"Teen-age love angst with a peculiar feminist slant from three brothers?, cousins?, with the same last name of Caterer and a drummer who make up the disbanded but fondly remembered 'Smoking Popes'. This is breezy power pop with a dominating lead guitar, a little like 'The Smiths' or 'Talking Heads', but without the psyche hangover of pent up emotion. Singer and lyricist Josh Caterer clearly wants something but is it the girl or just the girl's dress? His quest for love's renewal is so insistant, he sounds on the verge of becoming the woman he wants. "Just Broke Up" and "Need You Around" are great radio songs, if only there was a radio station that would play them."
One of the best albums you never heard
Keith Taylor | Walkertown, NC United States | 02/19/2002
(4 out of 5 stars)
"Even though the smoking popes are history, this cd is one of the best rock albums out there. The songs are simple but they sound really good; they get in your head stay there. I wish this band could've gotten some support from their label, then they might still be around. Oh well, there is always N SYNC."
One of the best unheard ofs around
mattaca | Boston, MA, USA | 06/05/2001
(5 out of 5 stars)
"Smoking Popes aren't the biggest band in the world, but if you have ever wonder what it would sound like to have the voice of a lounge singer backed by the guitars of a band like Weezer or Blink 182, this album is a must buy. It's one semi-hit, "Need You Around" is a beautiful example of the bands break-neck speed and soothing lullabye sounds simultaneously. A big fan of their third album, Destination Failure here, which was marketed more careful and probably more successful, I would still have the say the ten songs on this album top it by a great deal. Rubella will make you want to jump, My Lucky Day will make you want to smile, and Adena will make you want to croon along. Take a risk on the Smoking Popes and you'll wonder how you lived without them."
Smokin'!
mattaca | 12/31/1998
(5 out of 5 stars)
""Born To Quit" is a power-pop masterpiece. The Smoking Popes' sound is somewhere in between the Smiths and They Might Be Giants...in fact, Morrissey has given them a ringing endorsement of "my favorite American band". Buy this album ASAP, and see what he's talking about."
From one Pope to another-You rock!
Mel Zorro | 03/17/2008
(5 out of 5 stars)
"It was 1998, I was a High School Junior in a used record store looking for a cheap Weird Al Yankovic CD. Little did I know that just behind a CD with Al looking like Coolio, I would find the most important misplaced album of the century "Born to Quit".
All I saw were the words "Smoking Popes" and I thought, "Hey, my last name is Pope, I wonder if they're funny...I wonder if we're related".
So I bought the CD, leaving Weird Al in the dust and upon hearing the opening chords of "Midnight Moon" accompanied by Josh Caterer's stellar voice, I could feel my musical horizons being busted wide open.
I had never played an instrument, but I knew at that moment that I needed to buy a guitar and learn how to play "Midnight Moon" and "I Need You Around".
I have often heard them compared to Weezer and although I am a Weezer fan, the only connection I can find is that the songs from both groups are so heartfelt and personal.
This is a truly cohesive album, with each track blending perfectly with the next. These songs are not deep by any means, and though I don't use the word often, the only way to describe the album's play list is sweet in its sincerity.
Buy this album, 'nuff said.
As a side note, it turns out I'm not related to the Caterer boys, but I am now related to Weird Al Yankovic, since my brother just married Al's cousin. Small world, it all seems to come back to that fateful day: It was 1998, I was a High School Junior..."