24 Hours a Day

Bottle Rockets | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Audio CD (August 12, 1997)
• Original Release Date: August 12, 1997
• Number of Discs: 1
• Label: Atlantic / Ada
• ASIN: B000005J6F
• Also Available in: Audio Cassette  |  MP3 Download
• Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (12 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #98,569 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com

If you don't believe the Bottle Rockets are contenders for the title of world's greatest rock & roll band, you should check out their 1994 release, The Brooklyn Side, the decade's best rock & roll record: an out-of-fashion, unhoped-for blend of Lynyrd Skynyrd and the Clash, funny and scary and catchy all at once. It was so good it was released twice--first on the late, lamented indie label ESD and then again on Atlantic. That's why it took three years for the follow-up, which was actually recorded in July 1996, to emerge. Because less is at stake in the songs, 24 Hours a Day isn't quite as good as The Brooklyn Side, but it's a remarkable piece of work just the same.

Like the Blasters, the Bottle Rockets realize that roots are not an empty suit to hide in but a pair of shoulders to stand on so one can reach even higher. The four scruffy musicians from Festus, Missouri, can sound like fading Grand Ole Opry stars on an understated country song like "Dohack Joe," and they can sound like a Southern-rock bar band on an overstated rocker like "Slo Toms." These familiar formulas give the Bottle Rockets an entrée into the Middle America they spring from and speak to, but the band strips the forms of their predictability and sentimentality. The quartet plays with a sort of controlled anarchy, as if at any moment they might leap into epiphany or fall apart altogether--and that creates a suspense that makes you want to listen to each new measure. And lead singer/chief songwriter Brian Henneman is so quick to laugh at his own protagonists that the blue-collar romanticism of Mellencamp and Petty is boiled away to reveal lives as they're actually lived. --Geoffrey Himes

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars brilliant, hilarious, moving rock and roll, January 4, 2001

By 

R. Hutchinson "autonomeus" (a world ruled by fossil fuels and fossil minds) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: 24 Hours a Day (Audio CD)

The Bottle Rockets are one of the best bands in the whole "alt.country/roots rock" scene. You know what that means? They're one of the best bands in the world, period, right now! This is the Bottle Rockets' best record. Just about any song on it should be a hit in a better world. Just consider the title track

"I quit my job, no time to work, gonna spend 24 hours a day -- LOVING YOU!"

This has got to be one of the secret anthems of all guys. Brian Henneman is the singer, and main songwriter, but guitarist Tom Parr contributes two songs, and drummer Mark Ortmann writes one too. Some songs have fierce electric riffs, and others are acoustic, but as a whole they tell stories about working class folks trying to get by, with brilliant insight.

"Can't go West, can't go East, I'm stuck in Indianapolis with a fuel pump that's deceased... Is this Hell or Indianapolis?"

It could be the very character in this song who realizes too late that he's neglected his girlfriend, and sings about "When I Was Dumb." A couple of the most intense songs on the album are "Things You Didn't Know," and "Waiting On a Train," a breakup song with a screaming guitar riff that threatens to blow the walls out:

"He's got two things on me, you know, diesel power and he feels no pain!"

The other records by these guys are all great too -- THE BOTTLE ROCKETS (93), THE BROOKLYN SIDE (95) and BRAND NEW YEAR (99).

(verified purchase from Zia Records in Tucson)

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Listenable 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, December 7, 1999

By 

cd-heaven (ROCK CITY) - See all my reviews

This review is from: 24 Hours a Day (Audio CD)

This band is America's Hidden Treasure. Absolutely, one of the most pure and simple bands since Lynyrd Skynyrd. Brian Henneman is a songwriting genius. Brian writes songs about his own life experiences, whether it actually happened to him, or his friends or what he probably read in a newspaper. He doesn't sit around and think about what to write, he writes songs that touch your mind, heart, your spirit and your soul. It's that pure and simple. Every song on this disc is a classic from Kit Kat Clock to Perfect Far Away to One of You. The clincher is Smokin' 100's Alone and Indianapolis. The first being one of the most beautiful heartache songs EVER!! The latter being a classic road trip gone to hell stuck in all places, Indianapolis. If you love heartland music ala John Cougar Mellencamp's (who is immortalized in Indianapolis song) Scarecrow era songs, then you'll love this album and eventually The Bottle Rockets. A true Americana classic.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Solid Middle America rock-n-roll..., January 13, 2006

By 

Travis B. Hill "seeker of music" (Little Rock AR) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: 24 Hours a Day (Audio CD)

...and that's a good thing! Although I saw these guys open for Steve Earle years ago I somehow managed to overlook them. My loss then is my treasure chest now! I love to "discover" bands like this that have a catalog of underrated and overlooked songs which are better than 95% of the crap that fills corporate radio these days. I guess Festus MO is too country for rock and too rock for country when it comes to radio programming. Solid songwriting, jangly and growling guitars all over the place, plus a band that takes music serious but doesn't take themselves too seriously and you have a really good album that sticks in your head. Chuck Berry meets Wilco backstage at a Steve Earle show. Pick it up!