjusting sound sources using equalization, dynamics processing and audio effects, mixing, reproduction, ...
* Nigel Mills - assistant recording engineer
* Willy Smax - artwork
*
Anton Corbijn
Anton Johannes Gerrit Corbijn van Willenswaard (; born 20 May 1955) is a Dutch photographer, film director and music video director. He is the creative director behind the visual output of Depeche Mode and U2,Pitman, Joanna"The silent partner"' ...
- photography
Charts
References
External links
Beat Crazyalbum information a
''The Joe Jackson Archive''
{{Authority control
1980 albums
Joe Jackson (musician) albums
A&M Records albums