Covers records are a strange animal. They pretty much show off a band's inner fan/critic (I think they're largely synonymous -- it might be safe to say that people don't tend to go into reviewing for glory or monetary gain) and suggest that if you like their music, you'd better dig these songs cause that's where they come from. Or, there are those rare times like on Cat Power's The Covers Record where an artist takes some songs and makes them completely their own. You could say Firewater does the same thing here if you liked and appreciated what they do, and I must confess I'm completely ignorant of their original sound. All I know is that their "Diamonds and Gold" is basically Tom Waits mugging. And the rest of the time I feel like I'm listening to Southern Culture on the Skids, and that makes my head hurt.
Firewater sounds like a bar band of the worst sort. The kind where you want to reach through the chicken wire fencing and choke the guys to death for failing to do anything that makes you content to just toss your beer bottles at them. There's some high energy hootin' and hollerin' on the late great Cash's "Folsom Prison Blues," but it still doesn't do enough to justify itself as a proper interpretation. That's the problem: they obviously enjoy these tunes, but refuse to keep us interested beyond checking out the originals. This goes especially for the Lyn Taitt & The Comets instrumental "Storm Warning" and not so especially for "Hey Bulldog" (sub-par Beatles piss from Yellow Submarine).
It's very tempting to do a song-by-song analysis of Songs We Should Have Written, but it's really not necessary. All you need to know is that if you enjoy Nick Cave-ish rockabilly with pop sensibilities, then you can't go wrong here. But it's kind of like reading the Rolling Stone top 500 and being ordered to accept stuff like No Doubt on their extremely convoluted terms. I should warn the discerning music fan that The Stones' "Paint It Black" is butchered yet again along with the lamely dark reading of the obscure pop gem of Peggy Lee's "Is That All There Is?" (check out Scorcese's After Hours to properly appreciate this number in its original form). All in all, this is stuff that's accomplished and assured sounding, but ultimately stale as beached bread. It actually works better as a guide to good music than good music in and of itself. Keep this in mind and spend/save wisely.
1. The Beat Goes On
2. This Town
3. Diamonds and Gold
4. Folsom Prison Blues
5. Storm Warning
6. Hey Bulldog
7. Some Velvet Morning
8. This Little Heart of Mine
9. Paint It Black
10. Is That All There Is?
11. I Often Dream of Trains
More about: Firewater
