Cheap Trick Heaven Tonight on LP

When Cheap Trick burst onto the music scene in the 1970s, they broke new ground with a punkish, hard-edged brand of literate garage rock that was the perfect antidote to what ailed weary FM radio listeners worldwide. Their uniquely midwestern sensibilities have been deftly recorded in over 25 albums and laid bare in thousands upon thousands of performances worldwide. With walls of gold and platinum records to their credit, Cheap Trick and its pick-flinging, checkerboard-bedecked dynamo, melody machine Rick Nielsen, are without a doubt a musical institution and long running progenitor of the power pop genre. 

Between 1974 and the band’s first album in 1977, Cheap Trick toured constantly, playing over 200 concerts a year, including opening slots for Queen, the Kinks, Kiss, and Santana. During this time, the band built up a solid catalog of original songs that would eventually comprise their first three albums; they also perfected their kinetic live show. Cheap Trick signed with Epic Records in 1976, releasing their brilliant self-titled debut in early 1977. The record sold well in America, yet failed to chart. However, the album became a massive success in Japan, going gold. Later that year, the band released their second album, In Color.          

Capturing both the loud, raucous energy of their eponymous debut and the hook-laden song craft of second effort In Color, 1978's platinum certified Heaven Tonight led to the fast rising band's first Top 100 single, "Surrender," which peaked at number 62. The album is also home to such further classic Cheap Trick fare as "Auf Wiedersehen," "Heaven Tonight" and an explosive cover of The Move's "California Man."