oldnewwaver wrote:great topic and was a hardcore Oingo Boingo fan for many years in the 80's (saw them over 20 times!)
In regards to their music and records, I think after the So-Lo record, their was a transition in their sound, It became more slick and polished, and it may have been from the new label from A & M to MCA, that could have been a factor to make them to create a more pop-oriented sound.
Still a huge fan of their first 3 releases (Only a Lad, Nothing to Fear and Good for Your Soul) and one of their best songs, Good Bye, Good Bye from that same period.
It seemed to me that they took more chances creatively than later efforts, which were hit and miss for me,
Dead Man's Party and Boi-ngo did contain many elements of their previous records in their sounds, but I think when Danny Elfman did his solo record and started composing film music, they turned a corner so to speak after 1984. I was not a fan of their work afterwards, especially of their last record (Boingo) which was really hard to listen to and was more post-grunge than new wave.
My only gripe with their catalog was the "Boingo Live" record which was live in the studio,rather than a true live in concert, which would have been awesome since they were at their peak so to speak when that record was released in 1988.
But there music to me was always best live than on record, sine they were one of the great local bands in the SoCal area and an integral part of my teen years and on KROQ back in the day.
From what I recall reading, Elfman allegedly became annoyed with A&M feeling their lack of commercial success fell on the label's poor promotion, and that's why he pushed to be released from the contract. On MCA, Boingo did change but the contradiction in Elfman's motivation is that Weird Science became their biggest commercial hit and then he quickly dismissed it and hasn't had much good to say about it since.
It doesn't take much to understand why the earlier albums didn't break, they were wacky and weird, and not at all in line with the REO Speedwagon or Journey "hits" that were saturating at the time. Not to mention a band named Oingo Boingo isn't going to easily roll off the tongues of the standard teens of the day. If Sparks had to change their name from Halfnelson because it was deemed too weird, that's nothing compared to a band named Oingo Boingo.
There's absolutely nothing commercial about those first three albums, and I don't doubt that's why they remain among the band's biggest and best loved albums. Even though it may seem that Elfman was trying to be more commercial with the later albums, I don't think he's actually made up of an ability to be commercial, he's far too unique, eccentric and interesting.
Regarding that 94 album, I don't even consider it part of the catalog. And it's maddening that I cannot post a thing on Facebook about the band without someone asking "What about a reissue of the 94 album?" Besides being owned by another label, being their lowest selling album, and having answered the question about the album countless times, I personally don't care for the attempt to be relevant in the Grunge era. I've gotten to the point that if I post something and someone asks about that album, I remove the comment. The question has been asked and answered so many times, it only takes a couple of minutes perusing my previous posts and comments to find the answer.
The Alive album, it seems, was Elfman's passion project. He wanted the ability to license the songs out, he reached the five year limit to where he was now able to re-record the material, and he felt the band live was far better than any studio recording. As a fan, I tend to disagree. While some of the renditions on Alive are pretty decent, none of them surpass the studio versions, in my opinion. Some songs are frankly ruined, such as Private Life. But he wanted a 'live' album without an audience, and in a podcast from last year he said Alive and Farewell are the only albums he can stand to listen to.