Should you’ve solely heard the hit singles on Bob Seger’s In opposition to The Wind, you most likely obtained the mistaken thought about the remainder of the album. These singles have been one thing new for Seger, essentially the most polished country-rock songs (or perhaps simply nation songs) he’d but performed. First impressions have been that Seger had grown up, mellowed out, and performed all these issues that grizzled heartland rockers weren’t speculated to do – together with hanging out with the Eagles and different members of the Los Angeles in-crowd. However appearances can deceive, as a result of these impeccably crafted singles – “Fire Lake,” “You’ll Accomp’ny Me” and the title monitor – all sit alongside essentially the most hellraising rock tunes of Seger’s commercial-peak years.
Hearken to In opposition to The Wind now.
A cut up musical character
At this level in his profession, a cut up musical character was Seger’s calling card. Credit score that to the ten years he spent making good albums for his homegrown followers. By the point he obtained to 1976’s Night time Strikes – his business breakthrough and his ninth studio album – his reflective aspect was no less than as sturdy as his rock’n’roll roots; considerate tracks like “Main Street” sat subsequent to barnburners like “Rock And Roll Never Forgets,” and FM radio liked them each. This additionally began his custom of recording a part of an album with session gamers (largely the funky Muscle Shoals studio crew) and the others along with his personal Silver Bullet Band, sweetening each with visitor backup singers.
In opposition to The Wind’s business success topped that of all Seger’s earlier data and it stays the bestselling album of the singer’s profession, regardless of its barely schizophrenic tracklist. Certainly, the advance single “Fire Lake” was a minor shock when it hit the airwaves in February 1980. With its loping nation groove and uncharacteristically easy manufacturing, it sounded similar to an Eagles file (and there have been, certainly, three Eagles singing on it). However, in fact, this was 1980: Eagles have been one of many world’s greatest bands, and sounding like them wasn’t going to do anyone any hurt. They have been additionally returning a favor since Seger had co-written and sung backup on the current Eagles hit “Heartache Tonight.”
A trio of ballad hits
In opposition to The Wind’s title monitor, nonetheless, couldn’t have been anyone however Seger. Lyrically and musically, it’s an apparent follow-up to “Night Moves,” containing considered one of his most quotable traces (“Wish I didn’t know now what I didn’t know then”) and lamenting the misplaced youth {that a} not-too-ancient songwriter was feeling at 35.
Finishing the trio of ballad hits is the timeless “You’ll Accomp’ny Me.” Organized as a country-soul ballad, it’s a type of template songs that outlines the place the Nashville sound was going within the subsequent few a long time. However you might additionally think about the tune working equally effectively with a rootsier remedy. For proof, search out the attractive Cajun-styled model (in French, with fiddle and accordion) that Kate and Anna McGarrigle recorded just a few years later.
Seger’s interior adolescent
The antidote to these three considerate, grown-up hits was the album’s different three FM-radio hits, on which Seger’s interior adolescent got here out to play. This wasn’t a well-known mode for him, since even the rockers on his final couple of albums had some gravitas to them, akin to “Hollywood Nights” and “Fire Down Below.” However In opposition to The Wind’s opener, “Horizontal Bop.” is pure illicit enjoyable, with the Silver Bullet crew doing their greatest Saturday-night bar-band shuffle. And that’s not even the rowdiest factor on the album. “Her Strut” sports activities an excellent raunchier groove and a lyrical pun that high-school guys in all places took to coronary heart.
Finishing the libidinous trilogy is “Betty Lou’s Gettin’ Out Tonight,” whose lyrics are a late-50s/early-60s slice of teenage life. Betty Lou’s been grounded for misbehaving, now she’s free and able to misbehave some extra. The tune could also be extra sophomoric in tone, but it surely permits this bunch of execs (right here together with ex-Manassas keyboardist Paul Harris) to rock out with uncharacteristic abandon.
On an album with six hits, only some tracks qualify as deep cuts, however “Long Twin Silver Line” is In opposition to The Wind’s nice misplaced rocker, a practice tune that evokes the deep South at each flip (it’s the one rocker right here that’s helmed by the Muscle Shoals crew as an alternative of Seger’s Silver Bullet regulars). “No Man’s Land” is the most recent in a string of Seger songs that paint the rock area as a battle zone, however right here the temper is much more tense than it was on “Turn The Page” and “Sunburst.”
Seeking to the long run
The album’s closing monitor, “Shinin’ Brightly,” is, of all issues, an optimistic tune. It was the primary tune Seger had written that dared recommend that life and love may simply get higher when your impulsive youth is over. Seger pulls out all of the stops for this one, from the uplifting chord strums that open the tune, to the gospel choir and the reassuring vocal interjections all through. Alto Reed’s majestic sax solo (framed by hovering Hammond organ) is considered one of his biggest moments, and Seger closes the monitor with a spontaneous, “It’s gonna be OK, yeah!” He additionally employs a number of the identical vocal tips as “Night Moves,” however right here he’s trying to the long run as an alternative of lacking the previous.
Seger would proceed going for depth on his subsequent few albums. The studio follow-up The Distance evokes the draw back of the relationships that In opposition to The Wind largely celebrates – and the narratives would get much more epic. However with In opposition to The Wind, Seger proved he may do deep ideas and have a hell of a great time whereas he was at it.
