The first Greg Kihn album issued under the banner of the Greg Kihn Band earns that privilege by virtue of the quartet in question—Kihn (lead vocals/rhythm guitar), Steve Wright (bass, keys, vocals), Larry Lynch (drums, vocals) and Dave Carpender (lead guitar)—having been a tight touring and recording unit for more than two years by then. They were a group on a mission, playing up and down California to increasingly enthusiastic club audiences, hungry for the break that would launch them to the next level.
It wouldn’t come on With The Naked Eye—but not for lack of trying.
Two years before, Kihn and crew had attracted attention (if not chart position) with a sterling cover of Bruce Springsteen’s “For You” on Greg Kihn Again. The Boss was sufficiently impressed that, in the midst of a songwriting streak of his own, he gave Kihn an unreleased tune to use on his next album. “Rendezvous” kicks off With The Naked Eye with a bang, an anthemic slab of guitar rock that Kihn and band give their all to. The consensus afterwards from Kihn, his bandmates, and Springsteen himself, was that they had fallen short of the song’s potential, but it’s hard to locate the flaws they seem to hear; yes, the GKB version lacks the grit of the recording Springsteen later released, but that was always Bruce’s thing, not Kihn’s. Where Springsteen dealt in desperation, Kihn was all about enthusiasm.
The other cover on the album met a similarly mixed fate. Kihn’s under-three-minute studio take on Jonathan Richman’s “Roadrunner” is pretty straight up and faithful to the original, which feels like a good thing until you’ve had the chance to hear the way the GKB transformed the song when they played it live, turning it into a full-tilt, free-ranging seven-minute-plus rock and roll tent revival. It was a battle the band would continue to fight, trying to figure how to translate the electric energy of their live performances into the studio environment.
The rest of the album is a similarly mixed affair. The third highlight is yet another song Kihn didn’t write, and this time he didn’t sing it, either. Drummer Larry Lynch penned and sang the punchy yet philosophical “Can’t Have The Highs (Without The Lows)” with keening sincerity, the first of several Lynch spotlights on subsequent albums that helped showcase the power and diversity of the group’s vocal attack.
Beyond those three, the songwriting on the rest of the album feels a little flat. “In The Naked Eye” goes for the airy mystery of Next Of Kihn’s “Remember” but never quite gets there, despite the best efforts of Carpender and Lynch in particular. The easygoing, thoroughly inoffensive “Getting Away With Murder” and “Another Lonely Saturday Night” feel like Kihn-by-numbers; the man quickly established a niche for earnest, gently punny self-deprecation and never hesitated to borrow from himself.
On the dark and angsty side of the street we find the reggae-inflected “Moulin Rouge” and the somewhat overwrought rockstar-cautionary-tale closer “Fallen Idol.” They’re both fine, but if there’s a sleeper to be found on With The Naked Eye, it’s the exuberant, unjustly ignored “Beside Myself,” a pure-giddy-fun 2:25 guitars-and-harmonies raveup with more than a little Buddy Holly in its bones.
Like each of its predecessors, With The Naked Eye was produced by Beserkley house producers Matthew King Kaufman and Glen Kolotkin, this time assisted by Kenny Laguna. The sound is clean and natural but too often feels like it still lacks the impact the band was able to achieve in a live setting.
It would take one more eager-but-flawed attempt—1980’s Glass House Rock—before the hardworking GKB would finally break through with 1981’s RocKihnRoll and its impossibly catchy hit single “The Breakup Song (They Don’t Write ’Em).” The seeds of those efforts were spread across the grooves of earlier albums like With The Naked Eye, but it would take a little longer for them to sprout.