staff music picks
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The big news concerning the new ZZ Top box The Complete Studio Albums (1970-1990) is that it restores the original mixes to the band's first three albums. Of these, Tres Hombres is the undisputed classic, but 1972's Rio Grande Mud is the one I've been playing the most. Here, the trio were working out the kinks in their sound and if they occasionally stumble, the record nevertheless sounds like a monster, particularly in its thick original mix. Plus, it has "Francine," which sometimes sounds like the best song they ever wrote.
~ Stephen Thomas Erlewine -
It's hard to imagine a more pop-perfect supergroup in 2009 than Tinted Windows. One Pumpkin, one Fountain, one Trick and one Hanson, each sharpening their pop hooks and singing guitar-group songs about love, girls and heartache all with a crisp sugary coating.
~ Zac Johnson -
William Haislip Squier's second studio outing had some real gems ("In the Dark," "Lonely is the Night," "My Kinda Lover"), but he knocked it out of the park with the classic Trans Am jam "The Stroke," which was purportedly about the slimier bits of the music business, and not the national anthem for puberty.
~ James Monger
