I've got very strong feelings about ZZ Top's Eliminator. Along with Dire Straits' Brothers In Arms, I heard it played constantly at Digger's and the Bayside way back in the day. Just opening bars of "Legs" or "Sharp Dressed Man" can bring back the taste of those kick ass turkey sandwiches, or the seafood chowder. Eliminator is also bar none the perfect music for getting jiggy with it: it's never too fast, heavy, or sappy. The ladies can really shake it to the computerized beats, and the guys aren't forced to embrace their feminine side as the riffs reek of stale beer and exhaust. It is my firm conviction that Eliminator has been responsible for many, many pregnancies, and I'm absolutely sure that one of my friends back home was conceived to it.
Having said that, I prefer the 1985 follow-up album, Afterburner. While it is true that the Texan trio stepped further away from their blues roots and incorporated more drum machines and synthesizers into their formula, I find Afterburner to be the superior album. As a child of the 80's, I'm always going to be drawn to cheesy, overproduced music, as long as it's got big drums, vintage 80's space age technology, and at least one mandatory slow song, so this should come as no surprise.
This album is like a gritty Texas strip club dropped into Mad Max and Maximum Overdrive. Machines are threatening to take over, and humanity hangs in the balance, but then along comes the bearded posse that is ZZ Top to impregnate as many remaining females as possible. Not surprisingly, you'll find a lot of not-so-thinly-veiled sexual innuendos and a song that would have been perfect for a middle school dance all mixed with driving beats and killer riffs.
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