Released February 1, 1989. This makes me feel older than turning 50. To put it in perspective, this post is the equivalent of the 20-year-old me in 1989 talking about an album that came out in 1959.
Wiki-wiki-wikipedia says …
Don’t Tell a Soul marked the debut of Bob “Slim” Dunlap, who replaced founding guitarist Bob Stinson. The album was recorded at Cherokee Studios in Los Angeles and produced by Matt Wallace and the band. It was mixed by Chris Lord-Alge, who decided to give the record “a three-dimensional, radio-ready sound”. However, singer and guitarist Paul Westerberg was not satisfied with the new direction, commenting: “I thought the little things I’d cut in my basement were closer to what I wanted.”
To celebrate, let’s all take a moment and watch one of my favorite rock ‘n’ roll moments.
As explained by a lesser blog …
Before the show, they were told they needed to change the line, “We’re feeling good from the pills we took.” Well, fittingly, Westerberg did no such thing, and the censors were obviously ready for it, as the tape goes silent during that section of the song. What the censors at ABC didn’t anticipate was this: Near the conclusion of “Talent Show” the lyrics address the time when the band hits the stage and there’s no retreating: “It’s too late to turn back, here we go” is repeated twice on the album version, but here Westerberg has changed the line to “It’s too late to take pills, here we go”—ha! The censors missed it and they’ve pissed everyone off again! To add insult, the line is sung three times.
How much holder is Tim? That’s the one that sucked me in…
34 in October.
I didn’t hate this album as much as everyone else did, but it did sound out of character for them. Saw them on this tour. And I love this clip too.
It’s easy to forget how many great tracks are on the least-loved Replacements album – “Talent Show,” “Achin’ to Be,” “They’re Blind,” “I’ll Be You,” “Rock ‘N’ Roll Ghost.” Not too shabby.
I didn’t hate this album, but at the time I thought it was a bit of a let-down. It has grown on me since then. Or maybe, other music has diminished. Do any of you have occasions where music you had little regard for back in the day sounds better now? Happens to me all the time. Probably an old-man thing. “In my day, the worst music was way better than this crap!”
(cough, cough) Smiths (cough)