Icon: The Replacements

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Sorry Ma, I Forgot To Take Out The Trash [Expanded Edition]

The Replacements

2008 | Ryko/Rhino

Snotty, slurry, spazzy; this is what the middle of America Minneapolis to be exact sounded like in the late '70s and early '80s. Looking for a shouting match they'd never win, the 'Mats, as they were affectionately known, recorded this relentless, slapdash album without a trace of guile. They're drunk and nasty and happy about it. Westerberg doesn't so much sing as caterwaul. And like a younger, more irresponsible Buzzcocks, only eight of the 18 songs here exceed two minutes (which got the band slapped with the hardcore tag). But even at just 20 years old, Westerberg had a way with pop structure. Nearly all of the songs on Sorry Ma have double meanings though they aren't exactly mind puzzles. "I'm careless, careless / couldn't care less, care less," Westerberg sings on "Careless," an important distinction. Being something and feeling something are never the same. From "I Hate Music": "I hate music / sometimes I don't / I hate music / it's got too many notes." See, they contain multitudes. A ramshackle effort, but an essential document of frustration.

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Stink [Expanded Edition]

The Replacements

2008 | Ryko/Rhino

A fitting companion to the band's furious debut, the Stink EP kicks off with a recording of some teenagers cursing out a police officer attempting to break up a party. "Kids Don't Follow" follows with the same speed and anger as anything on their debut, but there is a hint of polish on the edges. The production is cleaner, Bob Stinson's guitar sound heavily influenced by the '70s virtuosos, like Yes' Steve Howe is brighter and given to the occasional solo. Westerberg is still shouting his childhood diary at us "Fuck school, fuck school, fuck my school!" he blurts but he's starting to develop a voice and taste for the little details, as on "Stuck in the Middle" and "White And Lazy," which cheekily apes the blues with an over-the-top harmonica and self-incriminating diatribe. The band would never be this raw again. But then, how it could it?

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Hootenanny [Expanded Edition]

The Replacements

2008 | Ryko/Rhino

An early toe-dip into the mainstream and certainly a calmer effort than their debut those cascading, percussive synths on "Within Your Reach" scream romantic '80s movie jam. But Hootenanny is still rippling with fits of distortion and dissonance. "Color Me Impressed" is their tightest song yet, but no less smug. "Everybody at your party, they all look depressed / everybody dressing funny, color me impressed," Westerberg groans at the outset. It isn't until the song's final 30 seconds that, for the first time, a singing voice emerges. Westerberg pushes past melody and into harmony, setting himself up for a far less ragged future. There's also an Easter egg that would predict the sound to come on "Mr. Whirly," a bizarre double cover that begins with Bob Stinson playing the opening chords of the Beatles' "Strawberry Fields Forever" then transitions into a messy remake of McCartney's "Oh, Darling." The band's Fab Four obsession would soon come to light, bearing their best work ever. Elsewhere, Minneapolis alt-weekly City Pages gets an extended shout out on "Lovelines" as Westerberg, over a slick, jazzy bassline from the then-16-year-old Tommy Stinson, reads verbatim from the personal ads, imbuing some charm and a wink in some otherwise dire newsprint pleads for love and attention. And then there is "Treatment Bound," the simple, nearly acoustic, addiction-addled album kicker broken down, beaten-up and headed for detox.

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Let It Be [Expanded Edition]

The Replacements

2008 | Ryko/Rhino

Wherein the brats become the boys next door. How the Replacements grew into this delicate and beautiful sound blinding chords, incandescent choruses, actual bridges! isn't entirely clear. But Bob Stinson and Paul Westerberg, one pushing the hard and fierce sound of past works, the other seeking a bolder and brighter pop approach, seemed to meet in the middle on this iconic work, the last for local indie Twin/Tone. "I Will Dare" announces a new band, more complex and ambitious, as the two-guitar attack darts around like a stray, mangy dog, and Stinson's bass puffs its chest out. Westerberg, increasingly a storyteller, pens the sad, elegant "Androgynous," an unlikely waltz about a cross-dressing couple, different but deeply in love. "Favorite Thing" even indulges gasp open-hearted sentiment. Wait, what band is this? The old 'Mats aren't exactly gone the goofball narratives "Gary's Got a Boner" and "Tommy Gets His Tonsils Out" could have made it onto Stink, no problem. But what makes this an indelible artifact of '80s youth are the mid-tempo ballads, a style not easily conquered. The shimmering "Unsatisfied" is a hymn for the wastrels of youth, asking the question everyone asks of themselves, be they wracked by love, loss or malaise: "Are you satisfied?" Westerberg, never more earnest or essential, isn't. On "Sixteen Blue," he turns back again to a character, the disaffected 16-year-old girl at the center of "Sixteen Blue," a crushing, balls-to-the-walls rumination on those confusing teenage years. These two songs, along with "Answering Machine," make up an unimpeachable troika of heartstring-tugging, guttural white blues. And as the final line of the terrifyingly accurate "Answering Machine" "How do you say good night to an answering machine?" fades out, and the voice of an automated operator requests a line, the dial tone clicks on a perfect album from an utterly imperfect band.

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Tim [Expanded Edition]

The Replacements

2008 | Rhino/Warner Bros.

