John Kongos - Kongos

The Happy Mondays' Pills 'n' Thrills and Bellyaches is one of my favorite albums and never fails to put me in a good mood.  But I hadn't really gotten into other bands of the same era and feel, so I wanted to search for some of their influences instead.  The Mondays covered at least two John Kongos songs that appear on this album.  

This album sounds like some pretty talented studio / session players (essentially Elton John's band at the time) dragged their instruments out to the woods, overloaded on really fantastic drugs, and tried to find Jesus.  It's no wonder the Happy Mondays like this guy so much.  You could spend a career trying to hit the same highs Kongos does.

Yellow Magic Orchestra - Solid State Survivor

I enjoyed YMO's self-titled debut, but Allmusic recommended their second album more.  These guys are often compared to Kraftwerk, but where Kraftwerk is steely and grey, YMO is popped colors, fun.  Here they ditched some of the traditional Asian tunes they had on their debut and save their cover song for "Day Tripper". 

I don't know as I'll keep looking for more YMO albums, though.  I do have a Ryuichi Sakamoto solo album that I've hardly listened to; maybe that's where I'll go next.