Have you ever wondered what a sandwich sounds like?

Not much to it is there?

Unless of course it's a Walker's sandwich.

Mmm, that is good.

Now that's what Asani should sound like.

Go all crisp in with walkers.

Delicious.

Delicious. Welcome back to Hit Parade, a podcast of Pop Chart History from Slate magazine about the hits from

coast to coast. I'm Chris Malanfi, chart analyst, pop critic, and writer of Slate's Why Is This

Song Number One series? On our last episode, we introduced you to prolific producer and songwriter Robert John Lang,

better known by his nickname, Mutt Lang. Raised in South Africa, nurtured in the British

recording industry, Mutt emerged as a top producer at the start of the 1980s, with a detailed, meticulous method for

crafting fist-pumping anthems, from ACDC to foreigner, deaf leopard, to Billy Ocean.

We're now in the mid-80s, and Mutt is about to embark upon an even more complex Deaf Leopard LP,

before making an improbable pivot to country music by the 90s.

Deaf Leopards' fourth album seemed cursed from the start.

Mutt Lang did help the band start writing its songs in 1984, just after their

Pyromania album wound down. But he declined to produce the LP, citing his exhaustion after

producing the car's heartbeat city. So, for the rest of 84,

the band tried other production arrangements, including producing themselves with the assistance

of engineers, and even working with Jim Steinman, the famed meatloaf producer we covered in his

own hit parade episode.

...