Fuzzy Lion

One of my favorite bands of the 90’s was Grant Lee Buffalo. Mighty Joe Moon is an absolute classic album and its follow-ups, Copperopolis, and Jubilee is one of the best 1-2-3 punches by a band I’ve ever experienced.

Needless to say, when news of the band’s split came, I was very upset. The only saving grace was that it’s founder and frontman, Grant-Lee Phillips was planning a solo career.

GLP’s first solo effort was Ladie’s Love Oracle, and to say I was disappointed in it would be an understatement. At best, it sounded like a collection of acoustic b-sides. I feared the glory days were gone; that was until Phillips’ second record, Mobilize, was released. Mobilize is a phenomenal record from start to finish. Tracks such as “See America,” “Spring Released” and “Humankind” have that old Grant Lee Buffalo energy behind them that fans such as myself had loved from the start. Phillips 2004 effort, Virginia Creeper, was also wonderful, in a more hauntingy beautiful way. “Mona Lisa,” “Lily-a-Passion” “Josephine of the Swamps” are some of the records stand-out tracks.

With 3 albums of original solo material, Phillips hit us up with 2006’s cover album, Ninteeneighties. Ninteeneighties is a collection of some of Grant-Lee’s favorite 80’s tracks including Echo & the Bunnymen’s “Killing Moon,” R.E.M.’s “So. Central Rain” and The Cure’s “Boy’s Don’t Cry.” (Grant-Lee and I have very similar taste it appears!)

Next week, Grant-Lee will release his most recent album, Strangelet. I’m only a few listens in but I’m really loving what I hear so far. If you are not familiar with Grant Lee Buffalo or the solo work of Grant-Lee Phillips, you’ll really be doing yourself a service by getting familiar with it. Not only is Grant-Lee a brilliant songwriter, but his voice is one of the most unique and wonderful around.

Listen to “Soft Asylum (No Way Out)” from the soon-to-be-release Strangelet.
I’ve also included “Arousing Thunder” from 1996’s Copperopolis. This song sends chills down my spine!

This entry was posted on Thursday, March 22nd, 2007 at 7:51 pm and is filed under Downloads, Music. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.