Hang on Mike

Mike Viola | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Audio CD (January 20, 2004)
• Number of Discs: 1
• Label: Sony
• ASIN: B00016XO5Q
• In-Print Editions: MP3 Download
• Average Customer Review: 3.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (11 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #181,549 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Major Step!, January 20, 2004

By 

saddyboy (indianapolis, in United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Hang on Mike (Audio CD)

on this confessional record, Mr. Viola opens up about his life and history in a way unheard on modern records...in fact this might be comparable to 'Blue' in it's honesty and unflinching POV...his best so far and a contender for best of 2004!

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Excellent, June 3, 2010

By 

Bill Your 'Free Form FM Handi Cyber Print DJ ... (Mahwah, NJ USA) - See all my reviews
(TOP 1000 REVIEWER)   

This review is from: Hang on Mike (Audio CD)

Candy Butchers is love and life in the 2000s for a regular guy named Mike Viola. This has the gentleness and musical base of Squeeze and 1970s Todd Runngeren.

There is not lot new sounding here, and that is the point. Except for a few more spikes in the irony--and 2000s verbiage-this sounds like a 70s singer-songwriter album, with all the requisite, well composed piano tunes. Nice chord changes here--familiar, but never stock.


Not as campy as early Ben Folds, this music sounds great because too few are doing it in a dancified, digitally compressed rock world.

If you like the Candy Butchers, check out a little known band called June and the Exit Wounds, A Little More Haven Hamilton, Please being one of the two albums by them I have heard. They sound like a slightly more produced Candy Butchers, and I think they are even better.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Keep growing, Mike, February 29, 2004

By 

M. K. LEVINE "lefty18" (Monroe, New York USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Hang on Mike (Audio CD)

Front-man Viola is light years ahead of most other pop-60s influenced melodists. Not only are his vocals strong and appealing, his tunes are airy and unforced. This latest record has an unprententious down home feel. But Viola's introversion here, while warm and surely endearing to his family and friends, is specific without being universal. All the sweat that went into this latest album and yet you can tell why this album hasn't quite taken off. Most of the lyrics reach in without reaching out. He refers to himself in the third person several times (my name is also Mike and I'm not still not interested). Nevertheless, it's worth buying and you have to think they're just an album away from the big one. I'm rooting for them.