Customer Reviews

Pony Express Record

5 star:		(29)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

I was listening to Verve Pipe's new album the other day - when this very distinct voice in the background vocals kept tickling my ear. Sure enough it's Craig Wedrin, lead singer of Shudder To Think - one of the most progressive pioneers of late 20th century rock. All I can say is thank God somebody else noticed these guys. Just when you thought there was no more virgin territory for musicians to explore - these guys hijack the tour bus and fly it to mars. This album - which I consider STT's best - takes the rock and roll format paradigm and chucks it unabashedly out the window. It is definitely not for most tastes, but for true connesieurs of wicked hard, wicked funked-up, bleeding edge music - this album will nuke your neurons, melt your melon and squish your squash!! As previous reviews have said - it's hard to describe - but impossible to forget. As a musician You can crash your brain trying to contemplate how four musicians could actually sit together in a room and come up with this stuff!! The drum fill in "Chakka".... the lyrics to "Hit Liquor".... simply the title of the song "Gang of $"... this album is so genius it will TROUBLE YOU how musically inept it makes you feel!!

This is a difficult record, but holds many rewards. The first cut, Hit Liquor, will definitely either beckon you in or make you scream for the door. The structures of the song are a bit wild, less cohesive, yet they work.

J. Nesker pretty much hit the nail on the head for how I felt about this album although I will admit that I have no idea who made "Loveless" by My Bloody Valentine. I first heard some early STT and thought they were OK. I then heard No Rm. 9, Kentucky on MTV and bought the CD. I listened to it a few times and was thoroughly bored. About a year later I started listening to it again and liked it a bit more. I really "got it" a few years after that to where it now has ascended to my #1 album of all time! The rest of my top 5 is in no particular order (Deftones - Adrenaline, Smashing Pumpkins - Siamese Dream, Weezer - Pinkerton, and PJ Harvey - Dry).

One word of warning - a friend of mine whose musical tastes I highly respect listened to this cd and couldn't get past track 4 due to the fact that his ears were about to bleed. If you like harmonic dissonance and tension and release you'll think you died and gone to heaven.

This album is, in my opinion- the most exciting, original rock album of the 90s. I've listened to it all VU to Sonic Youth and I'm telling you that Shudder to Think's Pony Express Record sounds like nothing else out there-the chords, the melodies, the vocals and rhythms especially. This is the closest 90s rock has come to genius. Just go and buy it. Allright if you really want comparisons I'll try. Imagine Fugazi backing Freddie Mercury's Queen singing dada poetry over beautiful songs arranged by Primus. See! Comparisons fail. In an age where any four shmucks can get 2 guitars, a bass and drums and a mike and call themselves a rock band. Shudder to Think are perhaps the only existing proof that creativity, talent and ORIGINALITY still exist in rock.

The essence of what is to be duplicated 100x over for decades to come, and then get labeled "new" and "cutting edge" to add insult to injury.

The fact is that this album was innovative and visionary, and FAR exceeds current bands at the helm of the modern day convergence of genres - the post-punk-prog-emo-math rock bands like Mars Volta, Coheed & Cambria, Open Hand, etc.

Without STT I don't know if such bands would exist.

While aforementioned bands have their moments, STT has VOLUMES... near boundless volumes of beauty, confusion, and sheer rock power!

I could make a recommendation based on artistic merit, but the simple fact is that this criminally overlooked CD is available almost anywhere for a few bucks. Based on price alone, why pay more? ;)

this album, i'm certain, was beamed down by aliens. even in a million years, it will still be ahead of it's time. "pony express record" is like a perfect pop album, shattered into countless pieces, and arranged randomly to create something truly beautiful and, frankly, f**kin' W E I R D. you'll never hear anything like this again. most people HATE this band and especially this album, but they just aren't smart enough to wrap their tiny little brains around this puzzle of an album.

Everything is right about this band and especially this record. Lyrics are very original. The songs are exciting and create a unique atmosphere. The vocals are some of the best ever recorded. These guys rocked. I really enjoy playing this record in my car and
singing along on the top of my lunges. 'Room #9 Kentucky' is my favorite STT song.
I could heve delt with a couple more records!

Vintage stuff I will keep playing until the day I die (november 28, 2068)

I continue to see the influence of this album grow with time. For years, it was ignored and forgotten, but it seems people are beginning to talk about Shudder to Think again, especially this album. I think their influence goes much deeper on modern rock than what they are ever credited with. Personally, this album changed the way I thought about song structure, period. I've talked to a lot of musicians who have said the same. STT made us realize that a song could be very poppy and very bizarre at the same time - that the two concepts could exist in harmony. They weren't the first to ever do this, but I think they were the first to do it with glam-rock, and what a glorious marriage it was. Most of their other material is noteworthy, but nothing comes close to the apex of Pony Express Record. I hope that down the road, this record begins popping up in the top 100-200 lists of the greatest albums of all time. They say not many people bought Velvet Underground records back in the day, but everyone who did formed a band. I think not many people bought STT records either, but everyone who did who was in a band suddenly aspired to sound like them.

OK, so I bought this years ago and recently dug it up again. These guys were WAY before their time. I saw them open for Foo Fighters about 10 years ago (if I remember correctly)... they were so good!
The songs are a little strange (and.....beautiful??), but that is what makes them so great. So catchy, even after about 8 years of not hearing the CD, I remember all the songs.

If you are reading this, you are either already a Shudder to Think fan, or you remember that one song from back in the day, and were trying to remember who sang it, and came across Amazon's page for this record. If you fall in the latter category, take the leap and buy this record. I whole-heartedly agree with the reviews that proclaim "Best record of the '90's", etc. It is true that on the first couple of listens, it's a little hard to "get in to". But don't let that scare you. Give it a little time, and trust me, it's worth it. It is at the same time the most hard-rocking album you've heard, and the most gentle and poetic album you've heard (sometimes in the same song!). If this were a perfect world, Shudder to Think would have been one of the biggest bands ever. As it is, I think Craig has to be considered one of the great rock vocalists.