I used to love Mason Jennings. I thought he was the second coming of Bob Dylan, Paul Westerberg, and Jesus Christ. I remember I would be at the 400 Bar every Thursday watching him and his band play. I prolly extolled his virtue to many of you as well. Of course I then left Minneapolis. I saw him less frequently, listened to his CD's more. Still loved his self titled debut and Birds Flying Away had some great songs on it. The Simple Life a collection of songs that did not make Birds was also quite good.
Then came Century Spring. Man that album sucks. I mean if you wanted a collection of sappy, pretentious, coffeehouse ballads pick up this piece of crap. I mean wow this album was one of the biggest disappointments in my music listening career. I gave up on Mason. I didn't even bother with Use Your Voice, because everything I heard it was as bad as Century Spring. So it turns out he was not Paul Westerberg he was a weak sauce John Mayer.
Mason's latest effort is called Boneclouds. I got this album because Mason had peaked my interest again. Think this is his first "major" label record (going from Bar-none to Epic). The record company seems to be pushing him a bit more. He was on the excellent CBS Sunday Morning (which is the only show I watch on CBS - take that CSI.) Also I have heard some good things about this album. Though the album cover looks a Greatful Dead reject, which worries me. I have note yet heard one note of this disc. So if you grab it off the old iDisk let me know what you all think.
This post updated while listening to Aramis Ramirez hit a grad slam against the St. Louis Cardinals.
6 comments:
Cool.
I was wondering when he was going to put out a new album.
I would agree that Century Spring was sappy and week . . . a song done to try and get on the Shrek 2 soundtrack. Come on Mason, grow a sack.
However, I found a couple of the tracks on Use Your Voice to be excellent, especially the Paul Wellstone tribute.
I hope this album is good. We shall see I guess.
This album is horrible.
It does seem like another step backward for Mason.
"Where the sun had been" interests me the most. The other tracks fail to capture his earlier angst or even the imagery of much of his past work.
It seems to me he played this album VERY safe. I wish he would take some chances with his music.
I am going to pretend he never put this album out and try to remember the good times. ahhhhhhhhhh . . . . .
this album is straight up crap. better then century spring, but totally weak. Where is the Mason of my youth?
Boy, I'm glad I didn't dl it.
this album has been deleted.
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