4 (1981)
1. Night Life
2. Jukebox Hero
3. Break it Up
4. Waiting for a Girl Like You
5. Luanne
6. Urgent
7. I'm Gonna Win
8. Woman in Black
9. Girl on the Moon
10.Don't Let Go
The fourth studio album in the band's fourth year of recording. Expectations? Probably that the record continued in the same vein - a few killer hit songs that classic rock would remember, like, forever. Well, the album did accomplish that, but more. Much much more.
Just about everyone that follows this band will agree that this was their best effort ever. Maybe it was just time for their creativity to peak? Maybe, though, they did a bit of fine tuning to make this thing really stand out. For starters, the band has now been whittled down from six members to four (another reason for the album's title, I guess). Six people in a rock and roll band is a bit much, and the two guys that were exiled, to be honest, really aren't missed. That left a core group of singer, guitarist, bass player, and drummer. The guitar player also handled all of the keys - which were still a big part of this band's sound. Then, they hired Mutt Lange to produce the record. Not quite a household name yet, Mutt had recently produced two classics by AC/DC - "Highway to Hell" and "Back and Black". Although comparisons between these two super groups may not seem to yield that much in common, the sound that Mr. Lange achieved on these records contains a lot of similarities. All of this to say that Lange is a great producer, and he shines on this record.
Unlike every other Foreigner studio album, this one has no filler whatsoever. Every song on here is great, and every song probably could have been heavily rotated on radio airplay. They really only have three songs here that most know that were the "hits" - Urgent, Waiting For a Girl Like You, and, to a lesser extent Jukebox Hero. I only say "to a lesser extent" because I don't believe it ever was played on top 40 radio that much. Not that this is a big deal, it just seemed like Foreigner was basically everywhere on radio during this time. Although Foreigner did have a plethora of hits, if you asked any fan to pick the top ten Foreigner songs of all time, these three would probably make the cut on most of those lists.
One shouldn't limit their purchase to a "hits" collection if one wants to obtain the above mentioned tracks. This is definitely an album that everyone with any remote passing attraction to this band should buy. This album is arena rock at its best, and still sounds so wonderful all these years later. The band's crowning achievement.
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