After a six-week run atop Billboard’s 200 album chart with the multi-platinum debut album Beauty and the Beat, all-girl rock group the Go-Go’s hurriedly released the follow-up sophomore effort, Vacation. Echoes of previous singles “We Got the Beat” and “Our Lips Are Sealed” could still be heard across radio airwaves when “Vacation” became the band’s third hit single in the summer of ’82. The bubbly title track was the first-ever cassette single and was accompanied by its vivid and playful music video, which revealed the band members hamming it up while pretending to be highly skilled water skiers.

The Go-Go’s second studio album started off strong, but inspiration seemed as if had been stretched thin in order to quickly release a follow-up to the band’s best-selling debut. Leftovers from the Go-Go’s earlier live setlists unfortunately found their way onto the sophomore effort, effectively diluting what could’ve been a solid track listing. The obligatory cover tune “Cool Jerk” and the subpar “Beatnik Beach” sounded like fillers included to expand upon the album’s abstract beach theme. It resulted in making the Go-Go’s second album sound as if the girls had been left scrambling for quality material. Additionally, Jane Wiedlin’s heavy reliance on Webster’s rhyming dictionary (as evidenced on “Girl of 100 Lists” and “It’s Everything but Partytime”) certainly didn’t help matters. Fortunately, Kathy Valentine was aptly able to pick up her cronies’ slack by contributing the effervescent title track, the accidently prophetic “We Don’t Get Along” and the ethereal closing ballad, “Worlds Away.” [Read Full Review]