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Don't You Know Who I Think I Was? - The Best of the Replacements

The Replacements - Don't You Know Who I Think I Was? - The Best of the Replacements Audio CD

A fair review of the The Replacements "Don't You Know Who I Think I Was? - The Best of the Replacements" Audio CD. Please note that the below review is the views of the authors, and authors only. You can get a complete list of all The Replacements reviews here, or go back to the The Replacements tabs.

Band: The Replacements
Title: Don't You Know Who I Think I Was? - The Best of the Replacements
Rating:

Release Date: 2006-06-13
Media: Audio CD

Tracks: 1: Takin A Ride 2: Shiftless When Idle 3: Kids Don't Follow 4: Color Me Impressed 5: Within Your Reach 6: I Will Dare 7: Answering Machine 8: Unsatisfied 9: Here Comes A Regular 10: Kiss Me On The Bus 11: Bastards Of Young 12: Left Of The Dial 13: Alex Chilton 14: Skyway 15: Can't Hardly Wait 16: Achin' To Be 17: I'll Be You 18: Merry Go Round 19: Message To The Boys (New Recording) 20: Pool & Dive (New Recording)

Decent starting point, but missing too many key Twin-Tone tracks to be the last word on 'Mats comps

As a Warner Music imprint, Rhino may not have wanted to weight this latest collection too heavily in favor of the Twin-Tone material. The first question any record geek worth his collection of rare, OOP picture sleeve singles asks about another compilation -- particularly one of a former indie cult band gone major -- is "who's it for, anyway?" Fans, who have all the original LP's, EP's and 7"'s? Or newbies, who must be tired of all the old guys telling them how great the 'Mats were "back in the day"? Since Don't You Know Who I Think I Was? (hereafter DYKWITIW?) contains no B-sides or other rarities -- beyond the two "new" 'Mats tracks, the engaging-but-slight "Message to the Boys" and "Pool and Dive" -- it's fair to assume this comp is for the kids. (Sire/Reprise's 1997 compilation All For Nothing/Nothing For All included no Twin-Tone tracks at all, and so provided a grievously incomplete summary of the band's work. On the other hand, the second disc, containing B-sides and other rarities, was worth the cost of the whole thing. ) So the final score: eight (8) from the Twin-Tone years; ten (10) from the Sire/Reprise albums; two (2) new 'Mats tracks. As someone who got his introduction to the band in 1984 with Let It Be (and then promptly bought the first three Twin-Tone records -- Sorry Ma, Forgot To Take Out The Trash; Stink EP; and Hootenanny), I'll always be partial to the TT releases.

At 65 minutes, DYKWITIW? is a little light on the 1980-84 records: Rhino could have included "Johnny's Gonna Die" from Sorry Ma, and both "Androgynous" and "Sixteen Blue" from Let It Be. If the idea is to let younger fans know why the Replacements were one of the great indie/alternative bands of the '80's, it would have made sense to cull all the best tracks from the albums that made their reputation before they made the jump to Sire/Reprise. And while Paul Westerberg's songwriting was always the weapon that set the band apart from the other entrants in the "hard, fast, loud" competition, it might have been nice -- if only to show the extent to which Westerberg and Co. were indebted to 1970's AM and FM radio for their sound -- to incorporate the band's approach to covers. (Notable contenders: Kiss's "Black Diamond," T. Rex's "20th Century Boy," and the Grass Roots's "Temptation Eyes," the latter of which is available on several "unauthorized" releases. ) But obviously, a single-disc collection couldn't accommodate every aspect of the band's work.

So maybe the Replacements, even with a relatively manageable recorded output, are just too big to be summarized in a single compact disc. A better solution, although more expensive for all involved, would be a double-disc collection, with the best of the Twin-Tone years (including rarities like "If Only You Were Lonely," "Nowhere Is My Home," and the early version of "Can't Hardly Wait") on the first disc, and the Sire/Reprise material on the second (make sure to save space for their cover of the Only Ones's "Another Girl, Another Planet").

Overall, DYKWITIW? gets 3 1/2 stars. It's a reasonable, if not terribly generous, collection of the Replacements' best tracks, and provides a decent introduction to a band whose reputation has taken an unfortunate nosedive in the last decade or so (probably due to all the mediocre Paul Westerberg solo albums, but that's another rant for another review). If you're a 40-something for whom the 'Mats were an important part of your college and post-college years, and you want to do that precocious teen or college-age kid a favor, get him a copy of Let It Be, followed by Sorry Ma and Tim.
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Missing one ultra-important song
All my other Replacements stuff is on records, which I can't play in the car. Usually, I don't pick up "best of" albums, but the only Mats CD I own in "Sorry Ma'". Originally, I was just going to buy a copy of Tim, but then I saw this and I figured "what the heck".

The only real problem I have with this disc is that it doesn't contain "Raised In the City" from the first album. I don't see how you can rightly have a "best of" Replacements album that neglects the song that was responsible for them getting into a proper studio and launching the band.

