Oh, so very, very, very, very, very good
Od Peltier | New Orleans | 07/28/2003
(5 out of 5 stars)
"To me, it is something of a tragedy that so many will live and die without ever hearing (or even hearing of) The Only Ones. This is exemplified by the presence of only one (no pun intended) review prior to mine. I bought this CD about 6 months ago, so I could say that that is the extent of my relationship with the band, because I don't own any of their other recordings, and am (about 20 years) too young to ever have seen them play. I figured that since their career only spanned 3 albums then this collection would cover their material, by and large (anyone disagreeing with this please email me and tell me what else I ought to listen to :))).The path that led me to The Only Ones started in about 1996 when I heard Goo Goo Dolls' "Name" on the radio. I bought the album that contained that song, and subsequently all the Goo Goo Dolls that had preceded it. And I loved it. Not because it was great songwriting, but because they really and truly sounded like they couldn't care less. About anything. Even the music. And I thought that was cool. And then, lo and behold, they sobered up and produced excrement such as "Iris" and....well, I will post a review where it belongs...
But, through my affinity for the Goo Goo Dolls, I learnt about The Replacements and Paul Westerberg. And if you are reading this and haven't heard of them either, then this really is turning out to be a tragedy. I suppose that's besides the point. As I was saying......my "research" into the 'Mats led me to The Only Ones, and figured that if they were mentioned in the same circles as the 'Mats, they couldn't be all that bad.When I bought this CD, I was firstly pleasantly surprised (because the guitar riff of the first song, Lovers of Today, went straight into my head), then impressed (because the songs that followed were all so good), then shocked (because nobody that I knew had ever heard of these guys and I assumed not many others did either), then saddened (for the same reason I was shocked), and then eventually delighted that I had heard The Only Ones.And, in spite of all that Paul Westerberg wrote that was SO brilliant, Peter Perrett of The Only Ones wrote perhaps my favourite lyric ever in The Whole of the Law. Short, sweet, to the point, and oh so true.You might be thinking, if they were really THAT good, then they WOULD be famous. That sounds like a logical and reasonable argument .....and...hmmm....I don't know what to tell you........except that somewhere, something must've gone horribly wrong and so here we stand today - me trying to convince you.So, seeing as this is The Only Ones that we are talking about, I think there is a very big chance that nobody will ever read this review. So, this may all be in vain. But let me still say this: whatever record you were going to buy next, skip it, or postpone it, and use the spare 10 bucks to buy this. If your musical tastes can be placed in the broad category of "music with guitars", then there are very few records that are better than this, and that combined with the sense of discovering a band as good as this will make this almost certainly one of the better music purchases you will ever make. I am pretty confident about that.So, from here I will try to continue my musical journey back and forth in time, searching for ever better things (I will settle for equally good, or even not quite as good)....and I think New York Dolls is my next target. There may have been a beginning to it all that counts for more than all that came afterwards, but the great characters, whenever they appeared along the way, shouldn't be ignored. Peter Perrett is without any doubt whatsoever one of these great characters.....he would always have been so, but combined with a superb guitarist, made some very, very, very enjoyable songs."
But there IS ONLY ONE
D J. Nolan | Toronto, On | 02/03/2000
(5 out of 5 stars)
"I can't believe that these guys aren't hailed as gods and then put to the ritual sacrifice. 20 years after my first hearing of the only ones, I'm still stuck on their channel."
Track Listings (21) - Disc #1