Vacation by The Go-Go's

Vacation was the Go-Go's' second album, the 1982 follow-up to the chart-topping Beauty and the Beat, and on the surface it's more of the same sunny stuff: Belinda Carlisle's bright vocals, Charlotte Caffey's lead guitar and keyboards, Jane Wiedlin's rhythm guitar, Kathy Valentine's bass and Gina Schock's drums, all punchy, bouncy and built for summer. Richard Gottehrer produced for I.R.S. The title track went to number eight on the Hot 100, the album hit number eight on the Billboard 200 and went gold, and "Beatnik Beach" and "Get Up & Go" kept the party going.

Behind the beach-party grins, though, the sessions were rough. Most of the band was struggling with drug addiction, the creative arguments were getting louder, and friction was building between songwriter Caffey, Carlisle and a Wiedlin who wanted a bigger say in the writing. Those cracks kept widening until the band came apart after Talk Show.

Written with AI assistance from RockLists chart data, MusicBrainz and Wikipedia.