For My Sunday Song #354, we are talking another ballad by Aldo called “Ball And Chain” off his debut 1982 album ‘Aldo Nova’. The album came out on April Fool’s Day in the States but it was no joke. The double platinum selling album was huge for Aldo. His song “Fantasy” made the Top 40, but that wasn’t necessarily the best song on the album. One thing Aldo can do is ballads and “Ball And Chain” was one I gravitated towards almost immediately. Aldo wrote and played guitars and keyboards on it as well.
Lyrically, the song is about a love gone dead. The guy sits around waiting for the girl to come back to him. That love he feels weighs him down like a ball and chain as he can’t get over her and he just wants to hear her voice one more time. He wants to hear her say that she still loves him and so he sits, painfully, by the phone waiting for her and yet she never calls. How miserable must he have been to wait so long…he needs some help!!
Musically, it is saturated with keyboards/piano as Aldo loves those synths, but it fits the song so well. The keyboards are almost wailing at times as if they are crying as the hurt so much not hearing from the woman he loves. It is pretty cool effect. Aldo’s guitar solo matches the sound of the keyboards and he just wails away on those notes and makes them cry as well. Aldo sings as if he is feeling the loneliness of his situation and he captures the lyrics so well. And that last “Ball & Chain” vocal sees Aldo hold out the note as long as he can and it ends the song perfectly.
2 Loud 2 Old Music 