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Music CD - Brendan Benson: Lapalco
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Music CD: Lapalco
Artist: Brendan Benson
List Price: $13.98
Our Price: $9.87
Your Save: $ 4.11 ( 29% )
Availability: Usually ships in 24 hours
Manufacturer: Vagrant Startime
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Average Customer Rating:  
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Tracks:
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1. Tiny Spark
2. Metarie Benson
3. Folk Singer
4. Life in the D
5. Good to Me
6. You're Quiet
7. What
8. Eventually
9. I'm Easy
10. Pleasure Seeker
11. Just Like Me
12. Jet Lag
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Binding: Audio CD
EAN: 0821487000624
Label: Vagrant Startime
Manufacturer: Vagrant Startime
Number Of Discs: 1
Publisher: Vagrant Startime
Release Date: 2002-02-26
Studio: Vagrant Startime
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Spotlight customer reviews:
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Customer Rating:
Summary: one of the most important records I've heard in years
Comment: Every now and then a record comes along that changes the way you look at music. This is such a record for me. I haven't stopped listening to it yet, but I've already ordered his first and third albums. And when I am not listening to it, I'm talking about it. I can't add anything to what the others have written, but there is no need. They are right about this one.
Customer Rating: 
Summary: A marvelously affecting power pop album
Comment: I have a rule that I never review an album that I haven't heard at least ten times all the way through. If you scroll through my various reviews and notice just the music, I invariably give albums either four or five stars. This is mainly because albums I really dislike never fulfill the ten-times rule. I bring this up because on the first two or three hearings of this album I wasn't terribly impressed. I didn't think it a bad album, merely one that I wasn't going to be able to listen to ten times. I stuck with it, however, and somewhere around the sixth listen everything clicked. Now, I am a huge fan of power pop and have been since discovering Big Star, the Raspberries, and the Shoes ages ago. Now the thing is, those bands all blew me away on a first listen. This one took longer, but I'm simply delighted that I stuck with it.
There is not a whole lot to say about this album. The melodies are great, the performance excellent, the lyrics filled with some great twists. He often reminds me of other artists, whether A. C. Newman or Apples in Stereo or the Shoes. That's a pretty wide range of music, but he seems to fit somewhere among them with his own unique sound. I think what initially failed to turn me onto him is the fact that his songs have less aggressive hooks than many other power pop performers. The Smithereens, for instance, are all hooks, and as a result tend to be as interesting upon repeated hearings. But this album seems to get better with each time I listen to it.
I like nearly every song on the album, but my favorite might be the one that opens the album, "Tiny Spark." It starts with some misdirection as a synthesizer that does not represent the sound of the rest of the album opens things up. But it opens up immediately to a pop song of the first rank. This, like many of the other best songs on the album, were co-written with Jason Falkner, who has been in several bands, but is probably best known for his work with the Three O'Clock. But Benson's songs have an equal charm, such as "Metarie" and "Folksinger" that follow the opening cut. I personally like Benson's more up-tempo numbers than the slower cuts, but I can easily imagining feeling the opposite depending one's taste.
So I definitely recommend this one. And if, like I did at first, you don't love it at first, stick with it. I bet you come around.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Catchy intelligent power pop
Comment:
I bought Brendan Benson's latest album 'The Alternative To Love' and really loved it. I saw
him in concert in Dublin a month ago and was similarly impressed. To be honest,in concert the
songs that worked best were off the album 'Lapalco' which I hadn't heard.
I bought 'Lapalco' a day after the concert and it's been on heavy rotation on my IPod ever
since.
Five of the twelve songs on 'Lapalco' were co-written with Jason Falkner ex-Jellyfish and
The Grays. It has to be said that all of these songs are excellent. Falkner as a solo artist
specialises in intricate, catchy, intelligent power-pop with lots of nice touches in every song
that he does. He and Benson are a great combination - they both know how to write great
pop songs. Falkner seems to have spurred Benson on to great accomplishments. In must be pointed
out to be fair that the Benson-only penned tracks are as good as the co-writes.
The album opener 'Tiny Spark' is great.He closed his show in Dublin with this one and it is a
great anthem. 'Metarie' is lovely also. Benson's lyrics are always very honest "Met a girl,
introduced myself, asked her to go with me and no-one else".It's a great song about trying to
get a girlfriend."Folk Singer" is another cracker - it's one of the many songs where Benson's voice
hits falsetto on the chorus. This to me is the essence of power-pop - soaring vocals that lift the
spirit. The rest of the album is equally strong and I can honestly say that there are no weak tracks
afterwards. My personal favourite is 'Pleasure Seeker'. It too features a killer chorus and
Benson's voice soars high again.
If you haven't heard of Benson and are a fan of the power-pop , you should give him a chance.
He deserves all the success he gets for his intelligent, intricate music. I'm listening to his
songs as I write this review and they still give me a kick after four weeks of heavy rotation.
Brendan's next collaberation is going to be with Jack White of The White Stripes. It will be
interesting to hear how it turns out. Hopefully it will bring Benson's music to the attention
of a wider audience. He really deserves it.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Prepare to sing along!
Comment: Let's be frank here: anyone who likes popsongs with lots and lots of hooks, catchy melodies, beatle-like chord canges, and (often silly) lyrics about girls, should buy this album right away and never stop enjoying it immensely. At least that's what I did.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Glad folks like this one
Comment: One good song and the rest were very boring - why the fuss over this guy, everyone says that this is a great CD, maybe his first CD was better.
The great thing about music is that there is something out there for everyone. Some people love Creed, and Puddle of Mud, God bless their little hearts. Bottom line is that there are better CDs you should spend your money on. I generally agree with Allmusic.com, but this one is just not up to the quality of similar works.
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Editorial Reviews:
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While Brendan Benson may be best known for receiving the fervent patronage of fellow Detroit natives the White Stripes, the songs on his second album display little of Jack and Meg's garage roar. Rather, Lapalco recalls power-pop groups such as Fountains of Wayne and Teenage Fanclub. Benson and longtime musical colleague Jason Falkner write ornate, Technicolor-bright songs. On "Folk Singer," Benson directly references one of his idols: "She says, 'Stop pretending you're not John Lennon.'" Sure enough, "Tiny Spark" is built around a classic-sounding 1960s riff. Benson also likes to inject character and humor into his songs. In "Metarie," he sings that he "Met a girl/ Introduced myself/ Asked her to go with me/ And no one else," only to be told, "You need a bath/ Your clothes are wrong/ You're not my type/ Know we wouldn't get along." He might mock himself on his own record, but this self-professed loser has produced a winner of an album. --Louis Pattison
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