Firewater megamix:

1. Bourbon And Division (mp3)
2. Green Light
3. Fell Off The Face Of The Earth
4. Dark Days Indeed (mp3)
5. Diamonds And Gold
6. Three Legged Dog
7. When I Burn This Place Down
8. Dropping Like Flies
9. Seventh Avenue Static (mp3)
10. Anything At All
11. I Often Dream Of Trains
12. One Of Those
13. Whistling In The Dark
14. The Man With The Blurry Face
15. Don't Make It Stop
16. The Drunken Jew
17. So Long, Superman (mp3)
18. Woke Up Down
19. Some Strange Reaction
20. Another Perfect Catastrophe
21. Balalaika

I have to say, even though I wasn't crazy about the album that Firewater released this year, it and the show I saw them play of mostly songs from that record at the Ottobar have really reminded me what a great band they can be sometimes. Tod A. may sometimes seem to be playing Tom Waits karaoke (OK, on "Diamonds And Gold" that's literally what he's doing), but he's a pretty damn consistent songwriter and he's always had solid musicians who can pull off all the middle eastern/klezmer/spy film music vibes that get thrown into the pot.

Maybe the problem with Firewater is that they nailed a specific sound so well right away that there was nowhere to go but down -- in fact, I realized that pretty much every album they've made has been weaker than the last (that's not entirely true, since I like the 2nd, The Ponzi Scheme most and the new one The Golden Hour, slightly more than the two before it). So when J.G. heard some Firewater when I played them on a long drive recently and immediately took a liking to them, which I probably should've expected but somehow never thought to play for her for years and years, I decided to make a mix that reflects the diminishing returns in the band's catalog. That is to say, the first 6 songs are from each of the band's 6 albums, in order, and then the next 5 songs are from the first 5 albums, and so on, so the whole mix is weighted toward the early stuff that I like best.

This entry was posted on Friday, November 14, 2008 at 11:13 PM. You can skip to the end and leave a response.