Customer Reviews

Almost Killed Me

5 star:		(11)
4 star:		(6)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

I don't know anything about the Brooklyn music scene and I don't care. I'm sick of critics qualifying and quantifying groups 'cause they come from a certain place or fit neatly into some newly devised genre.

All I know is the Hold Steady make awesome, powerful, lyrically complex-at-the-same-time-rough-and-beautiful music. I've listened to certain songs on this album literally hundreds of times 'cause they're that good. And I have no affiliation with this band. I lucked into them and now I'm a die-hard fan.

The music is really catchy, and the social observations are quite biting. If you want intelligent, angry catchy rockin' rock, here it is.

and this bar band is goooood!

Fronted by a singer that can't really sing, this band sounds like the spirit of Charles Bukowski (un)filtered through classic rock. The bars, the drugs, the shows, the guitar solos, it is all here. If you ever needed a primer on how to live a life of excess and come out on the other side still alive - this is it. One of the more exciting albums I've heard in years, I've been listening to it for a long time now. Fave track: "Certain Songs"

Highly recommended.

I love this album. I adore it. I burnt a hole in it. It is not Separation Sunday, but Killer Parties and Most People are DJs are still 2 of my favorite Hold Steady songs.

Why, oh why, hasn't the license holder for Lifter Puller re-released those albums yet?

and you will realize that this is one of the best releases of the past few years. Finn is truly an amazing lyricist, and sure he has his own quirky talking/singing vocal style but he's so passionate and articulate that it totally works. The lyrics are dead serious and hilarious, the music is catchy and meadering, and the band rocks. THS are also excellent live; check them out and you will not be disappointed. My favorite NY band.

The raw, raucous bar-rock from former Lifter - Puller-ites succeeds in as much as it undertakes. Don't get me wrong; this album is not going to reinvent music or single handedly save rock and roll. But damn, it nice to hear a ROCK album, pure in its intentions, ripe with buzz and guitar, and with a sincerity and delivery that would send most twee bands crying. This guitar and drum assault doesn't disappoint and touches on well known rock concepts... with Finn delivering smarmy jibes he conjures a bit of Jello Biafra lecturing the crowd... meanwhile the riffs/solos remind me of a picture I once saw of Slash leaning against a wall on his butt, cigarrate haning out one side of his mouth, guitar in one hand, bottle of JD in the other. That's what this album is about. "The Swish" and "Hostile Mass" are probably the best tracks, even if the tounge in cheek lyrics sound funny out loud, they sound great being snottily slung by the singer. ("Hey my names Cory / I'm really into hardcore / They call me hard-Corey / Don't you hate these clever people?). Or the legends retold within "Barfruit Blues" ("went down on the tallboy cans and he woke up in a cargo van / went down with the girls gone wild and he woke up with the middle man / went down with like fourteen bucks and woke up with like sixteen grand"). And the album wouldn't be complete with out the hard rock mellow out slow down song..."Killer Parties". Pick this up if you are tiring of pretentious rock, or are into some of the new hard rock throwback / ripoff rock ala the Darkness or Jet.

A friend of mine turned me on to the Hold Steady a bout a year ago and they've grown on me slowly but surely ever since. The sound and some of the song formats in this album are a little rougher, but just like with their later albums, the more I listen, the more I like. I'd recommend Boys and Girls in America and Stay Positive as better introductory albums, and then if you like those, go ahead and grab this one, Separation Sunday, and their new album A Positive Rage (coming out tomorrow - 4/6/09). Enjoy.

The first thing I heard from them was last year's fantastic "Separation Sunday" - which, although it was great, ended up just outside my top ten for the year.
And then this year, with "Boys & Girls in America" receiving all sorts of praise, and deserving the bulk of it, I managed to pick up a a copy of this, their first album, with only moderate expectations. See, I've heard from various publications (RS and P-fork) that their three-albums-in-three-years were a streak of solid discs reminiscent of Wire's three at the tail end of the 70s - and I'm a sucker for comparisons, so I had to go back to the beginning and hear this one to see if the name-dropping was apt.
And in this case it most definitely is.

"Almost Killed Me" is the kind of album that looks better now than it did when it first came out, I think. Like, given the benefit of hindsight, yeah - this was really great, but had I heard it at the time, I may have written it off as an interesting if ultimately unspectacular debut, which many people did (largely as a result of being turned off by Craig Finn's vocals) - and which is a shame. It's also why I'm glad I came to this album in the way that I did - with the benefit of hindsight.
Going back now and listening to this, with excellent album opener "Positive Jam" leading seamlessly into the rollicking "The Swish," it's clear that this is the genius band that now is the Hold Steady in chyrsalis, and that's a beautiful thing.

