Men At Work – Business As Usual

Men at Work - Business as Usual
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Men at Work are an Australian rock band formed in Melbourne in 1978 and best known for breakthrough hits such as "Who Can It Be Now?" and "Down Under". Its founding member and frontman is Colin Hay, who performs on lead vocals and guitar. After playing as an acoustic duo with Ron Strykert during 1978–79, Hay formed the group with Strykert playing bass guitar and Jerry Speiser on drums. They were soon ed by Greg Ham on flute, saxophone, and keyboards and John Rees on bass guitar, with Strykert switching back to lead guitar. The group was managed by Russell Depeller, a friend of Hay, whom he met at La Trobe University.
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Business as Usual is the debut studio album by Australian new wave band Men at Work, which was released in November 1981 in Australia, and April 1982 in the United States. It spent nine weeks at the top of the Australian Kent Music Report Albums Chart from December 1981 through to March 1982. The Australian version had a black and white cover design; overseas releases had a similar design, but in a black and yellow colour scheme. Business as Usual was one of the most successful albums internationally by an Australian group. It spent an unprecedented 15 weeks at No. 1 on the US Billboard 200 from late 1982 to early 1983; and five weeks at No. 1 in the United Kingdom Albums Chart in early 1983. Business as Usual was also one of the highest selling Australian albums in the early 1980s, with 6 million copies shipped in the US, Surprisingly, the disc also made it to No. 31 on Billboard's Black Albums chart.
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A1 Who Can It Be Now? 3:21
A2 I Can See It In Your Eyes 3:28
A3 Down Under 3:41
A4 Underground 3:02
A5 Helpless Automaton 3:21
B1 People Just Love To Play With Words 3:28
B2 Be Good Johnny 3:34
B3 Touching The Untouchables 3:39
B4 Catch A Star 3:27
B5 Down By The Sea 6:38
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I'll it that this style of album isn't one I'd usually listen to, however, this is the exception. Business as Usual is a really good album to listen to in the background as you work (in fact I'm listening to it as I type this). The 2 best songs in my opinion in this album are 'People just love to play with words' and 'Down under' which are songs I've liked for a while now before listening to it, so this is a pleasant surprise that there isn't one bad song on this album. (now that isn't to say they are all good either). This is a decent buy at a local record shop, in fact i picked my copy up in near mint condition for only £6.
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Album Score: 8.5/10