|
It's a testament to Matthew Sweet's songwriting ability that this is a best-of that misses so many of his highs. It's just that his best work doesn't fit into a mere eighty minutes, especially when some of his best songs, for whatever reason, don't even make it to albums or even those soundtracks (like "Strange Faces", a beautiful home-recorded piano ballad only found in demo form). Like many Sweet fans, this reviewer's favorite (and unfortunately omitted here) tracks include the soundtrack contributions such as "Happiness" (Kids in the Hall: Brain Candy) and "Farther Down" (Can't Hardly Wait).This disc is, however, ideal for a casually interested fan of excellent power pop that owes something to the Beatles, Beach Boys and Byrds, as well as Television (Richard Lloyd is a frequent contributor to Sweet's songs), Neil Young, Big Star, R.E.M. "Girlfriend", "Sick of Myself", "Time Capsule", "I've Been Waiting", and "Where You Get Love" simply had to be included, and their appearance here make the disc worth the price alone.
In fact, Mr. This disc is also just a ridiculously enjoyable listen for fans of said guitar-heavy (and sometimes piano-based) power-pop/alt-rock. Casual fans who've never heard these songs and don't want to waste too much money on more than one disc shouldn't be disappointed with the music that is actually included.A caveat: If your lyrical tastes are more geared towards, say, James Mercer (Shins) style oblique and nearly indecipherable poetry, Matthew Sweet's simpler (and for this reviewer's money, more charming) lyrics may not be for you. Sweet's Girlfriend is one of my "desert island" albums, along with R.E.M.'s Murmur, Pixies' Doolittle, The Beatles' Revolver and Television's Marquee Moon. That said, his unpretentious lyrics can still frequently (especially on these tracks) lay bare stunningly honest emotion and/or fun conceits that play very well against the downright filthy-fun foil of the lead guitar of the excellent Richard Lloyd, Robert Quine and Pete Phillips.Another caveat: Don't be surprised if, like me, you end up ravenously devouring everything else of his, eventually rendering this purchase practically redundant. In fact, his albums also miss some of his highs.
Only die-hard fans lament the omission of tracks like "Come to California", "In Too Deep", "Reaching Out" and the like. Kimi, Altered Beast and In Reverse are ridiculously awesome, too. and other more guitar-heavy and "crunchy" and/or "twangy" alt-rock power-pop acts. Yes, sadly, "Winona" and "Evangeline" were omitted, but Girlfriend, from which those two songs originate, is an album also worth it's price (and, in fact, an even more enjoyable musical experience, albeit demanding more time to reveal its true worth), meaning it's more lucrative to spread the disc space around more evenly across all five of Matthew Sweet's albums from the '90s, so that casual fans can get a taste of each album's offerings, in a more quickly digestible manner.On that level, this compilation succeeds extraordinarily well.
I strongly recommend that you check out the following: 1) Teenage Symphonies To God by The Velvet Crush 2) Papa Nez: A Loose Salute To The Work Of Michael Nesmith by Various Artists 3) Nashville by Josh Rouse I am a huge fan of power pop with a little twang.
Not much here can be completely discounted and the new songs fit in quite well (although I probably would have included "Evangeline" at the expense of "Ready"). Its not that he doesn't sing with passion or feeling, but somehow the words seem to get lost in the mix. "I've Been Waiting" works well in combining catchy melody with plaintive adolescent desire, and "Girlfriend" is for the most part a great rocker. There are some truly impressive (albeit derivative) stuff here: "What Matters" is in my opinion the greatest Byrds song never written, "Hide" is a beautiful piano ballad that wouldn't seem out of place on Badfinger compilation, "If Time Permits" has some of the most beautiful chorus harmonies not written by Brian Wilson, etc.
A lot of music fans have mused over why Matthew Sweet did not achieve greater success with the masses despite his obvious ability to write very catchy songs. Despite the undeniable quality of the music there is nothing life-changing here and ultimately great music must at least have the semblance of being life-changing. However, after the relatively simple production of Girlfriend, his later albums got bogged down in an attempt to recreate a "wall of sound" feeling, which quite frankly doesn't really work unless you're Phil Spector. "Sick of Myself" single-handedly rejuvenated my faith in the power of pop music at a time when pop seemed to have exhausted its possibilities.
etc. Still heartily recommended for fans of catchy, melodic pop-rock. But in retrospect Sweet simply wasn't a very marketable commodity for the music industry, and on top of that his vocals and lyrics somehow didn't grab people. Perhaps its a production thing; regardless, the vocals on a MS album always seem to be secondary to the music and that is a no-no for any great singer-songwriter.
So instead of buying it on CD I bought this 'Best Of' instead. I guess it's not too bad to use as background music while you're doing something else (like writing album reviews). I liked the song so I went out and bought '100% Fun' on cassette.
The rest aren't really that good. The more attention you pay to the music the worse the songs sound, besides the few good ones. The tracks I truly enjoy are Sick Of Myself, We're The Same, If Time Permits and So Far.
I first heard Matthew Sweet in the early nineties when 'Sick Of Myself' was getting some airplay over here in Australia. Although most of the tracks are different from '100% Fun' there are only some songs I like enough to keep listening to. Matthew Sweet is certainly capable of writing good songs, just not enough of them.
I enjoyed some of the songs, didn't like some others. My opinion of this album is the same as for '100% Fun'.
(I know, some Sweet fan, huh). You won't be disappointed. It's so nice having most of Matthew's best stuff on ONE CD. "Where You Get Love" is amazing as I've also heard a live version of this one & it only gets better.Don't wait another minute before picking up this album. (unless you were wanting mushy gooshy bubblegum pop or death metal) That's not to dismiss the rest of the songs that didn't make it. Still, I absolutely LOVE "Ready" & hadn't heard it before this album.
|