....and hard drugs are for bartenders, I think I might've mentioned that before...

There are certain "singers" who are an acquired taste. You cannot just jump into Bob Dylan, Neil Young, or Tom Waits.

Craig Finn has always been one of those front men. His voice is an acquired taste. But, the Hold Steady play with enough enthusiasm and power that its worth the investment of acquiring that taste.

There are overhyped bands and then there are underhyped bands, bands that receive scads of unfair and inaccurate criticism. The Hold Steady definitely falls into the latter category. I find it astonishing that a number of people are willing to dismiss them. Rock critics, who are far more finely attuned to chicanery than average, everyday fans (as the dean of American rock critics, Robert Christgau, has pointed out, if you spend almost every one of your waking hours listening to music, you are going to be better at it than someone who spends only a few hours each week), do not detect the villainous flaws that the band's detractors do. In fact, their most recent album, BOYS AND GIRLS IN AMERICA, was voted by the 494 participating critics (definitely a who's who of writers about music) the Village Voice's 2006 Pazz and Jop Poll the #4 album of the year. Getting 494 top critics to agree about something is a pretty impressive feat.

So, it is utterly safe to ignore the people who dismiss The Hold Steady. The fact isn't that they "got" the band and dismissed it, but that they still haven't a clue. I will allow that some people just have trouble with Craig Finn's voice and perhaps his appearance. He looks today like in ten years he will have the archetypal appearance of a used car dealer. He absolutely does not look like the headliner of a great rock band. Furthermore, while it is hard to deny his amazing gifts as a lyricist, he doesn't sing. Instead, he declaims the lyrics of the song. Few people manage a completely unique "singing" style, but Finn definitely has. Myself, I absolutely love the guy. No, he doesn't sing, but his vocal style perfectly suits the band's aesthetic. And I love the way his lyrics combine equally cynicism, humor, weariness, and more than a little self-deprecation.

So much attention attaches itself to Craig Finn that sometimes the rest of the band escapes notice. But this truly is a fantastic band from top to bottom. Finn might be the most dominating frontman in America today, but Tad Kubler is one of America's greatest guitarists. Indeed, he may have been born outside his time. He is one of the few guitarists around capable of foisting a song onto his back and dominating it for long stretches of time. He would be a legend had he lived in the seventies instead of today, had he lived when long, eight-minute guitar solos were not only acceptable but in demand. Anyone doubting his ability should listen to the second have of "Everyone's a DJ." The ghosts of Leslie West, Alvin Lee, and Ted Nugent haunt every measure. If Craig Finn gives the band most of its identity, Kubler gives it its musical backbone. Though they sound almost nothing like one another, a Finn-Kubler comparison to Jagger-Richards isn't misleading.

Although BOYS AND GIRLS IN AMERICA is The Hold Steady's break out album, I honestly think ALMOST KILLED ME remains their best album. But I say that with the caveat that all three of their albums fall into the "must own" category. No band on planet earth has produced three such perfect albums in the past three years.

Other reviewers have praised "The Swish," which truly is one of the great rock songs of recent years. I actually like "Everyone's a DJ" even more, mainly because of Kubler's long guitar solo. But for brilliant, funny, clever lyrics it is hard to beat "Knuckles." Every single song, however, is infused with great lyrical content, Finn's passionate declamation of the words, and one of the tightest bands in the world pounding out great music. If you love music, you need this album. They do remind you of some of the great bands of the past, though interestingly of bands that normally you do not think of at the same time. What other band sounds like Bruce Springsteen, Thin Lizzy, and the Replacements all at the same time, while also sounding completely unlike them all?

While all three of the Hold Steady's albums should be in the musical library of any music fan, I also encourage more serious collectors to go in search of two albums by the Minneapolis band Lifter Puller, FIESTAS AND FIASCOS and the compilation album SOFT ROCK, which includes virtually everything else Lifter Puller recorded. The reason this is relevant is that the frontman for that band was Craig Finn and the lead guitarist was Tad Kubler. The sound is different from the Hold Steady, but the music is of the same high quality.

If you like power chords and clever, intelligent lyrics, this CD is for you. "The Swish" is in the running for rock song of the decade, and the rest of the album is solid. It manages to be completely original, and at the same time heartily celebrates its influences. Frontman Craig Finn doesn't sing as much as he rants, and in this way his delivery is somewhat similar to that of Joe Strummer.