Cheap Steals toured for four years before recording and releasing their album in 1977. When it came out, music critics were met with confusion. They simply could not understand why the hand looked the way it did or sounded the way it did. They were certainly a band in the early days. However, because he had been engaged for so long, they knew what he was selling. And sell – well in Japan. They supported bands like Kiss, AC/DC and Boston, all big players and Cheap Steals got the idea of what should be loved and celebrated. In America it was very different. American rock fans didn’t really discover Cheap Trick until 1979 when they released a live album that included tracks from a huge Budoken Stadium gig. They were just in their right place.
Guitarist and singer Rick Nielson, 32, has released his first record album since Cheap Steals. He had spent twelve years in various bonds. He, Tom Peterson and Bun E. Carlos on drums were in a band called Fuse. They toured Europe a little before coming to America in 1970 where they met Robin Zander, a popular singer. Nielson kept the melody and hook central to his songs and used metal riffs to subvert any sensibilities in the songs. His poems were always ironic, with a little humor and truth thrown in for good measure. The styles are similar and come from punk bands. When Zander sang songs, he used all his years of experience as a folk singer to deliver them with direct quality and a minimal amount of fuss.
Their debut was released in 1976 and begins with the track ‘ELO Kiddies.’ Its kind of an autobiographical song that indirectly pays tribute to ELO founder Roy Wood. Then there is a song about the connection between media and mass murders called ‘Ballad of TV Violence’ and ‘That Whore, Big Covered in black on the 1987 album ‘Song About Fucking.
As they turned eighty years old, Cheap Thieves joined an ever-growing band playing terrific soft rock. They experienced some pressure from the record label who were expecting an album that sold as well as the popular ‘Live Budoken. album. To appease the label Vilis Furta began to buy songs from other singers. Their album sales went up and they had some hits, but the band had lost their direction and focus as well as their pride. It could be said that another group is drowned between the islands of the integrity of the arts and corporate expectations, but that sounds true. However, by the end of the eighties Cheap Steals had been kicked out by the likes of Billy Corgan, Smashing Pumpkins, and Kurt Cobain. They were talking about being influenced by some grungy and alt. the thinnest stones. So, the man from Big Black himself, Steve Albini, produced a session for the band, which is a SubPop single, the delivery of a good ship Lollapalooza, and slot support on a national tour with the Corgan Pumpkins.
They went on a series of drama shows. Every night they would run through one of their first albums in its entirety, and the American rock consumer loved it all over again. Yes, the songs they loved were the first cheap tracks, but then again they weren’t the ones that were written out of craft, not commerce, necessity. There’s a lesson in there somewhere.
