INXS: Listen Like Thieves (40th anniversary edition) [ATLANTIC]

Why you'll love it

This 40th anniversary edition was pressed in Germany and comes in a heavyweight inner sleeve. The album gave INXS their first US top-5 single in "What You Need," spent two weeks at No. 1 in Australia and reached No. 11 on the Billboard 200.

This edition

• 40th anniversary edition
• Heavyweight inner sleeve
• Pressed in Germany
• Stereo mix

About the album

The Swing had made INXS stars at home, but the six lads from Sydney wanted the rest of the world to notice. So they stayed in Sydney, booked Rhinoceros Studios and brought in Chris Thomas, the producer behind records by the Sex Pistols, the Pretenders and Roxy Music, to toughen up their sound.

It worked. "What You Need" is all strut and saxophone, the title track sways with Michael Hutchence at his most magnetic, and "Kiss the Dirt (Falling Down the Mountain)" rolls in like a storm. The three Farriss brothers, Andrew, Tim and Jon, lock in with Garry Gary Beers and Kirk Pengilly, and Ray Cooper adds percussion to "Same Direction." Rolling Stone heard the crunch of hard rock and the step of a disco beat in the same grooves.

It started a long run with Chris Thomas that led straight to Kick, and in 2024 Uncut ranked it among the 500 greatest albums of the 1980s. Forty years on, it still makes the strongest case we know for a saxophone in a rock band, and we've stopped arguing the point.

Also at Kops: more INXS on vinyl · browse Rock

Tracklist

Listen

On Petrol / Atlantic / Rhino (cat# R1 726935), a reissue of the 1985 album.