well I never said it was a groundbreaking undiscovered gem but for a probably hastily thrown together Christmas song it's alright.
Listen like Thieves (Album): This is one of those albums I would call a 'Desert Island Disc' or requisite listening for a car trip album. Like The Swing before, this was introduced to me courtesy of my older brother and of course, being 8 at the time, still didn't know who the band was. At least until I saw the What You Need video during the summer of '86. The dots came together and suddenly I had discovered a new band and the rest is history as they say. This is a fantastic album, front to back. I feel that the band had come into their own on this album and to me, began a string of memorable albums. To this day, I make sure to carry the album on my phone or any listening device I have on hand.
Just had a listen. Boy in retrospect I really prefer The Swing. That one sounds more effortless and carefree. This sounds like it’s swinging heavily for the U.S. market and missing the interesting quirks that sum up the era for me. The obvious hits stand up but there’s a lot of filler here, just plodding rockers. And I really miss the synths from the previous album. Each to their own.
"What You Need" Cover art for US and UK editions, also used for the worldwide 12-inch vinyl Extended Mix maxi-single Single by INXS from the album Listen Like Thieves Released 26 August 1985 (AUS)[1] 1986 (US) Recorded 1985 Genre Rock, Alternative rock Length 3:35 Label Atlantic Songwriter(s) Andrew Farriss and Michael Hutchence Producer(s) Chris Thomas "What You Need" is a song recorded by the Australian band INXS. It is the leadoff track from their 1985 album, Listen Like Thieves. "What You Need" was the lead single off the album in Australia and New Zealand, while it was in USA and Europe the second single after "This Time" and was the band's first American Top Ten hit, peaking at #5 on the Billboard Hot 100 singles chart. After the album Listen Like Thieves was recorded and ready to be given to the record label for inspection, producer Chris Thomas was worried that the album didn't have a "hit". As Andrew Farriss recalled in a 2005 interview; "'What You Need' is another example of a huge hit that essentially took no time at all. We'd already finished the Listen Like Thieves album but Chris Thomas (the producer) told us there was still no "hit". We left the studio that night knowing we had one day left and we had to deliver "a hit". Talk about pressure. The band's performance on that track is amazing. We absolutely nailed it."[2] UK 7" INXS 12 "What You Need" – 3:35 "Sweet As Sin" – 2:20 UK 12" single INXS 512 "What You Need" (Remix) – 5:35 (Remix: Nick Launay) "Sweet As Sin" – 2:21 "What You Need" (Live) – 3:56 "The One Thing" (Live) – 3:31 ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- This song hit the airwaves like a ton of bricks, and a lot of that has to do with the intro. It seems so off the cuff and kind of raw, that it grabbed the attention back then. I get the feeling that even folks that weren't particularly interested would have turned their head, and even if they weren't too fussed about the song, that intro just kind of got the attention. We also have a situation where the video has a slightly different intro to the single as well. As was stated just above there. I don't think there is any doubt that this album was a little more directly aimed at the US market, but it still retained an Inxs/Aussie kind of feel to it. By the next album even many of us in Australia felt the band were just straight up leaning into the US market..... and here's the thing, it was almost essential for an aussie band to break the US market, or they needed to get a good slice of the European market, because survival with just the Australian market was extremely difficult. Australia is a huge country, with the population of Florida. Think about that for a minute.... To reach the fans for gigs, you have to tour the whole of mainland USA, to reach the population of Florida..... anyway, that's a sidetrack. Personally I like the album version of the song, with those drums rolling in, and the sort of randomness of the instruments, and then they just roll into the groove. Again the arrangement here is quite brilliant. The carefully layered sections, the clean guitars, the intro of the crunch guitars. The layering of the sax. On listening more closely during this thread I have gained a whole new respect for the studio craft of the band. They just knew how to layer the songs in such a way as to really make them shine, yet on a casual listen they don't sound overstacked to me. This is an iconic Inxs song, so I am not really sur eI need to say much more. You guys can take it away.
