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Album Details

• Artist: Meat Puppets
• Album: Classic Puppets
• Label: Rykodisc
• Year of Release: 2004
• ME Rating:
• Reviewed by: dscanland on 2004-05-05

I'm not sure if you would say that The Meat Puppets were legendary or notorious. I might be a combination of both but one thing's for sure, it was the help of their friend's Nirvana and the MTV Unplugged album that solidified their place in alt.rock's hall of fame. When Cobain started singing the words to the Meat Puppets track "Lake Of Fire" people were looking at each other wondering what was going on. Well, the Kirkwood's had a couple of classic albums as well as what could be considered a hit with "Backwater" on Too High To Die. The album starts out with their atrocious beginnings that were pretty much considered trashy thrash punk. I couldn't stand these tracks. It wasn't until a couple songs in that their charm starts to set in as well as their kitschy songwriting. I would still be hard pressed to say that this group has strong vocals. No, it's in the guitar arrangements where Meat Puppets shine. The guitars are rarely distorted. The sound is fairly clean, for the most part and that's what stands out for me. The brothers Kirkwood also try to incorporate a country element on a few songs like "Burn The Honky Tonk Down". It's a shame that Ryko couldn't get access to the Too High To Die sessions. These were, for me, some of the best and most cohesive efforts that the group ever did. Yes, there were some really great tracks on Meat Puppets II as well as Up On The Sun and they are all compiled here. This is definitely not an essential album but a great overview of the earlier Meat Puppets songs - from their self-titled debut right up to their last album for SST, Monsters.

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