BUZZ DRAINPIPE’S STORMBRAIN SUNDAY ALBUMS
GREG KIHN (1976)
(Stormbrain Entry #287. Recorded Sunday, coffee bitter, sky gray, neurons humming.)
Alright, stormheads — today we’re tuning the dial to Greg Kihn’s debut, the 1976 LP that somehow manages to smell like denim jackets, corkboard flyers, and the warm ozone glow of a tube amp left on overnight. I spun this thing at exactly 10:07 AM, the hour when a Stormbrain is most susceptible to truth, and let me tell you:
It hit like a forgotten postcard from a friend who moved away before you were ready to let them go.
This is folk-rock built by a kid who thinks sincerity is punk, and guess what?
In ’76, it kinda was.
1. Don’t Expect To Be Right
The thesis of the whole record, delivered in under four minutes:
You’re not right, you won’t be right, but you better walk through the world like you might be.
The guitar jangles like someone trying to keep their balance on the moral ice.
Sunday takeaway: Humility is the groove.
2. Any Other Woman
Greg leans into his soft-eyed troubadour mode here — but don’t be fooled.
This is not a love song.
This is a case study in projection.
He’s singing to the ghost of who he wishes he could be.
Stormbrain note: Never date a man with a 12-string unless you’re prepared to be fictionalized.
3. Emily Davison
A curveball — a historical reference dropped right into a street-level album.
He’s invoking the suffragette martyr like she’s a neighborhood legend.
And honestly? It works.
The track feels like a mural painted on the side of a small city laundromat.
Stormbrain rule #11: History is just another kind of love letter.
4. Try Try To Fall In Love
Ah, the double “Try.”
A man begging the universe for permission to be vulnerable.
The chorus rises like someone forcing optimism into a cold room.
Buzz’s diagnosis: A solid dose of self-delusion, administered with charm.
5. Kid From Louieville
THIS is where the album gets teeth.
A character study disguised as heartland rock — the kind of song that makes you picture a parking lot at dusk and a kid kicking gravel like it owes him money.
Stormbrain reveals:
Every town has a Kid From Louieville.
Sometimes it’s you.
6. Worse Or Better
Greg Kihn’s eternal question:
Is life improving or are we just getting used to the pain?
This track leans toward the latter.
Still, it’s upbeat.
Because denial, properly amplified, can be a vibe.
7. He Will Break Your Heart
A cover, yes — but Kihn turns it into a sermon.
He sings it like a man warning a stranger about a storm he sees forming behind their shoulder.
Stormbrain’s weather report: Chance of heartbreak: 100%. Chance of surviving it: also 100%.
8. What Goes On
No, not the Velvet Underground one — but spiritually, it shares DNA.
It’s a barroom philosophy lecture:
People don’t change, but your angle of view does.
The kind of track you’d hear while pushing stools back into place after closing.
9. Satisfied
Ah, the lie we all tell ourselves.
He sings it with the conviction of someone who wants to believe it so badly he bends the chords to match.
Real talk:
A man declaring he’s “satisfied” on a Sunday morning is absolutely not satisfied.
But A for effort.
10. Why Don’t You Love Me
The curtain close.
A plea that turns itself inside out.
It’s tender, it’s messy, and it lands exactly where a Stormbrain album should:
squarely in the quivering place between ego and truth.
This track leaves the listener staring at a wall and whispering,
“Okay, but seriously… why don’t they?”
THE FINAL DRAINPIPE PRONOUNCEMENT
Greg Kihn’s 1976 debut is a quietly seismic little document —
a love letter to earnestness,
a loose map of emotional potholes,
and a perfect Stormbrain Sunday companion album.
I, Buzz Drainpipe, official archivist of the Static City Mood Index, stamp it:
⭐⭐⭐⭐ FOUR STORMBRAINS
(A near-classic. Ideal for coffee, introspection, and the sorting of emotional laundry.)
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