What You Need - the video With the video version we get the chop up effect on the vocal to start us off.... it is very effective here, but I got tired of the chop up thing very quickly, because it appeared everywhere, and I just tired of it very quickly. I think the rest of the song is the same, but please correct me if I'm wrong there. Now I seem to remember there being some kudos given for the video itself at the time, but I was never very interested in videos, and the animation used here is actually quite clever. I'm not sure how new the technique was, but it looks good and interesting. If any of you guys are a little more clued in than me on the video aspect, please fill us in.
The extended mix We get another variation on the intro, and I still prefer the album version lol We move into the groove and it moves into a somewhat instrumental variation of the song, then with a drum breakdown we move into the vocal and the instrumentation is stripped back and slowly reintroduced and we have louder bvox, and a lot of nice little variations that will give the 12" fan plenty to get into. This is actually a pretty interesting remix of the track, and although I am going to lean to the album version, this certainly has its place.
Extended Fab Mix? I am not sure if this is a fan mix, or a version from much later, but I thought I would throw it in here anyway. I like the intro, and the various things going on are pretty cool, but for me the song loses its all important momentum. I think that sometimes with mixes, like technically gifted musicians, we get plenty of technical prowess, but the song can get lost. The mix settles down a little and the song takes the stage again, but if this was me at home it would have been off by then. Interesting and well done, but not to my personal taste in regard to this song.
Sweet As Sin Drums [Snare Drum & Sticks] – Jon Farriss Engineer, Mixed By – David Quinn Guitar [Additional] – Andrew Farriss Producer, Performer, Written-By – Garry Gary Beers This is a fun little track.... it has a sort of rockabilly kind of thing going on. A good choice for a b-side.... it is hard to be too sure of an opinion as with all the other b-sides this is completely new to me. What I can say though, is at least the guys were obviously still trying stuff in the studio, and that is always a good thing. I assume Beers is singing and it sounds pretty decent. With each of these b-sides it becomes more and more perplexing that a b-sides compilation has never surfaced.
I'm Over You This is another b-side from some versions of What You need. B I'm Over You Engineer – Alan Wright Guitar – Kirk Pengilly Written-By, Producer, Performer – Jon Farriss 4:05 This is actually quite interesting and it has a lot of the new wave sound about it. I hear a lot of different influences here.... Joy Division, Heaven 17, and a few other things come to mind while listening to this. The intro isn't too flash, in my opinion, that sample sound is a little irritating to me, but once we get passed that and into the song, I actually quite like this. Pengilly does a good job on the guitars and the feel of the track works well for me.
Based on the obvious quality of the A-side and two very enjoyable B-sides I reckon this might be their finest single overall.
I rode from Lexington Ky, to Palmdale California and had "Listen Like Thieves" on cassette. Listened to it for nearly the entire 2,517 mile trip. YES! it's a 'Desert island Disc' to me!
What You Need Always liked this song, it's funky, has interesting sections and the sax has an important role. The album version could've been an extended remix as is. The big slapping drum sound, buzzing bass and guitar. A 5/5
What You Need. 4/5. It’s a good song, and Kirk’s sax is the highlight to me, but the production of it is lacking. There should be more punches than just Kirk’s sax at the end. Always disliked the quick chops, dates it when the song shouldn’t be dated. The song has bounce, joy, and excitement though. The video is excellent. Their best since Shabooh. Great ideas in that video. Sweet as Sin. 3/5. Okay. I’m Over You. 4/5. Should have replaced Biting Bullets to be honest.
What You Need is totally killer. A simple yet insistent rhythm, short lyrics delivered superbly, perfect instrumentation including the sax during the build-ups, and a powerful arrangement make this a truly top-shelf track. This is the sound of a band that’s ready to become superstars. There's nothing wrong with intentionally writing a hit, especially not one as good as this. And there are very few bands or songwriters that could do it on order.
