Sea to Shining Sea

Love As Laughter | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Audio CD (September 4, 2001)
• Original Release Date: 2001
• Number of Discs: 1
• Label: Sub Pop
• ASIN: B00005NFXO
• Also Available in: Vinyl  |  MP3 Download
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #220,489 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars 4 1/2 Stars, July 31, 2002

By 

treblekicker "treblekicker" (Houston, TX) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Sea to Shining Sea (Audio CD)

Sam Jayne and company have turned out a ... record that's rock and roll in every sense of rock and roll. Produced by Unwound's Vern Rumsey and the ubiquitous Phil Ek, the record is a slick, skillful outing camouflaged in gritty, raw production. And Love as Laughter don't waste a second proving it. The opening track, "Coast to Coast," builds from an adrenalized Who-like intro into what may be either one of the best tour songs I've ever heard, or the theme song to a potential Love as Laughter TV series, wherein "like every band on the run/ [they] fight for noise and some fun."

In case you don't get the joke, sly allusions to classic rock mainstays are scattered throughout the album. The guitars in the hyperkinetic ode to paradise lost, "Temptation Island," wink at Led Zeppelin. And "Miss Direction," a bluesy Let It Bleed-inspired sing-along (and pun aside, among the album's best tracks), cleverly appropriates one of Paul Simon's most infamous lyrics.

Some of the better moments deviate from the winking allusions to classic rock history. "Sam Jayne = Dead," reputedly inspired by apocryphal bathroom graffiti at Sam Jayne's day job, has a gritty, off the cuff quality, informed by comparatively spare instrumentation and Jayne's unsettled vocals. Similarly, "E.H.," the album's 10½ minute-long closer, builds on a comparatively simple melody with some nice guitar work and fervent vocal delivery.

At its best, Sea to Shining Sea has a dusty, archival aspect; these are songs you'd expect to find hidden in some brilliant but forgotten rock and roll compendium, salvaged after twenty-five years of dust gathering from the backroom of an out of the way record store. There are a couple of misses along the way-- "Drugachusetts," a psychedelic, Eastern-inspired jam, is ambitious, but it leans just a little too much toward kitsch, and "French Heroin," a clumsy Sonic Youth impersonation, suffers as much from seeming essentially out of place on this album as it does from its general mediocrity-- but the accomplishment of the record as a whole largely cancels them out.

The trendmongers and poster boys of 2001 may pass without comment as the next phase of rock revival rears its ugly head. That Sea to Shining Sea conforms to fad undermines its status as a great album, fashion be damned.

-Alison Fields

4.0 out of 5 stars Nihilist vagabond hype (see lalenguadelnumberoocho), January 6, 2003

By 

"templecola" (LA, CA, USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Sea to Shining Sea (Audio CD)

I think you'll enjoy this offering from LAL, but not for the reasons espoused by other reviewer(s). I think you'll find the music quite basic, the lyrics a bit droll, the production rough, and the vocals garage band chic. I don't think you'll draw lots of clever comparisons with Sonic Youth, the Stones, or Led Zep. In fact, I think Miss Direction owes more to Velvet Underground than any other band, but enough about me.
What makes this record worth a listen, worth a buy is that LAL knows that R'n'R is about goofing off and having a hoot, so they go at it. Join 'em.

1 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars What did you expect?, March 14, 2003

By 

templecola (Long Beach, CA United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Sea to Shining Sea (Audio CD)

I think you'll enjoy this offering from LAL, but not for the reasons espoused by other reviewer(s). I think you'll find the music quite basic, the lyrics a bit droll, the production rough, and the vocals garage band chic. I don't think you'll draw lots of clever comparisons with Sonic Youth, the Stones, or Led Zep. In fact, I think Miss Direction owes more to Velvet Underground than any other band, but enough about me.
What makes this record worth a listen, worth a buy is that LAL knows that R'n'R is about goofing off and having a hoot, so they go at it. Join 'em.