Pretty-good early-'80s mainstream pop....

It's bn awhile since I've done this, but I needta get back in the habit, so....
Charlie Dore's LISTEN! (1981) is a pretty solid, above-avg Xample of early-'80s lite mainstream pop, per4med by a woman who was previously something of a pub-rocker, & later went on 2 have a pretty Dcent songwriting career. Her only hit in America was the kinda-silly Top 20 "Pilot of the Airwaves" (which isn't on here), & she later co-wrote Sheena Easton's hit "Strut" -- neither of these songs ever did much 4 me.
This album sounds nothing like pub-rock & only a little like Sheena Easton. The production's strong & the backing is studio-pro perfect -- producer Stewart Levine also polished-up the 1st Dixie Dregs album & helmed sevral albums 4 lite-jazzers The Crusaders. The backing band includes 3 members of Toto -- Jeff Porcaro on drums, Mike Porcaro on bass, & Steve Lukather on guitar.
MayB U're thinking all this studio polish might make this sorta a bland, faceless early-'80s piece of hackwork. Well, mayB, Xcept that....
Dore wrote or co-wrote all but 1 of the songs, sevral w/ her keyboardist Robbie Buchanan, & a couple of the cuter, sillier 1's ("I'm Over Here," "Sister Revenge") w/ her longtime writing partner Julian Littman. (The only song she didn't at-least co-write was "You Should Hear (How She Talks About You)," a Dean Pitchford/Tom Snow job which Bcame a Top 5 hit 4 Melissa Manchester a coupla yrs later. Dore's version is almost as annoying as Manchester's, & the arrangement is almost identical.)
Then there's the vocals. Dore had an amazing range. One section near the Nd of the crashingly melodramatic side-closer "Don't Say No" is sung at the very top edge of her range, her voice all squinched-up & tiny, & as a result the lyrics R the most poignant in the whole song: "How does it feel with my heart on your sleeve?/You're scared that I'll stay and I'm scared that you'll leave/Reason leaves town for the day/But I want you anyway...." Then the band, orchestra & chorus kicks in & the world shudders. As the gtrs chime away doomily like it's The End Of The World & the chorus chants "Don't ... say ... no" over&over, in the background U can hear Charlie calling out "Listen to me!" & she sounds like she's drowning. & w/ this production, she probly was. U know me, I love my melodrama....
But the album starts out much more modestly. "Listen" itself is almost a standard adult-contemporary lovesong, bouncy & attractive enuf in its repeated choruses 2 pull U in2 the album. "Falling," dedicated 2 high-wire aerialist Karl Wallenda, has some great lyrics, tho the music still isn't what NE1 would call heavy: "On the wire I'm kissing fate/All the rest is only waiting/Waiting 'til the moment comes again...."
"Wise to the Lines" keeps up the melodrama after "Don't Say No," opening Side 2 w/ a clever catalog of events laid-out like a spy novel but narrated by the Other Woman, on the run from the Jealous Girlfriend. Xcellent gtr here & Xcellent catchy choruses, & Dore's backing vocals R marvelous.
"I'm Over Here" is a silly love letter from a fan 2 a rock star, cute but kinda obvious. "Sister Revenge" opens w/ a pretty arresting couplet ("I'd like to get you in a dark corner/And do something nasty to you...."), but it never follows-up....
"Like They Do It in America" is about how couples drive each other crazy, & the lyrical slide from the verses in2 the choruses is irresistable.
So, 6 pretty-good songs outta 10. At least a couple of em coulda/shoulda bn hits. If U're a fan of early-'80s women vocalists U should try it. Tho there R occasional slips in2 melodrama & silliness, a lot of it's probly what record-co types thot young housewives were listening-2 in the early-'80s. (But who really knew?) Sheena Easton fans'd probly like it.
The folks at Chrysalis Records didn't give LISTEN! much of a promotional push -- Xcept 4 Jethro Tull, Blondie, Billy Idol & Sinead O'Connor, did they ever push NEthing? So it pretty-much sank w/o a trace in the U.S. Tho Dore herself has a page on Wikipedia, there's no Ntry 4 this album. 2 bad. MayB not a Lost Classic, but nice. & parts of it R still really striking....
(This review is 4 my old Idaho buddy Don Vincent, the only person I know of Bsides me who bot a copy of this album. He picked it up during a visit 2 California, 2 remind him of a woman he was in love w/, & geographically separated from by about 600 miles, B4 they eventually got 2gether & got married. Tho I wasn't impressed by LISTEN! at 1st, every time Don played it -- & he played it a LOT while missing his future wife -- it grew on me more until I had 2 get a copy 4 myself. ... Their marriage lasted 10+ yrs & they got a coupla great kids out of it. In some ways, he & I have very similar lives.... R U out there, Don?)