Latest Release
- FEB 10, 2023
- 1 Song
- Hi Infidelity (30th Anniversary Edition) · 1980
- The Hits · 1981
- You Can Tune a Piano, But You Can't Tuna Fish · 1978
- Wheels Are Turnin' · 1984
- You Can Tune a Piano, But You Can't Tuna Fish · 1978
- The Hits · 1984
- Hi Infidelity (30th Anniversary Edition) · 1980
- The Hits · 1987
- The Hits · 1988
- R.E.O. · 1976
Essential Albums
- This 10x-platinum 1980 album (the band’s ninth) is the career pinnacle for arena rockers REO Speedwagon. By this point, they’d shed their earlier prog affections and roadhouse rave-ups in favor of straight-up heartland radio rock. The slick-sounding album is often lazily dismissed as a cloying collection of power ballads, but a closer listen reveals both songcraft subtlety and how long-overlooked guitarist Gary Richrath kept the songs grounded in some rock ’n’ roll debauchery. Richrath had a rarely contained Ron Wood/Jeff Beck vide amid an otherwise controlled bunch of players and songs. Ex-folkie Kevin Cronin penned the majority of the tunes, but Richrath was key to their success. High Infidelity is a study in contrasts. They got the ladies with weepy, unironic ballads and the dudes with raunched-out, glammy guitar. Both elements often appeared in the same tune, as on the massive hits “Take It on the Run” (written by Richrath) and “Keep on Loving You” (written by Cronin). Conversely, songs like “Don’t Let Him Go” (featuring a killer Bo Diddley beat), “Out of Season,” and “Someone Tonight” rivaled the pop of Dwight Twilley or The Knack.
- “Roll with the Changes” features one of the most scorching guitar tracks in all of rock ’n’ roll. Filled with tortured notes and beautiful droning harmonics, Gary Richrath’s six-string performance soars and kicks, giving the song true rock ’n’ roll chutzpah. Much of the album is like that: Richrath rocked the ballads that singer Kevin Cronin wrote, while Cronin sweetened the rockers that Richrath penned (though “Runnin’ Blind” careens as if Cronin is hanging on for dear life). Cronin’s songs got the girls and Richrath’s got the boys. That was a golden combination: this 1978 album was their first to enter the American Top 40, and it sold more than 2 million copies. “Time for Me to Fly” launched the band into the mainstream rock pantheon. Yet there’s plenty of great stuff here that never made the radio. There’s a Richrath instrumental (“The Unidentified Flying Tuna Trot”) that’s as close to arena-rock boogie-woogie as you’ll likely ever get, and the finale, “Say You Love Me or Say Goodnight,” plays like standoff between Cronin and Richrath, a piano-guitar duel to the end.
Artist Playlists
- Hard rock? Soft rock? It's all epic stadium rock where these guys are concerned.
- Drill further into the multifaceted band's ballads and rockers.
Singles & EPs
Live Albums
Compilations
About REO Speedwagon
Although many old-school rock bands had a rough time adjusting to the 1981 emergence of MTV, REO Speedwagon navigated the video age with flying colors. Chalk it up to good timing: From day one, MTV embraced the group’s engaging live performance videos and the pop-leaning vibe of their LPs, especially 1980’s Hi Infidelity, which featured the smoldering power ballads “Keep On Loving You” and “Take It On the Run.” REO Speedwagon initially formed in a more analog time—the late 1960s, in Champaign, IL—and cut their teeth playing at bars and frat parties before debuting with a self-titled album in 1971. After a series of personnel shifts, the band’s lineup eventually settled to include songwriters/guitarists Gary Richrath and Kevin Cronin, who split lead-vocal duties until the latter took over full time in the late ’70s. That proved to be the group’s career turning point, as a sprawling 1977 live jam on “Ridin’ the Storm Out” became their first charting hit, leading to their breakthrough album, You Can Tune a Piano, But You Can’t Tuna Fish, which included the soulful, piano-driven barn burner “Roll With the Changes.” The momentum carried the band through Hi Infidelity and beyond, as REO Speedwagon enjoyed video and concert success in the ’80s and have since sustained a robust pop-culture presence. In 2016, Pitbull interpolated lyrics from “Take It On the Run” in his Enrique Iglesias collaboration “Messin’ Around,” and the band and their songs experienced a popularity surge in 2020 after an appearance on the TV series Ozark.
- ORIGIN
- Champaign, IL, United States
- FORMED
- 1967
- GENRE
- Rock