The intro doesn’t get the song off on the right foot, but the rest of the song is pretty cool. This could have fit on the album, but it would have cut into the “live rock band” feel they were going for. Best of the Bsides here. In the US they stuck this on the “This Time” single, so it’s swapped in from the Australian “What You Need” single: they switched the Bsides just as they switched the release order of those first two singles from the album.
What You Need Yes, the stop-start edits date the song to a specific time in the 80’s, but INXS had used that a couple times on The Swing tracks too. It works for me, but I am glad they moved on from this sound effect. “What You Need” has one of those great intros that sounds like the song starts, then falls apart, then restarts and turn into a roaring beast. Instantly recognizable - one of those tracks that when you hear it begin you know the next 3 1/2 minutes are going to be spent having fun. Lots of bands have tried to “write a hit” but ended up with boring cliches. This one hits the mark.
These three early demos are on that Stay Young compilation from Deluxe that includes their first two albums and related singles.
Upon hearing What You Need for the first time, you can easily tell it's a smash hit. And for good reason. As it's simply one of the best songs INXS ever wrote and quickly became a live staple because of it. The abstract intro, interestingly enough, sounds very similar to the intro of Roxy Music's Pyjamarama. I love the mixture of funk / hard rock guitar and sax riffs, as well as how rhythm centric it is. WYN is yet another quintessential INXS song. The music video was extremely innovative and was one of Richard Lowenstein's finest achievements. Like many other different mixes already reviewed, the extended and fab mixes include components that better parts of the original mix - in this particular case, it's the drum parts, which are much more bass oriented and almost present a different groove. And as a result, they're more enjoyable than you'd probably expect because of it. Sweet As Sin is meh B-side. But I'm Over You is far superior and exudes a very cool electronic funk feel. It's definitely one of the best B-sides INXS ever released and is strong enough to be an album track. However, stylistically speaking, I can see why they didn't include it on LLT because it doesn't fit.
What You Need: It's easily one of the band's iconic and identifiable songs. The intro is fantastic and leads into this fantastic arrangement of rock and funk. As a kid, it was an song I remember quite well during the early part of 1986. A definite classic in my book,
There were auditions at the rock/dance club that I eventually became a DJ at and this is the song that got me to the final round. As fate would have it, I was given my walking papers at The Palladium in NYC during “It Takes Two” by Rob Base so I never made it to the TV show but WYN will always hold a special place in my heart
What You Need is definitely the first taste of the INXS that would straddle the globe. A new league, with all their strengths crystallised. I was only 12 or 13 when it came out, but I remember it was everywhere. I've said in previous posts that the album as a whole hadn't aged as well for me, but this song is INXS par excellence. Have we mentioned Molly on the thread before? For non-Aussies, he hosted the Sunday night music show Countdown. Hindsight makes me marvel at the reach the show had (it was the only real national music show with real cultural clout - make or break stuff), but also, as the show's creative force, Molly had such power of editorial. There was a 10 minute 'news' section called Humdrum where he spoke freely about his many enthusiasms, but he wasn't afraid to take bands to task either. Anyway, I remember him giving INXS a bit of a serve because, while loved What You Need, he was chiding them for not having put out the 12" version yet, that they risked losing momentum in the clubs. In today's oversaturated media climate, it's hard to imagine a primetime music and culture host taking a band's tardiness in releasing an extended mix to task! What's got me scratching my head is the last few posts' comments about the video intro with the 'cut-ups'. It was becoming commonplace around then for bands to take elements of the 12" mix and edit them into a 7" mix. I'm guessing it was to differentiate from the album version and maybe drive fans to the 12". It would sound like a single version but with a few dubby tweaks. (Midnight Oil later did it with King of the Mountain, as did Real Life with Catch Me I'm Falling. Hall and Oates' Out of Touch had a section of the 12" mix at the start of the 'single' video.) Anyway, I assume that the 'what-what-whats' in the What You Need video are from the 12". But, if they had the 12" mix in the can at the time the single and video were released, I wonder why Molly was chiding them publicly? Sorry - hardly the greatest unsolved mystery of all time. I'm just speculating. Funny the things your memory decides to keep 30-odd years down the track!
