Cons: "She's an Angel" and "Ana NG" are slaughtered. Predictable song selection.
The Bottom Line: This is a great live album. Most of the old songs sound fuller and livelier. May be alienating to some listeners, though, and some odd choices were made.
dopple's Full Review: Severe Tire Damage by They Might Be Giants
Live albums can often be useless. While live shows are usually the best way to experience any real band, it's somewhat pointless on record. Sloppier versions of the albums with crowd noise in between songs. It's just not the same as being there, and doesn't usually offer anything special to the music itself.
But for They Might Be Giants, it's different. True, any live album of theirs culled from the 1980s or early 90s would have been EXTREMELY pointless: the band was a two-piece and relied on tapes for most of their backing music. But this is a group that underwent an extreme transition in the mid-90s: they became a full band. The two Johns welcomed full backing bands to tour with them, and started bring these bands into the studio with them to record their albums _John Henry_ and the underappreciated _Factory Showroom_.
Seeing as they had mostly only used synths and samples for their first ten years and four albums, the addition of a full band changed their sound dramatically. It got fuller and more experimental, especially in a live setting. Using actual musicians instead of prerecorded tapes meant they could actually mess around with songs live, and they probably jumped at the opportunity seeing as they had been playing some of them for so many years.
So SEVERE TIRE DAMAGE, a collection of live songs recorded with TMBG version 2.0, actually has the chance to be quite interesting, and for the most part it is.
On one hand, the song selection is unfortunately predictable most of the way through; it can read like somewhat of a live 'greatest hits'. The only songs pulled off their classic early records are "She's An Angel" and "Ana NG", and the renditions here are not flattering: both songs are slowed down just enough to rob them of their frenetic energy.
Otherwise though, the predictable song selection is offset by the unpredictable performances. Of course, they play the three big ones off of their breakthrough album _Flood_ - "Birdhouse in your Soul", "Istanbule (Not Constantinople)" and "Particle Man". But these are VERY cool and original versions, especially of the latter two. "Istanbule" gets a neat intro and a more organic feel. "Particle Man" gets much more crunchy and lively than it's album counterpart.
One of the more popular songs off their second major label album, _Apollo 18_, gets a much-deserved update - "She's Actual Size" sounded to me like it should have been a good song, but it sounded too flat to come alive. On SEVERE TIRE DAMAGE, it finally gets the treatment it deserves. The band really helps this one.
Something I can't quite understand is why there are so many songs from
_Factory Showroom_ on here. I guess it's likely they wanted some of these songs to get more exposure, as that particular album totally bombed commercially. But it robs this album of some value, seeing as they already had a full band for that album so the versions here aren't particularly unique from their originals. The songs ("XTC vs. Atom Ant", "Till My Head Falls Off" & "S-E-X-X-Y") themselves are quite good, and show why 'Showroom' should have gotten more attention, but are kind of a waste of space where we could have heard revamped versions of, say, "I Palendrome I", "Cowtown" or "Purple Toupee".
There are some new songs on SEVERE TIRE DAMAGE that make it even more essential for fans of TMBG. Three new studio tracks - "Dr. Worm", "Severe Tire Damage Theme" and "About Me". The middle one is pretty disposable - just a short, hokey, throwaway instrumental - but the other two are definitely keepers, especially "Dr. Worm". Theres also the live-only tune "They Got Lost", which describes their own car troubles to a catchy tune. Yes, there are also some silly bonus "secret songs", poorly recorded and seemingly improvised on stage, all named after Planet of the Apes sequels. That's hardly essential, but cute.
So is this album worth getting? Well, casual fans might be drawn in by the track selection, but it's not very good as a hits collection. As I said, "Ana NG" and "She's An Angel" are poorly represented, and the _Flood_ tunes, while excellent here, are radically different from the versions most radio listeners are familiar with. Those types of people are better off with _Dial-A-Song_, the two disc anthology.
For fans of the band though, it's kind of a must. It's just damn interesting and a fine mix of TMBG tunes. Great for when you get tired of the albums and want to hear the classic tunes with a twist, and further evidence that They Might Be Giants did not lose relevence when they signed to a major label and ceased being a two-piece.
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