This Week's Pick: Stay On These Roads - A-ha

I was out for some record shopping yesterday. I was so lucky to find UK 7'' singles of The Sun Always Shines On TV & Stay On These Roads. After making a perfect debut with Hunting High And Low and raising the stakes, the second LP Scoundrel Days didn't satisfy me with it's heavily influenced rock sound. It's a great album but it never sounded A-ha to me. It doesn't fit between Hunting High And Low & Stay On These Roads. If I didn't know A-ha I'd say they made their debut with Hunting High And Low, released Stay On These Roads as the second album and then released Scoundrel Days cause their fourth album East Of The Sun West Of The Moon sounds more similar to it. When I was reading about the album on Wikipedia, it says that they chose the Alternative Rock sound over Synth Pop because Synth Pop begun to fall out of style. Synth Pop will NEVER EVER lose it's style and uniqueness. Alternative Rock? Really? We're not rebellious teens anymore! Rock music lost it's thing after the 70s and they tried to shove Rock in our faces throught the 90s and it was just not right.  Anyway, Stay On These Roads was a BIG RELIEF after Scoundrel Days. It's more synth oriented and  it's classic A-ha with it's deep lyrics and synth pop sounds. Plus we can clearly see how hot the trio looks unlike the depressing artwork of Scoundrel Days.


TRACKLIST:

1. Stay On These Roads
2. The Blood That Moves The Body
3. Touchy!
4. This Alone Is Love
5. Hurry Home
6. The Living Daylights
7. There's Never A Forever Thing.
8. Out Of Blue Comes Green
9. You're The One
10. You'll End Up Crying


The album is produced by Alan Tarney, and it was recorded in RG Jones Studios, Wimbledon between 1987-1988 and released on 3rd of May 1988. After the dark and haunting air of the Scoundrel Days, Stay On These Roads has a deeper and spiritual feel with some strong lyrics. To me, we can see it on the two top points of the album: There's No Forever Thing & Out Of Blue Comes Green.
There's Never A Forever Things is deep enough with it's title and the lyrics will eventually make you cry with the music. Morten tells us not to cry but his voice touches the most hidden spot in us so it's hard not to feel affected while listening to it. Is it because of his voice and the song that makes me feel blue or is it the fact that there's really never a forever thing?..
After There's Never A Forever Thing, Out Of Blue Comes Green is like a sunlight appearing between the dark clouds. There's still clouds, it's still dark but there's something to enlighten the spirit and push the clouds away. ''Father! My wings are clipped. See the steps that made me drip. Now I'm so lonely.'' Written by Pal Waaktaar the song must be very personal since his wife Lauren Savoy is the one behind the title of the song. Of course Morten Harket is very successful to deliver the vocals and reflect the feel of the song.


The album begins with the title track Stay On These Roads. It's another big one like Hunting High And Low & Living A Boy's Adventure Tale. The vocals of Morten are lush! The songs is a living proof against the people who say pop music can't reflect any emotions. The album continues with The Blood That Moves The Body. The song talks about teen suicides in Japan and paying it's tribute to Eyes Of A Blue Dog, a short story by Gabriel Garcia Marquez with the line ''Red Stains on Eyes Of A Blue Dog''. Touchy! is the third song of the album. The most uplifting song on the album along with You Are The One. Yamaha DX7 was used during producing the song. It was released as the third single off the album and sold 900.000 copies around the world, reaching #11 in the UK. This Alone Is Love only has three verses but they're deep enough to make the song strong with it's long and catchy outro. The last song on the Side A, Hurry Home is another deep song with some personal lyrics. It's about the self changes that the narrator is having.


The second half of the album begins with the the famous and arguably the best Bond theme; The Living Daylights. Sounding all diferent than the single version, the song remains one of the most known A-ha songs. Always performed in their tours the song has been extended into a sing along with the audience. There's Never A Forever thing slows things down and leaves the listener fragile with Out Of Blue Comes Green as the follow-up track. The second last track of the album You Are The One raises the energy and makes us move as a feel-good song. I've always found You Are The One as another attempt to make Take On Me 2. The ''aaaah'' vocals that performed by the trio on the backing vocals give the song another joy. It's so 80s. It's classic, it's catchy and it makes you happy. You'll End Up Crying is the closing track of the album. The song only includes synth string sessions. Still strong and still effective as a synth ballad.

There is not a single track I skip as I spin the LP. Every single song has a soul and depth. Unlike todays shallow pop songs which written by at least ten people came together, most of the songs on the album were written by Pal Waaktaar and sometimes by the rest of the trio. No wonder it's a successful album like their earlier albums.


CHARTS: 

Australian Albums (Kent Music Report): 52

Austrian Albums (Ö3 Austria): 9

Canadian Albums (RPM): 55

Dutch Albums (MegaCharts): 5

,French Albums (SNEP): 3

German Albums (Offizielle Top 100): 4

Italian Albums (Musica E Dischi): 2

New Zealand Albums (RMNZ): 36

Norwegian Albums (VG-Lista): 1

Swedish Albums (Sverigetopplistan): 10

Swiss Albums (Schweizer Hitparade): 6

UK Albums (OCC): 2

US Billboard 200: 48

EU LP (925 733-1) Front

EU LP Back

EU LP Inner Sleeve Front

EU LP Inner Sleeve Back

Lyrics to  Out Of Blue Comes Green taken from the innersleeve

EU LP Side A

EU LP Side B