Foreigner has been ubiquitous on classic rock and AOR radio for over 40 years, and with good reason. They had a lot of great rock and roll songs. Lou Gramm had a great, husky rock voice, and the band was able to tap into that gray area between pop and hard rock.
It all started with this album, and the band hit the ground running. The album reached #4 on the Billboard album charts and has since gone platinum five times in the U.S. Their first three Billboard Hot 100 Top 20 hits were on this album: "Feels Like the First Time" (#4), "Cold As Ice" (#6), and "Long, Long Way From Home" (#20).
The album was a springboard, as it was the first of five consecutive Top 5 and multi-platinum studio albums for the band in the U.S. All told, between 1977 and 1988, the band had 16 Top 40 hits in the U.S., including 9 Top 10s and one #1 (1984's "I Want to Know What Love Is"). The band has sold over 80 million albums worldwide.
The Spotify version of the album is expanded to include four demo tracks.
Favorite song from Side 1: "Feels Like the First Time"
The first track on the first side of a Foreigner album is appropriately called "Feels Like the First Time." It's a good start to the band's catalog, and it was the band's first (of seven) Top 5 hits on the Billboard Hot 100. Songwriter and guitarist Mick Jones wrote the song about new beginnings, both because he had this new band and because he had just gotten married and moved to America. I have always like Gramm's wailing "never again" at the end of the bridge.
Favorite song from Side 2: "Long, Long Way From Home"
I kind of forgot about this song in the Foreigner pantheon because you don't hear it as much as some of their other hits. But it's a great song that veers more towards hard rock than pop.
Favorite song from Side 2: "Long, Long Way From Home"
I kind of forgot about this song in the Foreigner pantheon because you don't hear it as much as some of their other hits. But it's a great song that veers more towards hard rock than pop.
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