NRBQ, All Hopped Up (side A)

1977's All Hopped Up is a typical NRBQ album.  It combines mostly originals with a few obscure old standards, and they're a bit inconsistent overall.  Notable among the standards, Jimmy Logsdon's "I Got a Rocket in My Pocket" became a staple of NRBQ's concerts.  Al Anderson's "Ridin' in My Car', while not prominent in the group's touring repertoire, found a new life as a power-pop favorite, and was recently covered by She & Him.  I'm also fond of "Doctor's Wind", a lighter instrumental from Joey Spampinato that's atypical of the group's work.  Like so many NRBQ albums, the production of All Hopped Up has aged poorly—it tries to sound syntactically modern for 1977, rather than capturing the magic of their live performances.  Though the Q stands for quartet, the front and back cover images include members of the horn section.