A great album by a good band

This is a very good album. Against the word of all my friends, who told me this was a bad album, I bought it a few weeks ago from a used CD bin, as I'd heard "AM Radio," "Brown-Eyed Girl," and "Wonderful" on the radio quite a bit over the last few years and liked all of them. Who'da thunk these were three of the weaker tracks on the album? My friends, surprisingly, were very wrong about this album.



It starts out very well, with the title track, a mellow little number, and keeps getting better as it goes along. The best track on here is "Unemployed Boyfriend." It's an awesome song, basically summing up the whole 'Love at first sight' experience very well.



This is a good album. Be forewarned, however, it doesn't sound like a normal Everclear album. It's a bit more 'poppy.' But it's all the better for it, I say.

Strong album from a smart band...

Strong album from a smart band. This is actually a concept album about Art Alexakis growing up and falling in love. The follow-up album is about his divorce and it's on my to-buy list. I love this album so much, especially the cuts "AM Radio" and "Here We Go Again".

The Arc of a Failed Marriage

Having heard So Much for the Afterglow after Songs, I now realize that Art Alexakis has been mining the same autobiographical lode for some time (the American Movie is of course his life), but what a vein he has struck. With repeated hearings, I keep liking this CD more and more. Its songs are loaded with pain and irony, but also with the moments of bliss and beauty in a now-broken relationship and the joys of fatherhood. He also has that rare quality in rock, a sense of humor (check out "Unemployed Boyfriend"). All this comes wrapped in a rock and roll package that variously recalls the sounds of "AM Radio" heyday, the R and B of early Van Morrison (a re-make of "Brown Eyed Girl" that stands strongly up to the original), and judicious use of strings ("Annabella's Song" and "Otis Redding"). "Now That It's Over" and "Thrift Store Chair" are my personal favorites. "Now" is a classic tirade song, right up there with Lou Reed's "Hooky Wooky," where he fantasizes throwing his ex-girlfriend's new lover off the roof or Dylan's "Positively Fourth Street". In Alexakis' case he sings, "Maybe we can be friends/Now that we're older/We can have fun.../Now that it's over," pauses and then scornfully screams "Yeah, right!" When I raved about the song to my 26 year old daughter, she said, "Too hardcore" rock. I took that as a generation gap compliment.



A keeper.