(Via Ultimate Classic Rock) by Jeff Giles
After toiling in obscurity with their earliest releases, Supertramp managed to score a few hit singles and albums during the mid-to-late ’70s — but they were only a warm-up for their sixth album, Breakfast in America.
Released in March 29, 1979, Breakfast found the band moving away from the more serious, prog-influenced fare that anchored records like 1974’s Crime of the Century and 1977’s Even in the Quietest Moments in favor of a more concise, radio-friendly approach that often emphasized the tongue-in-cheek humor of bandleaders Rick Davies and Roger Hodgson.
As Hodgson explained in an interview with Melody Maker later that year, “The songs on this album were chosen because we really wanted to get a feeling of fun and warmth across. I think we felt that we had done three pretty serious albums, and it was about time we showed the lighter side of ourselves.”
That didn’t mean Breakfast in America was all laughs, however; it was nearly titled Hello Stranger, due to a preponderance of songs about relationships broken by a lack of communication — a subject Davies and Hodgson knew well, given how poorly they were getting along during the making of the album…
Read more: https://ultimateclassicrock.com/supertramp-breakfast-in-america/