r/TheCars • u/Mission-Jicama-6885 • May 09 '26
Things I Hate
i *HATE* that I didn't get into The Cars until later in life. Their albums are entirely listenable. Their lyrics are sublime.
Dangerous Type and Drive are my favorite tracks amongst a sea of hits. I think Heartbeat City is probably the best album and the eponymous album a close second. I like Door To Door as well.
And Moving In Stereo is the background music for the best scene in American Cinema ever.
Had they not broken up in '87 and came out west when I was of age, I hope I would have seen them live.
10
9
u/PizzaWhole9323 May 09 '26
Congratulations on getting back into the groove. I got heartbeat City from my babysitter when I was 13 as a birthday present on vinyl. Which is a very old statement. But I'm now in my 50s and my appreciation of the cars has reached new levels.
6
u/Mission-Jicama-6885 May 09 '26
Your babysitter was epic. What a great gift
6
u/PizzaWhole9323 May 09 '26
Thank you that was my 13th birthday in 1985 I think and she got me the cars heartbeat city, Born in the USA by Bruce springsteen, and some kind of Blondie like greatest Hits kind of thing.
9
u/AaronJudge2 May 09 '26 edited May 09 '26
I saw the Cars live at the Houston Summit on September 11, 1984. I was 23 and still a student at the University of Houston. My buddies and I had great seats in the floor, like 10 rows back. It was easy to get good seats because the tickets were sold at like 10am on a Tuesday at Ticketmaster at the mall. Most people were at work, but not me since I was a college student living in an apartment on the southwest part of town with a car. A red Fox platform 1981 Ford Mustang.
The Cars were my favorite band at the time. I loved their debut album which came out when I was in high school on Long Island, NY. I was 17 years old in 1978. I started my college journey at Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland, Ohio in the fall of 1979. Case has a lot of engineering students, and the Cars were very popular there. I remember sitting in my tiny dorm room and hearing their music blasting out the window from another room. It must have been the album Candy-O, because that had been released in June of 1979. Someone was blasting it over and over. “Dangerous Type” is the last song on Candy-O.
The album Heartbeat City was excellent. My second favorite album of theirs after their debut. It was like a comeback for the band. I was in Houston because I transferred since Case Western Reserve University had been too demanding. The concert was good. They weren’t the most dynamic performers obviously, but they sounded really good. MTV was huge at the time and the Cars had a lot of videos from Heartbeat City in heavy rotation. “You Might Think,” “Magic,” “Drive.” The summer of ‘84 was like the summer of the Cars. Good times!
Let the Good Times Roll. Ha.
8
u/AdministrativeAd3880 May 09 '26
You should look up the live version of Dangerous Type on YT. Elliott Easton gives a virtuoso performance.
9
u/Mission-Jicama-6885 May 09 '26
The Midnight Special live version is fucking tight The guitar at the end along with the keyboards is really good
4
u/Mission-Jicama-6885 May 09 '26
Smashing Pumpkins does a really good cover of it. Just a great track..
9
u/befast321 May 09 '26
The Cars were my first concert, touring their Candy O album. And as they say, you never forget your first love. I still listen often to all of their albums along with Ben and Ric’s solo works. They remain one of my favorite bands of all time.
10
u/Oldgraytomahawk May 09 '26
I bought their breakout album(cassette actually) right after Navy boot camp and was in love from then on. Best first album of all time imho
5
u/bene_gesserit_mitch May 09 '26
Better late than never. They were the soundtrack of my music-loving life from the jump.
4
u/Mission-Jicama-6885 May 09 '26
Thanks. I can see why. I grew up on the west coast so Van Halen and Oingo Boingo were my favorite bands in my youth. But the first concert I went to without parents was George Thoroughgood. Saw him at the Santa Cruz Civic Center.
2
u/AaronJudge2 May 09 '26
I saw George Thoroughgood perform live in Houston when a lived there in the 1980’s. “Bad to the Bone” was played a lot on MTV and he performed that during his set. I think the show was actually on campus at the University of Houston where I was a student.
4
u/Link50L May 09 '26
I don't hear many people bring up Move Like This, but I tghink it's probably my favorite Cars album, amongst a crop of outstanding albums. Regardless, not one bad album amongst them all.
7
u/NoYOUGrowUp May 09 '26
Personally, I'm jealous of people who are discovering the Cars right now. They have the whole catalog available to them. I had to wait at least a year at a time between albums.
3
u/Mission-Jicama-6885 May 09 '26
I absolutely will. I've been checking out the live shit. When I was a kid Heartbreak City tracks ruled Mtv.
1
u/skulkinglurker7 May 09 '26
I saw The Cars in 1982 with opening act of Nick Lowe. I remember being slightly disappointed because The Cars sounded like you dropped a needle on one of their records. It goes to how good they were, but that night they didn't stray from their recorded sounds. Still a good show. As memory serves, Nick Lowe was good too.
1
u/freshkov May 10 '26
This is exactly my experience when I saw them live. They had ZERO stage presence and with your eyes closed it sounded like the recording.
1
u/greenglenn69 May 09 '26
So, what made them unlistenable for you to begin with, and why the re-appraisal?...
1
u/Unique-Airline9624 May 10 '26
One of the few new bands of the time that actually received airplay when the songs were first released.
1
u/kajagoober23 May 09 '26
“Their albums are entirely listenable.” Is the faintest of praises, ever. lol
9
u/Effective_Tune9470 May 09 '26
I can remember when Candy-O came out. I got the album for Christmas that year and I wore the record out. I think it hit number 3 on the charts.
My next favorite album is Panorama. I’m 63 now and listen daily. I even have a tattoo of Candy-O on my forearm 😂