Customer Reviews

Sampler

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Imagine this: A spectacular carwreck involving Frank Zappa, Michael Patton, Captain Beefheart, Bob Marley and Andrew Lloyd Webber as William Burroughs looks on and smiles knowingly to himself. Unfortunately, this just scratches the surface of this group's insane genius. Tim Smith, the Cardiac's main songwriter, has during this group's nearly twenty-year career single-handedly deconstructed the pop song several times over. This sampler is the perfect introduction. You might as well order their brilliant "Sing to God" while you're at it.

While nowhere near a "Best of" CD, this album gives the Cardiacs neophyte a very good overview of their output through the years. The sound of Cardiacs *has* to be heard rather than described. They reference a myriad of bands from The Beatles to Devo to Genesis, but in the end, perform a music uniquely their own. All of their albums except for their latest, _Guns_ , are represented here. Unfortunately, there is no new or unreleased material here, but it also proves that Cardiacs are not out to make a buck on the completists out there, either. Kudos to them for that. This is a very good compilation, "worthy of ovation", as the band themselves would put it.