Still this has plenty of great songs on it, culled from each of The Replacements seven albums. Check it out if you want a good overview, or if you find yourself slowly creeping into the 21st century, much like myself. .

An almost pretty-okay starting point...
Some of what made the band what it was were their live performances (great, good, bad & ugly) so a 'best of' for The Replacements hardly makes for a by-the-numbers textbook greatest hits collection. The Replacements are one of those bands where their legend almost over shades their actual recorded output. So it can't accurately and fully represent the band that they were on one single disc. Having said this, this collection is pretty okay. The track selection seems is a tad off. "Shiftless When Idle" and "Takin' A Ride" could have been left off. Additions of "If Only You Were The Lonely", "Raised In The City", and "Little Mascara" and the great singles "I'm In Trouble", "When It Began", and "The Ledge" would have absolutely made this a definitive greatest hits collection.

For fans of the band there are two good, newly recorded (!) songs ("Message To The Boys" & "Pool And Dive"). And considering they haven't actively done anything as a band in fifteen years - they're great.
Paul sings and plays guitar, Tommy plays bass, Chris sings prominent backing-vocals (esp. on "Pool And Dive") and seeing as Chris hasn't played drums in a few years and his own preference of just wanting to sing and not play they used Josh Freese on drums (who backed Paul on his 14 Songs Tour). The songs themselves sound like superior Westerberg solo material although they are definitely 'Mats songs.

For the uninitiated this, again a pretty okay compilation but only begins to scratch the surface. I'd personally recommend 'Sorry Ma, Forgot To Take Out The Trash', 'Tim', 'Let It Be' and 'Pleased To Meet Me' and that's just for for starters.

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"One foot in the door, the other one in the gutter."

The principle failing of the set is the track listing. The Replacements' second `best of' compilation - hotly anticipated due to it's inclusion of classic tracks (previously not included on the All For Nothing/Nothing For All set released by Reprise Records in 1997) from the band's first four Twin/Tone albums as well as those released after their controversial switch to major pastures (with Sire/Reprise) AND showcasing 2 brand new collaborative tracks from Paul Westerberg, Tommy Stinson and Chris Mars - was released comparatively hot on the heels of Westerberg's own solo best-of, Besterberg, and in a sense falls into some of the same traps. Now, I am well aware that choosing tracks for a best-of compilation is an almost entirely subjective process, but within The Replacements' canon there are certain staples who's omission is close to heresy. Having gained in stature immeasurably since their portentous release on 1984's Let It Be it almost beggars belief that neither the plaintively ramshackle `Androgynous' nor the spark-to-a-blaze `Sixteen Blue' (written by Westerberg about Tommy Stinson but adopted as an anthem of disenchantment and despondency by those marginalised during the Reagan years and beyond) were not included.

That said however, if you're limiting yourself to choosing The Mats' 18 "best" tracks then you are always going to struggle to please anyone but yourself entirely, and most of those that are here are indelible classics anyway. `Colour Me Impressed', `B@$tards of Young' and `Alex Chilton' are all irresistibly infectious rockers, whilst `I Will Dare', `Left of the Dial' and `Can't Hardly Wait' are as romantically steeped in the band's legendary self-deprecation and irony as they are in the legend of the band itself.

I bow to no one however, in my appreciation of the All For Nothing/Nothing For All best of the Sire-years set, and whilst the scope of tracks on Don't You Know. . . ? undeniably garners more kudos than the former, the presentation of the set leaves the latter trailing some way behind. This is particularly the case regarding the liner notes by Bill Holdship, whereby the insightful and sincere first-hand accounts of the All For Nothing set are replaced by crass generalizations ("`Kiss Me on the Bus' illustrated why [unlike many of their underground peers, including hometown heroes Husker Du] The Replacements had a whole lot of female fans") and nostalgic myopia. Additionally, the ethos of this set seems to be one of accentuating the bratty, drunken image of the band rather than balancing it out against the dignity and sensitivity that underpins the songs.

The two new tracks, `Message to the Boys' and `Pool & Dive' are something of a misnomer in as much as Chris Mars merely sings backing vocals (former A Perfect Circle and Westerberg-solo session man extraordinaire Josh Freese plays drums) whilst Slim Dunlap declined involvement, leaving Westerberg and Tommy Stinson the only two members of the lineup having any significant involvement. The tracks subsequently come to sound similar to his tracks for the Open Season soundtrack (2 of which also feature Stinson on bass) yet have a similar charm about them so disavow any particular disappointment at their lack of inspiration.

Overall, like so many before it, it is the "product" itself and the machinations of those involved in it that undermines the brilliance of the tracks, yet bypassing the sleeve and liner notes and going straight to the songs themselves is about as satisfying an experience as you can get from a compilation album.

`Go'; `Swingin' Party'; `The Ledge'; `Talent Show'; `Anywhere's Better Than Here'; `Sadly Beautiful' ?? You can't please everyone.

You can see a complete list of all The Replacements discography, or go back to the The Replacements tabs. There is also a good guide on how to read guitar tabs here.