NRBQ [1999] NRBQ

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CD

  • Release Date: 09/14/1999
  • Sales Rank: 149,212
  • Label: ROUNDER / UMGD
  • UPC: 011661316621

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  • Overview
  • Tracks
  • Editorial Reviews
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Track List
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NRBQ [1999]

1LISTENAin't No Horse 3:48
2LISTENSail on Sail On 3:11
3LISTENPain 2:35
4LISTENHousekeeping 3:28
5LISTENBreakaway to My Dreams 2:53
6LISTENPuddin' Truck 3:16
7LISTENCM Pups 3:11
8LISTENTake Me to Your Secret 2:49
9LISTENBlame It on the World 3:04
10LISTENBirdman 1:05
11LISTENI Want My Mommy 2:01
12LISTENCareful What You Ask For 3:25
13LISTENTire of Your Permanent 2:07
14LISTENLove Came to Me 3:09
15LISTENTermites 3:22

About this Artist

Editorial Reviews

Thirty years after they began their professional recording career, NRBQ was still rolling on, and in order to commemorate their anniversary they released another album called NRBQ -- which happens to be the title of their first album from 1969. More significantly for longtime Q fans, 1999's NRBQ is their first proper studio album (meaning, not a children's album or live album or reissue) in five years, since 1994's confused Message for the Mess Age. NRBQ does improve on that effort, largely because the band has gotten comfortable with Al Anderson's replacement, Johnny Spampinato, which makes it sound better than its predecessor; in retrospect, that record suffers from Anderson's desire to be elsewhere. Here, they hit upon a comfortable, earthy groove early on, and they ride it throughout the album. Sure, they get too cutesy -- "Puddin' Truck," "CM Pups," and "I Want My Mommy" being prime suspects -- but it wouldn't be a Q album without that. And it also wouldn't be a Q album if the musicianship wasn't so thoroughly impressive and rich that it makes up for the other flaws, whether it's cutesiness or underdeveloped material. At its core, NRBQ the 1999 version isn't much different than most of their studio LPs, but it's a solid and entertaining one, and considering that it arrives on their 30th anniversary, that alone is an accomplishment of sorts. Stephen Thomas Erlewine, All Music Guide

Customer Reviews

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  • Ratings: 1Reviews: 1

NRBQ [1999]by Anonymous

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February 22, 2000: An opening admission: Until yesterday, I had never heard of NRBQ. I had absolutely no clue as to how long the band has been together (30 years), the specific brand of music they choose to champion (folk, country, blues, roots rock, pop ? you name it; NRBQ plays it), or even what the letters in their routinely abbreviated name signify (New Rhythm & Blues Quartet). I was utterly ignorant of the fact that NRBQ had supported R.E.M. on 1989?s arena-rattling Green tour; that they have amassed a passel of passionate fans in Japan; and that they have a rather winsome weakness for wacky collaborations (Carl Perkins, Skeeter Davis, and World Wrestling Federation legend Captain Lou Albano). Songwriting duties on NRBQ ? the band?s 26th-or-so aural offering (including two best-of collections and at least a fistful of live discs) ? are pretty much evenly split between keyboardist Terry Adams and guitarist Johnny Spampinato. Relatively speaking, Spampinato?s compositions, while consistently and derivatively familiar (?Sail On Sail On? sounds like early-`70s Chicago; ?Breakway to My Dreams?: mid-`70s Art Garfunkel; ?Blame It on the World?: late-`70s Seals & Crofts), still easily outstrip his bandmate?s often jaw-droppingly awful efforts at levity (?CM Pups?, ?Birdman?, ?I Want My Mommy?). ?Puddin? Truck??s ersatz boogie-woogie blues might well get the coveralls-clad rumps a?wigglin?n?jigglin? in the smoky local roadhouse, but committed to disc it sounds about as fresh and spontaneous as a 70-year-old slab of Spam. Only ?Termites?, with its piano-enhanced ?9 to 5? bassline and Oingo Boingo-esque boisterousness, manages to rise above the status of fatuous filler. While there can be no questioning this determinedly quirky quartet?s chops or chemistry, NRBQ does nothing to establish the band as anything more than a flexibly irreverent bar-band novelty act. In the end, perhaps, one is best advised to track NRBQ to that aforementioned smoky local roadhouse, and then ? and only then ? decide for oneself if this is America?s most egregiously under-appreciated ?omnipop? outfit, or merely a ?flexibly irreverent bar-band novelty act? entirely deserving of its obscurity.