Reviews

Remember when music was fun and not just people complaing about how terrible their lives are, even though they get to live their childhood dreams, well I do. One of my personal favorite bands from this less gloomy era of music was Reel Big Fish.
 
Unlike most ska bands who either disbanded or kicked out their horn section to become emo, Reel Big Fish is still playing their brand of ska/punk. This bands saving grace however, is they don't let the term ska limit what they can do musically. While all the songs on this album feature their signature horn section, not all the songs are straight ska numbers.
 
While this album is loaded with great originals like "Drinkin'", "Don't Start A Band", and "The Fire". It also features three covers each of varying quality. The cover of Morrissey's "We Hate It When Our Friends Become Successful" succeeds and fails all on the same item, it makes Morrissey song happy. I love happy songs and I love Morrissey but the two should never get together like they have on this track. The cover of Tracy Chapman's "Talking 'Bout A Revolution" is best described as bad, while their cover of Social Distortion's classic "Story of My Life" ends up being not only a good cover but one of the album's strongest tracks.
 
The album closes with a great song call "Your Guts (I Hate 'Em). However after the song ends we are greeted with a hidden track filled with what is best described as noise (the musical genre not the adjective.) And while it is always great to hear a band expanding their horizons, I think it is safe to say all of Reel Big Fish's fans could have done with out ten minutes of noise (Johnathon from punkunited.com).