Tight Shoes 1980 Album

Foghat

The first Foghat record that shows serious slippage in quality and sheer entertainment value. The first indicator is the songwriting - all of it from Dave Peverett, when in the past albums consisted many Dave and Rod Price collabs, and a few interesting covers. Second, everything is in the same coked-out 80's rocker tone that is somewhere between hair metal and generic barroom blues. Third and maybe most important, the rushed feel of each and every song, as if everyone wanted to cut the record as fast as possible, because the simple act of being in the studio together was a chore. All of the previous Foghat albums, right up to sizeable portions of Boogie Motel - you can tell the band had serious fun putting them together. I have my doubts they felt the same about this particular effort. One thing I will say is, the anguish and desperation of the material matches the strung-out tone of the music itself, which does make this album a fairly nice candidate for a listening companion if you find yourself in a similar state of mind. Incidentally, this would the last Foghat album which Rod Price would play guitar on, until the mid-90's.