Do people have the kind of longing that makes them brave, forces them to act foolishly, or even risk damnation?
Mostly not. The Motels, a great and sultry band from the 1980s, just re-issued their best album, 1982’s All Four One, on pink vinyl. After weeks spent listening to Taylor Swift, Ariana Grande and Olivia Rodrigo, the songs on All Four One leap off of the turntable—sweaty, horny, crazed with desire. I don’t mean booty calls or the crudity that’s part of modern pop music. I speak of the soulful, emotional and erotic desire that consumes the body as well as the psyche—what makes you lose all sense and that was once central to pop music.
Motels singer Martha Davis delivers these great songs with a defiantly vulnerability, a willingness to push past irony and self-protection and expose a raw nerve. There’s the slow-burning “Take the L”:
Watching my head, holding my face
One more evening gone to waste
No longer do I know my place
Killing time and missing my cues
Watching her belong to you
Tears could only change my view
Take the L out of lover and it’s over
Take the L out of lover and it’s over
The big hit on All Four One was “Only the Lonely,” which still holds up. Still, my favorite track on the album was always “Art Fails”:
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