Number 956 - Toto

Number 956

Toto

"Africa"

(1982)
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Genre:Rock

Toto released its self-titled debut album in October 1978, and it hit the Top Ten, sold two-million copies, and spawned the gold Top Ten single "Hold the Line." The gold-selling Hydra (October 1979) and Turn Back (January 1981) were less successful, but Toto IV (April 1982) was a multi-platinum Top Ten hit, featuring the number-one hit "Africa" and the Top Tens "Rosanna" (about Lukather's girlfriend, movie star Rosanna Arquette) and "I Won't Hold You Back." At the 1982 Grammys, "Rosanna" won awards for Record of the Year, Best Pop Vocal Performance, and Best Instrumental Arrangement With Vocal; and Toto IV won awards for Album of the Year, Best Engineered Recording, and Best Producer (the group).
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That's a pretty impressive medal haul for a "mainstream" band don't you think? Toto have released another album in 2006 called Falling In Between, its good to see them still recording but it is a shame you don't hear them on the radio no more. (well here in New Zealand anyway)
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What does Rolling Stone think about Toto?
Toto sings love songs of little distinction or consequence, offering greeting-card verse and aural bouquets to fantasy lovers via the medium of cutting-edge studio technology and their own well-honed sessionman "chops." The group's cleverly titled new album, Toto IV, follows this formula to a T, mixing sodden ballads taken at tiptoeing-rhino tempos with booming, echoey rock songs. This band of pros doesn't miss a trick: since Asia has lately become the platinum nom de plume of four British art-rock superstars, Toto has asserted its territorial imperative with a tune called "Africa"–a ringer for the U.K group's FM smash, "Heat of the Moment." There's even a touch of Asia on Toto IV in the artificially malleted xylophone sounds that pop up on occasion. Typical of an album that feels about as real as a Velveeta-orange polyester leisure suit. [Source: RS 374]
For Asia see Number 658

Rolling Stone Top 500 Songs ranked this song at Number (They didn't and they should have) and the Album ranked at Number (Nope, criminal i say)

This song has a crowbarred rating of 52.9 out of 108
Toto - africa
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