Boston  – Boston – 1976

Claimed Sales: 20m

First listen?: Yes

Format Listened?: Apple Music

In my notes from listening to Boston for the very first time I wrote two words. An ALBUM. The caps bit is important. It’s genuinely hard to believe that Boston was recorded in 1975 the production style and tightness of everything must have been a revelation at the time. Often thanked/blamed for creating the modern rock/pop sound that made up most of US radio’s output in the following decades, Boston is arena rock; massive hooks, massive riffs and massive vocals. This isn’t a performer’s album, which succeeds off the idea that you could be hearing a real live band performing it in your headphones, Boston is a creation. A piece of music composition that has been carefully constructed as if band founder Tom Scholz has created it in a lab. It never sounds clinical though, every surface may have smoothed to a clean shine, but every track goes off and rocks as hard as it can thanks in part to the electrifying vocals of Brad Delp. Opener More Than A Feeling is truly a tremendous 7′ single managing to stand alone and working as the perfect entry point here. Stand-out double song Foreplay/Long Time sees the whole band trade guitar riffs and hooks across 7 minutes of perfectly placed rock. I can hear it now, the true rock fans saying that I shouldn’t be praising an act for stuff like this, but listening to Boston you just ‘get it’. It’s an obvious multi million seller and in its wider context the album only becomes more of a landmark event. Another huge surprise for me in this series.

Rating: 8/10

Will I listen again?: Yes

Best Track: Foreplay/Long Time was the moment where I really sat up and started loving Boston as an album.