Slug Line

This was John Hiatt's first single from his first LP after signing with MCA in 1979. Word is that MCA hoped John Hiatt would be their answer to the U.K.'s Elvis Costello---brash, tuneful, versatile, witty, rocking, etc. Based on the evidence in this terrific single, they would have been right. I haven't heard all of Hiatt's first MCA LP---which is supposed to have been one of his best ever---but this here track is one great piece of rock'n'roll, and it sounds like it came fresh off of the Stiff assembly line, with Nick Lowe producing. Its satire of runaway consumerism is also right in keeping with the political and social criticism so common in British punk and new wave bands of the era. This promo copy has the same version on both sides.