The Allnighter (album)

The Allnighter
Studio album by Glenn Frey
Released 19 June 1984 (1984-06-19)
Recorded August 1983 – March 1984
Studio Wilder Bros. Studios (Los Angeles), Muscle Shoals Sound Studio (Sheffield, Alabama), Ocean Way Recording (Los Angeles) and Caribou Ranch (Nederland, Colorado)
Genre Rock, blue-eyed soul
Length 43:09
Label MCA
Producer
Glenn Frey chronology
No Fun Aloud
(1982)No Fun Aloud1982		 The Allnighter
(1984)		 Soul Searchin'
(1988)Soul Searchin'1988
UK cover

The Allnighter is the second solo studio album by Glenn Frey, the guitarist and co-lead vocalist for the Eagles. The album was released in mid 1984 on MCA in the United States and the United Kingdom, two years after Frey's modestly successful debut album, No Fun Aloud and four years after the demise of the Eagles. It was and still is Frey's most successful solo album throughout his whole solo career, having reached #22 on the Billboard charts, and releasing two Top 20 singles with "Smuggler's Blues" and "Sexy Girl". The album achieved Gold status by the RIAA in the US. It is generally regarded as the culmination of the smoother, more adult-oriented sound of Frey's solo work.

The single "Smuggler's Blues" helped to inspire the Miami Vice episode of the same name, and Frey was invited to star in that episode, which was Frey's acting debut. The music video for the single also won Frey an MTV Video Music Award in 1985.

Composition

When Frey was asked about his song writing partnership with Jack Tempchin, he said at the time that "It’s funny, there are only those certain people where things click — at least for me. He’s very free. I’ll just run some soul licks by him, or I’ll ring him something like The Allnighter, which originally was just about staying up all night. But then we started talking about it and Jack says, ‘Staying up all night can’t play over three or four verses. What if the Allnighter was a guy?’ So, we made him into some woman’s every-guy."[1] The lyrics of "Better in the U.S.A" are opposed to the Soviet Union.[2]

Critical reception

In a contemporary review for The Village Voice, music critic Robert Christgau gave The Alnighter a "C" and panned it as a "smarmy piece of sexist pseudosoul".[2] In a retrospective review for The Rolling Stone Album Guide (1992), Mark Coleman gave the album two out of five stars and wrote that it "glistens with synthesized oomph, but the sugar coating doesn't sit well on Frey's mannered white R&B loverman act."[3] On the other hand, AllMusic's William Ruhlmann retrospectively gave it four-and-a-half stars and said that it departs from the "old Eagles sound" of Frey's last album for a "bluesy, rocking feel."[4]

Track listing

All songs by Glenn Frey and Jack Tempchin, except where noted.

No.TitleLength
1."The Allnighter"4:22
2."Sexy Girl"3:30
3."I Got Love"3:49
4."Somebody Else" (Glenn Frey, Hawk Wolinski and Jack Tempchin)6:00
5."Lover's Moon" (Frey)4:10
6."Smuggler's Blues"4:17
7."Let's Go Home"5:01
8."Better in the U.S.A."3:00
9."Living in Darkness" (Frey)4:35
10."New Love" (Frey)4:25
Total length:43:09
Additional track

Personnel

  • Glenn Frey – lead vocals, guitar, bass guitar, drums, keyboards, piano, synthesizer
Additional musicians

Production

Sales chart performance

Album Peak positions

Chart (1984) Position
North American Billboard chart 22
Canadian RPM chart 57
UK Albums Chart 31
Swedish Sverigetopplistan chart 40

Singles Peak positions

Single Chart Position
"Sexy Girl" The Billboard Hot 100 20
"Sexy Girl" UK Singles chart 81
"Sexy Girl" Hot Adult Contemporary Singles 23
"The Allnighter" The Billboard Hot 100 54
"Smuggler's Blues" Mainstream Rock Tracks 13
"Smuggler's Blues" The Billboard Hot 100 12
"Smuggler's Blues" UK Singles chart 22

See also

References

  1. ↑ http://ultimateclassicrock.com/glenn-frey-allnighter/
  2. 1 2 Christgau, Robert (October 22, 1985). "Christgau's Consumer Guide". The Village Voice. New York. Retrieved July 25, 2013.
  3. ↑ Coleman, Mark (1992). "Glenn Frey". In DeCurtis, Anthony; Henke, James; George-Warren, Holly. The Rolling Stone Album Guide (3rd ed.). Random House. p. 265. ISBN 0679737294.
  4. ↑ Ruhlmann, William. "The Allnighter - Glenn Frey". Allmusic. Retrieved July 25, 2013.
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