Somedays You Eat Bear

 

 

Create your own review

"Somedays You Eat THE Bear....And Somedays The Bear Eats You" (to give it its correct and charmingly weird title) was Iain's (or Ian as he was then) second solo album for Jac Holzman's Electra label (his first was the Michael Nesmith produced "Valley Hi"). Recorded in '73 and released in '74, "Somedays" was self-produced, and consequently was much more representative of where Matthews was coming from musically at the time. Personally, I consider this to be the best album Iain has made in his long and illustrious career, surpassing even the Top 20 charting, radio-frendly "Stealing Home". I have owned this album in one form or another since '74, have played it literally over a thousand times, and still love to listen to it. It's a wonderfully summery album and a great driving companion.
"Somedays" kicks off with a great version of Tom Waits' "Ol '55", surpassing the contemporary Eagles ("On The Border") cut. Iain I think is always at his best when covering the songs of the great (and largely at the time ignored) American songwriters. There are some lovely interpretations on this album - most notably Danny Whitten's beautiful "I Dont Wanna Talk About It', Jesse Winchester's lush "Biloxi", Peter Blumson's "Do I Still Figure I Your Life?", and a great reading of Gene Clark's "Tried So Hard" which easily eclipses the Burritos' version. Fagen and Becker's "Dirty Work" is very close to the original, which is not surprising as at the time Iain was being touted as the replacement for David Palmer as guest vocalist in Steely Dan.
The Matthews' originals on "Somedays" are all re-workings of songs which he had tried out before (on the then unreleased second Plainsong album), except for "Keep On Sailing" which is a much improved version of the one which appeared on "Valley Hi".
This is a gorgeous sounding album, a perfect example of 70's country/folk soft rock, and an album that I, after God knows how long, never tire of listening to.
The album, produced by Matthews himself is a shining example of what can be achieved when the combination of the right selection (of material), the right performances (from the likes of "Skunk" Baxter and David Lindley), and the right production (check out the backing vocal arrangements - all Matthews overdubs) merge to produce a beautiful, but sadly overlooked masterpiece of the early 70's West-Coast genre.
I bought an mp3 version of "Somedays" about 8 months ago from Amazon for £6.80, but its no longer available as a download anymore (maybe Amazon sold out of mp3s ... heh heh heh). Come on Amazon, give people a chance to hear this wonderful album at a reasonable price.

UPDATE 6th June 2011: I believe the mp3 download version is available on the USA Amazon.com website for under $9.00 - check it out.

Share your thoughts with other customers: Create your own review

› See the customer review...

 

Search Customer Reviews
Only search this product's reviews

Search Listmania!