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Top Notch - "Mean & Smooth" (2022 FNA Records)


AlphaMale

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http://fnarecords.net/mean-and-smooth.html

 

 

Track List

01 Doing Something Right

02 What's Your Daddy Gonna Say

03 You're The Only One For Me

04 She's Hot

05 Make Me Believe
06 Mean And Smooth
07 Through The Night
08 I'm Not Dreamin'
09 She's All Talk
10 Long Way From Home BONUS TRACK
11 Razor's Edge (Live 11 10 89) BONUS TRACK
12 Heavy Pettin' (by Next Of Kin) BONUS TRACK
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  • AlphaMale changed the title to Top Notch - "Mean & Smooth" (2022 FNA Records)

Description

Top Notch was formed by songwriter and guitar player, Eric Kellogg, in 1984 and included Ken Robertson on vocals, Todd Jeffries on bass, and Mark Alderette on drums. The songs were primarily written by Eric Kellogg and Ken Robertson. The hard rock sound that they developed was melodic with blazing guitar solos. Top Notch recorded their first demo on an 8-track in the bedroom of one of their best friends. This was met with much acclaim and their songs were played on KLOS and KMET Southern California radio stations. This launched them into the LA rock scene, playing every major club including The Roxy, The Whisky, Gazzari’s, and the Troubadour, opening for who would become some of the largest rock bands such as Warrant, Rough Cut, Poison, and many others. Top Notch was then picked up by Available Management run by Alan Oken and David Libert, who managed bands such as Guns N Roses, Alice Cooper, and Bryan Adams. Their new management connected the band with many large record labels and they ultimately signed a developmental deal with Polygram Records. At that time, guitarist Eric Kellogg was connected with many prolific songwriters such as Peter Frampton, Martin Briley, Mark Tanner (Nelson, Eddie Money) and Steve Plunkett of Autograph. Steve Plunkett and Eric Kellogg developed a close relationship and went on to write many songs together that are featured on this album as well as Steve Plunkett’s solo album. The band had a large and loyal following and sold out virtually every club that they played. In the midst of them preparing to sign a major record deal, the grunge scene came into play and tilted the rock n roll world upside down. At this time the band broke up and Eric Kellogg went on to write and play with many well known artists in the industry. The band was no longer together but Top Notch’s music will live on forever!

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Looking forward to my copy arriving of this release.   I've had their demo tape for many years and now, finally a real CD with even more tracks than I already have.   A good Sunset Strip band.....

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  • 4 months later...

Loving this. I've actually never heard of this band before, and therefore non of their tunes... well, except, of course, the Plunkett tune. More on that later. The one strange thing, though, is that the band pic looks incredibly familiar. I know a lot of the "hair metal" dudes can end up looking pretty similar, but I really feel like I've seen the band pic before, but not heard the tunes. Maybe they featured in one of my old print magazines from back in the day?

Either way, I love stuff like this. Lap it up like sex candy, in fact. 'Raw edge' is a bit of a throwaway live addition, but the rest is all very enjoyable. Love the opening riffage of the first two tunes - very cool. 

Favourite tune has to be the super melodic / commercial 'Make Me Believe' - yum. 

Further to all this, though, that Next Of Kin version of Plunkett's 'Heavy Pettin' - is that a one-off, or does anyone know if there are more Next of Kin recordings? I'd assume not, or they'd be here, but my goodness would I love to hear more of that if it exists. 

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  • 2023 Gold Donors
12 hours ago, Geoff said:

Loving this. I've actually never heard of this band before, and therefore non of their tunes... well, except, of course, the Plunkett tune. More on that later. The one strange thing, though, is that the band pic looks incredibly familiar. I know a lot of the "hair metal" dudes can end up looking pretty similar, but I really feel like I've seen the band pic before, but not heard the tunes. Maybe they featured in one of my old print magazines from back in the day?

Either way, I love stuff like this. Lap it up like sex candy, in fact. 'Raw edge' is a bit of a throwaway live addition, but the rest is all very enjoyable. Love the opening riffage of the first two tunes - very cool. 

Favourite tune has to be the super melodic / commercial 'Make Me Believe' - yum. 

Further to all this, though, that Next Of Kin version of Plunkett's 'Heavy Pettin' - is that a one-off, or does anyone know if there are more Next of Kin recordings? I'd assume not, or they'd be here, but my goodness would I love to hear more of that if it exists. 

Good question,i was wondering the same thing whether Eric Kellogg's  'Next Of Kin' band had any other recorded material out there - if so Id definitely wanna hear more too.

'Heavy Pettin' is a great tune...Steve's original was awesome too.

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  • 3 weeks later...
  • 2023 Gold Donors

Just received this in the mail this past week and I really enjoyed it!  The audio quality gets a little dodgy for tracks 7, 8, and 9, but overall these are some great tunes!  I've got to agree with Geoff, Make Me Believe is my favorite track followed closely by Doing Something Right and She's Hot.  Was pretty disappointed by the booklet though, or lack thereof.  It just was a couple more band pictures and the bio that AlphaMale posted above from the press release, not even a formal list of the band members (who are mentioned in said bio to be at least a little fair)

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  • 1 year later...
On 6/3/2022 at 10:50 PM, Geoff said:

Loving this. I've actually never heard of this band before, and therefore non of their tunes... well, except, of course, the Plunkett tune. More on that later. The one strange thing, though, is that the band pic looks incredibly familiar. I know a lot of the "hair metal" dudes can end up looking pretty similar, but I really feel like I've seen the band pic before, but not heard the tunes. Maybe they featured in one of my old print magazines from back in the day?

Either way, I love stuff like this. Lap it up like sex candy, in fact. 'Raw edge' is a bit of a throwaway live addition, but the rest is all very enjoyable. Love the opening riffage of the first two tunes - very cool. 

Favourite tune has to be the super melodic / commercial 'Make Me Believe' - yum. 

Further to all this, though, that Next Of Kin version of Plunkett's 'Heavy Pettin' - is that a one-off, or does anyone know if there are more Next of Kin recordings? I'd assume not, or they'd be here, but my goodness would I love to hear more of that if it exists. 

Hey Geoff, loving this blog and glad I found it (even though i'm a few years slow). My cousin was in this band and I know he was in a couple ad campaigns for Aquarius Drum Heads, full page stuff so you may remember him in various rock magazine ads back in the late 80s.

Delbert, I'd love to get a copy of that demo tape as this release is missing some of my favourite tunes like, Dream Come True. I've got hours of video of their shows, one from Gazzaris, Troubadour, and the Whisky. I love bringing them out now and again they were so close.....  

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