Thursday, 2 December 2004

The Verve, This is Music: The Singles 92-98

[Capsule review for Popshot]

The question I keep coming back to is: how could you spend your twenties in such a boring fucking band? The answer I choose is always: dope. These guys must have smoked acres of weed to make even their “rockers” plod along like they do. Their early work is drenched in regretable reverb and throughout they cheese it up so much you feel like you’ll be constipated for a week. They’re not purveyors of the short songs either. I stopped looking for one under 4 minutes. Sure, the first minute forty-five of “Bittersweet Symphony” is tasty but they drag the fucker out for 4 more minutes! In that time, you could have listened to three of the greatest songs in the world from the Beach Boys, Beatles, Ramones or Motown. In fact, I think I will go do that.