CD Review: "Just Desserts" Offers The Complete Recordings From The Waitresses

The 1980s pop/new wave movement could be considered just a fad, but one of the iconic female-fronted bands to find success with that fad was The Waitresses. Their music will forever live on with the holiday staple "Christmas Wrapping" and now Omnivore Recordings will release a 2CD set that includes the complete recordings of The Waitresses.

Their first album "Wasn't Tomorrow Wonderful?" was a mild success, hitting #41 on the Billboard album charts and included the hit single, "I Know What Boys Like." But the album also showcases a band that was ready to take over with their perfectly executed pop beats and punk-like attitude. Songs like "Wise Up" and "Pussy Strut" were a little too edgy for mainstream radio in the eighties, but the ska sound of "Redland" would have been a great followup to "I Know What Boys Like." The first disc also contains the holiday classic "Christmas Wrapping," the theme song to the show "Square Pegs" and the hard-to-find, rare recording "Hangover 1/1/83."

The second disc covers The Waitresses' only other studio release, "Bruiseology." While this album did not fair as well as their previous one, it does contain a couple of glimpses of greatness. The lead single from the album "Make the Weather," failed to make a dent on the charts, but shows that the band still had all the elements to make a pop single. It seems like the freshness of their sound just wore off as the songs "Bruiseology" and "They're All Out Of Liquor, Let's Find Another Party" sound like cookie-cutter attempts at pop hits that never found the right audience. The second disc closes with a couple of updated remixes of "Bread & Butter" to show that their sound was something special.

To find out more about this great new release, please visit omnivorerecordings.com/the-waitresses/.