David + David’s Dark, Cult Classic ‘Boomtown’ Turns 40 This Year – We Look Back

Every spring (during March to be exact) we look back 40 years to put together a playlist of rock songs for whatever given year that might be. This year, obviously, we looked back to 1986. As an aside, every January we do a 50-year playlist in the same manner, this year 1976.

When compiling the 1986 list I’d like to tell you the David + David (a 1-album wonder, if you will) 1986 LP Boomtown jumped out at me. But alas, I’d forgotten about it… actually I thought it was 1985, which is no excuse. As they used to say on Modern Family, “Get your head in the game, Phil.”

But my overlooking it – and having a friend of the blog “Dr. Rock” point it out to me – is sort of on brand for this dark little album. Despite being a minor hit I don’t think it was on a lot of people’s radar. I will admit to you, when I met the Rock Chick and this album came up in conversation, the fact that she knew it and liked it impressed me… not that I wasn’t already smitten.

In the 80s it was all about Van Halen and Hair Metal and good times. Alzheimer’s sufferer Ronald Reagan was in the White House and we were “A shining city on a hill.” Whatever that meant. My buddies were cranking 5150 or Bon Jovi’s Slippery When Wet, when suddenly this album with stories of lost souls dropped.

David + David were, as advertised, two musicians named David: David Baerwald (singer/songwriter) and David Ricketts (producer/songwriter/singer). Those two played almost all the instruments on the album. They had a drummer and a percussionist come in on a few tracks along with some backing vocalists but the rest of the LP is all them.

Reagan had cut the top tax rate down in 1981 and again in 1986. While the movie Wall Street didn’t come out until 1987, it captured the zeitgeist perfectly with its catch phrase, “Greed…is good.” But not everybody were doing well.

Take for example the characters in the opening track “Welcome To The Boomtown.” There’s “handsome Kevin” who took a year off of college only to become a drug dealer and never returned to academia. He “deals dope out of Denny’s, keeps a table in the back…” I remember hearing that lyric and thinking, “Damn! That’s poetry.” The wolf is never far away from the door.

And while music was mostly upbeat in those days there were dark records, like Jackson Browne’s Lives In The Balance. But for some reason there was just something about Boomtown that resonated more deeply with me. Not everybody was enjoying the boom…and of course the boom itself was doomed.

The drums are fairly muted on this album. The guitars are also more atmospheric than dominate. Keyboards are used to put interesting layers onto each track. It’s the heartfelt delivery of these lyrics that give the album its emotional grip.

There were three hit songs on the album. Not bad for a record that peaked at 39 on the charts. “Welcome To The Boomtown,” mentioned before was the first single and biggest hit. “Pick a habit, we’ve got plenty to go around.” The 80s were so cocaine infested… It’s a home run of a song and should be on any list of iconic 80s tracks.

“Swallowed By The Cracks” was another single and I think it was after I heard this one, that I bought the record. “I once was a dancer, I was young once like, though I know I don’t look it…” is a lyric that hit me hard at 22, even harder now.

“Ain’t So Easy” was the third track and it’s another great song. It’s a plea for love for folks that have found each other and perhaps found their last chance. “Being Alone Together” is a laid back groove that wouldn’t be out of place on a latter day Steely Dan album and frankly might be the emotional flip side of “Ain’t So Easy.”

The Rock Chick will insist only the first side of this album is worth listening to. I tend to disagree. She was also the first person to repeat the urban myth that the reason the first side is better is because Baerwald sings on those songs and Ricketts sings on the second half. That’s actually not true. Baerwald sings most of the album with Ricketts only taking the mic on “A Rock For The Forgotten” and “River’s Gonna Rise.”

Side two doesn’t have the hits that side one had, but there’s great material there as well. It leads off with the Ricketts’ sung track “A Rock For The Forgotten.” Ricketts’ lyrics verge on spoken word. It’s like the flip side of Billy Joel’s “Piano Man” told from the perspective of the bartender. “At the Firefly, We all tell lies…” And later, “While me I’m hiding here, Pretending that my mind is clear, A rock for the forgotten, But when I pour they smile.”

“River’s Gonna Rise” is a track I included on my Playlist: Songs About Rivers and it’s always been a song I’ve liked. “There’ll be dancing in the streets when the rivers done rise.” Bad shit is going down in this song.

“Swimming In The Ocean” is a tad more propulsive. It may be a deep track but it’s certainly not bad. “All Alone In The City” is another dark tale of loneliness and desperation. “Heroes” wraps things up on a loping, laid back note.

You don’t hear much about this album anymore and frankly that’s criminal. This is a great album – almost a time capsule – from a crazier time. We get to take a stroll through the darker, seamier side of life. Sometimes only the palaces are gilded and when you scrape it off, there’s rot underneath.

Either way this is great music. Baerwald and Ricketts never recorded another album together. They were both – I think – involved in the loose collective of musicians called The Tuesday Night Music Club. It was a group of musicians who got together to jam and workshop songs.

Famously, a member of the group was Sheryl Crow who named her first album after the collective. Both the Davids played on the album, although Baerwald more prominently. I seem to remember there being some controversy about how much he was behind the music… we never giver our female artists enough credit.

Regardless, while it’s  their only album it’s certainly a wonderful legacy for both the Davids. I suggest everyone hear/own this album. It should be a part of every serious collector’s stack or records.

Cheers!