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THE KNACK
But The Little Girls Understand (Capitol)
Reviewed by DJ Johnson
The Knack didn't have a hope in hell of following Get The Knack. Let's put aside all feminist arguments regarding the lyrics for the time being and just talk about the song structures, the hooks, the energy and the pure joy of that 1979 blockbuster. Imagine being Doug Fieger, guitarist, vocalist and chief engineer of The Knack, sitting in your living room at the end of a tsunami of a world tour, during which you were clearly everybody's rock and roll idol, and trying to write new songs that wouldn't let the fans down. Songs that would keep the band on top. I'm betting the local 7-11 sold out of Alka Seltzer and Tums pretty quickly. He wasn't alone. Lead guitarist Berton Averre co-wrote the songs with him, but that just meant less available Alka Seltzer.
"Tell Me You're Mine" and "I Want Ya" aren't bad songs at all, but neither one would have made the final cut on Get The Knack. "Baby Talks Dirty" is just "My Sharona" sideways, but "The Hard Way" has that spark and sass, even if it seems to be borrowing a little from The Who, and the Phil Spectoresque "The Feeling I Get" is at least an interesting sound and a fun example of how to spend a ton of money on one song in the studio. They rock harder than ever before on "(Havin' A) Rave Up," the B-side of the single for "Can't Put A Price On Love." Boy, did they get that A/B backward.
The bonus tracks begin with a pair of live Doors covers, "Soul Kitchen" and "Alabama Song (Whiskey Bar)," which feature Ray Manzarek on keyboards. Recorded on a cassette deck in 1978 as the band was just beginning to gain a following on the LA club circuit, the sound quality is obviously less than perfect, but it's quite listenable, and it has historic significance because this was the first time a famous musician sat in with the band, something that was about to become a trendy thing to do. By the way, the performances are pretty hot, too. Manzarek was on the money and the Knack weren't just pretty boys; they could play, and they obviously understood The Doors' philosophy of dramatic improvisation, letting the tension build and fall in all the right places. The disc closes with two demo tracks that didn't make it to record. "Revenge" was recorded in 1978 but, according to Feiger's liner notes, it was dropped because it was deemed too negative for a Knack song. Personally, I think the song lacked a lot of everything, but to be fair, it was only a demo and might have evolved had it not been dumped. As is, it's very ordinary. The final track, however, is a retro-tune called "Daughter Of The Law" that is Del Shannon-inspired but has Knack all over it and is a lot of fun, from the two-string guitar bends to Berton Averre's "Runaway"-like Farfisa organ work.
There are songs here worth owning, and for a true Knack fan it's a must have because there are actually good songs on all their albums (albeit not always great songs) so you'll need it to make your ultimate Knack comp. As a "I have enough money to buy one Knack album... should it be this one?" kind of thing... Nnnnno. Fieger and Averre must have been going nuts writing this album, trying to make lightning strike twice. It didn't. Sales went way down and The Knack were hearing "My Sharona" on Golden Oldies stations within a year or two of releasing it, while hearing nothing from this album after a brief period of airplay. From then on, airplay was always a problem for them. They continued to make good songs buried in so-so records, and even their late 90s comeback, Zoom, has several jumpin' power pop tunes, but as far as the bigs, it all happened in 1979, and it all happened fast.
© 2002 - DJ Johnson