Getting called up to the big leagues is always daunting. But Tim is an interesting exception. Somehow the Replacements managed to grow more, cleaning up and sometimes diluting their sound thanks to recruited producer Tommy "Ramone" Erdelyi, to record an album perhaps less emotionally indignant than Let It Be, but more physically rewarding. They're still having fun, but this time they're in the front of the bar boogieing, instead of out back vomiting. But this trip into a presentable avenue of mainstream American rock slowly began to rub Bob Stinson the wrong way. Songs like "Kiss Me on the Bus" and "Waitress in the Sky" acoustic forays into feel-good Beatles simulacra proved to be some of the most gorgeous and beloved of the band's career. And "Left of the Dial," a sort of indie insider's wet dream, became an emblem of outsider affection, with Westerberg talking about "your band" and maybe his own. But they were a dividing line; a real point of contention for Stinson. The reeling "Bastards of Young" and "Lay It Down Clown" were more in line with what the band once represented: rip-chord-pulling slop rock with traces of punk sentiment. But somehow the goofy abandon that once came so easily, feels labored over. This was a new band, packed with regret and sadness, and the music reflected that. Nowhere is that more apparent than on album closer, "Here Comes a Regular" maybe Westerberg's best song ever, a solo acoustic tale of a drunk misanthrope basically himself. It's full of want and need, like all the best Replacements' songs. Tim wasn't the commercial smash Sire Records hoped for, but in its own, new way, it stands up as one of the most seamless major label transitions of recent memory. It was also the last time the original lineup performed intact.

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Pleased To Meet Me [Expanded Edition]

The Replacements

2008 | Rhino/Warner Bros.

Farewell to Bob Stinson, fired for drunkenness and a refusal to cater to Westerberg's growing pop instincts. And so the Replacements carried on as a trio on this second album for major label subsidiary, Sire. Helmed by Big Star producer Jim Dickinson and recorded in Memphis, TN, the album is a love letter that band's gifted singer-songwriter, Alex Chilton. Chilton was originally in line to produce the band's previous album, Tim, but was forced to pull out. Pleased To Meet Me is a departure in a lot of ways, employing Memphis brass on several songs, including that enduring anthem of youthful impatience "Can't Hardly Wait." There are great moments here, including an out and out tribute to Chilton called, fittingly, "Alex Chilton," that featured the indelible chorus, "I'm in love / What's that song? / I'm in love / with that song!" But the band's forays into cocktail jazz and Stax-style raveups are often just derivative moves. Only "Shooting Dirty Pool" and "Valentine" seemed to capture their earlier verve. Outtakes on this expanded edition reveal a band that futzed around too much in the studio; the alternate takes are always always better than the originals, particularly the dueling versions of "Can't Hardly Wait." It's revealing to hear what did and did not make the cut; at times, it seems Westerberg didn't know who his band should be. Stinson, though a notoriously virulent presence, contained a fire the band could never reignite. He took their identity with him.

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Don't Tell A Soul [Expanded Edition]

The Replacements

2008 | Rhino/Warner Bros.

With Minneapolis guitarist Slim Dunlap now a full-time axman, the Replacements stripped down and washed out, composing their cleanest, dullest album ever, an occasionally pretty but mostly hollow set of country and blues-inflected rock songs. This was the first time a Replacements album felt inconsequential, as if the vigor and bile that fueled them for years, even after guitarist Bob Stinson's departure, dissipated in a fog of MOR ballads, particularly the bitter "They're Blind." Frontman Paul Westerberg was hailed for a transition to maturity firing Stinson, marrying his longtime girlfriend, etc. but in truth, his mellowing zapped the band of their virility. So many songs here begin as if they will be heavy and relentless, like the jangly "Back To Back" and "Anywhere's Better Than Here," only to melt into a quiet morass. Westerberg rediscovers some bile on "I Won't," and some heartfelt nostalgia for the band's beginnings on the elegant, effusive "Talent Show," but too often it finds him slumming, less effectively, in Huey Lewis and the News territory. His writing, now more than ever, feels like a self-conscious bid to break out, without discovering anything about himself. And his voice, once a ragged thrill, sounds glossy and affected. This blatant bid for mainstream success yielded their first charting single, the diffident "I'll Be You" (no. 51), but not the chart-topping they sacrificed for. There are moments here, but very quickly, this once so vital band ceased to matter.

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All Shook Down [Expanded Edition]

The Replacements

2008 | Rhino/Warner Bros.

Frustrated with Don't Tell a Soul's failure, Westerberg struck out on his own to record his first solo album, recording much of All Shook Down with R.E.M. producer Scott Litt, with hopes of recontextualizing himself as a sort of balladeer. Eventually, he decided to make this the last Replacements' album, but it is in name only. Chris Mars and Tommy Stinson appear rarely here, replaced by session musicians. But, surprisingly, All Shook Down is both a fitting last stand for the band, shimmering with the sort of gorgeous midtempo numbers that garnered them so much affection on Let It Be, as well as charting a nice transition for Westerberg from loutish drunk to MOR wannabe to, finally, winsome troubadour. The move works so well, and he seems so at peace with himself, that his songs shine, especially "Nobody," which recalls the word play of his early days, if not the fury. "Sadly Beautiful," which features viola played by John Cale, is one of Westerberg's best ballads, an inverse of "Here Comes a Regular." The hushed title track is that a recorder played in the background? and knowing closer, "The Last," are among the most unfussy, sweetest songs he would ever write. This is the end of an era, but only the beginning of a new Westerberg.

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Don't You Know Who I Think I Was?: The Best Of The Replacements

The Replacements

2006 | Rhino/Warner Bros.

An efficient, effective collection of the Minneapolis band's hits, misses, slag-offs and come-ons that somehow manages to pack each changing movement in the band's career into 18 songs, and two modest new rockers. It's quite a feat. For many, this will, quite literally be a soundtrack to your life because the Replacements so impressively shifted from fragile ballads to spleen-slashing spasms. Pissed off at life? Try "Shiftless When Idle" from Sorry Ma, Forgot To Take Out the Trash. Lovelorn and lost? There's always "Answering Machine." Need a pick-me-up? "Can't Hardly Wait" awaits. This terribly talented and terribly doomed quartet were never a singles band in their day. But to hear this compilation is to never know the truth.