Tropical Gangsters

Very smart vinyl with a nice crisp gloss cover.

Tropical Gangsters is the third album by Kid Creole and the Coconuts, released on May 10, 1982.^[1] Originally conceived as a solo album by band leader August Darnell and titled Wise Guy, his label ZE Records pressured him to change it to a Kid Creole and the Coconuts record and to make it more commercial sounding in order to relieve the label's financial problems. Despite the tensions this caused within the band and Darnell's complaint that the subsequent record was a "cop-out",^[2] the more dance-pop oriented sound helped it reached #145 in the Billboard 200 album chart, representing the group's commercial breakthrough in their home country (the album kept the title of Wise Guy in the US and Canada, with a different cover). However, to the surprise of Darnell and his record company Tropical Gangsters was a huge success in Australia and New Zealand, Europe, and in particular the UK, where the album peaked at #3 in the UK albums chart and yielded three top ten singles.^[3]Tropical Gangsters made Darnell a worldwide star, and the album remains both his and the ZE label's most successful record by far.