Susan Across the Ocean

The Silos | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Audio CD (March 15, 1994)
• Number of Discs: 1
• Label: Watermelon
• ASIN: B000000FDI
• Also Available in: Audio CD  |  Audio Cassette  |  MP3 Download
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #393,904 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)

Track Listings

1. Let's Take Some Drugs And Drive Around

2. Upside Down Instead

3. Shaking All Over The Place

4. All She Wrote

5. Wanna Ride

6. Susan Across The Ocean

7. Change The Locks

8. The Sounds Next Door

9. Start To Burn

10. Nothing's Gonna Last

11. I'm Straight

12. Fallen Angel

Editorial Reviews

Stephen Holden, The New York Times

Inflects the astringent twang of The Velvet Underground with the drone of R.E.M.

Someday we’ll brag about seeing them to our grandchildren. They’re that good. --This text refers to an alternate Audio CD edition.

Product Description

Susan Across The Ocean has been reissued with 4 Bonus Tracks! Possibly the most cohesive Silos album, it was recorded start to finish in 18 days by a band who had road-tested the material for months and essentially made a great studio recording of their "live show." It is The Silos of 1993 in all their glory. Mary Rowell had returned on violin. Manuel Verzosa had added his effervescent personality, gorgeous voice and dogged work ethic to leader Walter Salas-Humara’s thoughtful songwriting and world weary voice. The album burns with the hard won integrity of experienced musicians lurching forward through a blinding epiphany of new found optimism.

"Let’s Take Some Drugs And Drive Around" is a classic tale of desperate kids trying to escape small town boredom set to a soaring rock-soul beat. "Shaking All Over The Place" is an enigma surrounded by a swirly/moody groove. "Sounds Next Door" tells the tale of a plot to subvert a neighboring government gone hopelessly wrong. There are rockers, greasy back beats, and great covers including Jonathan Richman’s "I’m Straight," but the title track is this disc’s masterpiece. Performed simply by voice and guitar, it is a man questioning the worth of his long life. Though the character is happily married and has seen his three wonderful children grow up, he still can’t help wondering about Susan. --This text refers to an alternate Audio CD edition.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars SILOS ROCK!!!, October 9, 2000

By 

"drummindave" (Papillion, Nebraska United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Susan Across the Ocean (Audio CD)

This is one of the best rock albums from the 90's. Walter Salas-Humara is a brilliant song writer. Great production - minmal with a terrific "live" sound, raunchy guitars, great instrumentation. When you get fed up with the overly-dubbed, overproduced drivel that floods the airwaves - put this disk in, turn it up, and bask in it's honesty.....

3.0 out of 5 stars Wish I Could Like It Better, October 3, 2004

By 

James Carragher (New York) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Susan Across the Ocean (Audio CD)

Every few years I slap a few bucks down and sample another Silos CD, hoping to find a better balance between -- on the plus side -- terrific driving music (as in I'm Over You from The Silos), well-written intelligent ballads and -- on the big minus side -- plodding and overlong blues roots numbers. Alas, Susan Across the Ocean is the same as the others. For every terrific, Let's Take Some Drugs and Drive Around, Wanna Ride (a noised up Little Honda-like number) and title cut, there are far more than enough songs like All She Wrote, the paranoid Sounds Next Door, and Jonathan Richmond's I'm Straight, which Salas lead man Walter Salas-Humara unfortunately plays straight. Kind of splitting the difference and fairly interesting is Lucinda Williams's Change the Locks, which gets a very bluesy arrangement, but an almost wistful vocal from Salas-Humara.

Susan is hardly a bad CD, but you just keep thinking how much better it could have been. Say this, it is good enough that once again, in a few years, I'll take another Silos plunge.

4.0 out of 5 stars A Great Album from an Overlooked Band, April 23, 2000

By 

Brian D. Rubendall (Oakton, VA) - See all my reviews
(HALL OF FAME REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Susan Across the Ocean (Audio CD)

"Susan Across the Ocean" is the best Silos album. For confirmation, just check out the title track, a solo accoustic ode to lost love sung mournfully by Walter Salas-Humara, the band's long time leader. I defy you not to get a tear in your eye. The rest of the album is quite good as well, particularly "The Sounds Next Door," "Nothing's Gonna Last" and the great cover of Michael Hall's "Let's Take Some Drugs and Drive Around." The Silos country-tinged rock sound is backed by excellent violin playing. Definately a keeper that deserved a wider audience.