Ep 37: Joe Jackson-Look Sharp! vs Night & Day

This week CFX presents our second album war. This time we try to decide between Joe Jackson’s classic 1979 debut album, Look Sharp!, and his 1982 blend of Latin jazz and pop, Night and Day. Jeff presents the case for Look Sharp!, while Slip backs Night and Day. As with our AC/DC album war, this was another tough one as both of these albums are great. But the real question is do either or both of these albums still stand the test of time. As you’ve come to expect, we go into depth on Jackson’s history, his influences, the music itself and the zeitgeist when these albums were released to come to some conclusion and, along the way, we also learn… Why critic Robert Christgau’s description of Jackson as “The Billy Joel of New Wave” may be right (or may just be crazy) How Joe is sort of angry about being an angry young man What English people call cigarette butts and how they were weaponized against a fledgling Joe How if you’ve been playing the “CFX Steely Dan callout drinking game”, this episode may get you really drunk Where a hungry man can go to get some soul food, good food, whole food What insane concept album Joe needs to make and the true love of Joe Jackson’s life UPDATE: There was a technical glitch which caused an audio syncing issue starting at around the 1:23:00 mark. A fix was uploaded at ~7:50am PT (USA) on 7/30/2023. Sorry for the annoyance. Check us out on Instagram (https://www.instagram.com/culturalfutures/) for links and additional content related to this and other episodes as well as clues to upcoming shows or write to us at [email protected] All audio clips are used under the "Fair Use" Copyright Disclaimer Under Section 107 of the Copyright Act in 1976; Allowance is made for "Fair Use" for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching, scholarship, and research. Fair use is a use permitted by copyright statute that might otherwise be infringing. Non-profit, educational or personal use tips the balance in favor of fair use. All rights and credit go directly to its rightful owners. No copyright infringement intended.