the new granddaddy album is quite good...

[dwelle]

i like it.

it sounds nice...

[MisterMark]

yes, you have to give it to em...high marks for recording and producing all their own records!

mark

[goldenarmes]

wow. im suprised to hear that. i really was not expecting it to sound at all like it does. i was pretty dissapointed. it doesnt even sound like the same band to me. actually it kind of reminded me of when james brown started trying to sound like bands who were trying to sound like him. i really thought it was going to be good

[Al]

I've played tour support with Grandaddy 3 times,a nice bunch of guy's,and they make some really good music.
They seem to be getting more exposure and airplay now than before"which is cool for them",especially here in the u.k!, but i find it a bit bizarre, cause i dont think the new material is any match for what they have done before!

[prince turbo lung]

the slick production i actually do not mind, but the songs seem uninspired, the magic is missing. maybe the next one will be better.


k

[hurricaneE]

the slick production i actually do not mind, but the songs seem uninspired, the magic is missing. maybe the next one will be better.

I totally agree. Oddly enough, I keep wanting to hear a Badfinger-style lead guitar.
-E

[foley]

I like it a lot ... they always do great things with their ride cymbals ... clear and meaningful. And I especially like the song about being on "stand by" - who else could write that song?

I will concede, however, that it is not as creative (from a recording standpoint) as software slump, but it sure is clean. Maybe an attempt at commercial success? Mojo sure liked it.

mf

[ahmedgarcia]

Wow...they were just on NPR. hhmmmm. "Sum Day" They gave it a great review

[Bear]

I liked the production on the new album, but creatively speaking, it felt like a step backwards. Nowhere near as interesting as Sophware Slump. So I was pretty let down by this one.

[EasyGo]

I suppose it's not really fair to compare it to 'Sophtware Slump,' cuz that was kind of Grandaddy's big bang, IME. Kinda like the Flaming Lips' 'Soft Bulletin' - it'd be a tall order to make a followup equal to that one.

That said though, it bothers me that tracks 2-5 are so similar to one another. I do like 'Sumday' though, and really enjoyed seeing them live at the (wretched) House of Blues.

[gone]

...

[inverseroom]

OK, Let me weigh in, having only heard about half of the album so far... but... um... I like it more than Sophtware Slump. I'm a big fan of many of the bands Grandaddy is compared to, such as the Flaming Lips, Mercury Rev, and Sparklehorse, but I feel like those bands' experimentation is more organic to the material they come up with, and therefore far more successful, than Grandaddy's. The long songs on "Slump", rather than feeling big, lush, moving, etc., merely feel too long to me, and the short ones too short. I feel like Lytle is writing three-minute gems in his head and fucking with them to make them more "interesting."

Luckily the band is enormously talented and the songs on "Slump" are all "good," but the album as a whole seems derivative of the entire late-90's lo-fi-meets-hi-fi thing, already done better by other people. Sparklehorse, for instance, usually has enough good melodic lines, sonic tricks, and superb instrumentalism to fill a seven-minute song; M. Rev has got the production chops to do the same. Whereas Grandaddy is filling space.

I've heard half of somebody else's copy of Sumday and really love it--it seems to me that they've found the proper context for these great songs. They've come into their own, I think, making the record they ought to have been making AT THIS TIME. If the next album is one long track recorded at the bottom of a grain silo, and that sounds awesome, good. But for now, this seems to me like the best record this band can make. My own copy is in the mail, so we'll see if it holds up on repeated listenings, but I think it will.

OK, let me have it.

John

[gone]

...

[EasyGo]

Grandaddy to me is an acquired taste. I had to hear 'SS' in other people's cars and stereos about 5 times, and then, bam, it just gets under your skin. I think that's part of the charm.

[Bear]

One of my major gripes with Sumday was the pace of the album as a whole. It was almost all 4/4, played at a similar speed, and so much of the album was forgettable. I've listened to it for a few weeks now, and though I do like the album, I've pretty much set it aside already. Their previous albums held my attention for much longer. Also, lyrically speaking, when it comes to songs about Robots, the Flaming Lips already cornered that one with Yoshimi, IMO. New subject matter might be the call of the day.

And inverse, a good friend of mine is in the same boat as you, and I do see your point. But I really liked the disjointed feel of Sophtware Slump. It's part of why I found it interesting.