If released by a lesser band than Streetlight Manifesto, “99 Songs of Revolution: Volume I” would receive a completely different review.† However, as it was released by Streetlight, I find myself forced to compare it to their previous work, most notably their second to most recent album, “Somewhere in the Between.”† While “Between” was one of the most original and exciting ska albums I had heard in a long time, “Songs” is an album of covers, which seems like a step backwards.† It certainly aspires to be more, but when “more” is made up of a series of additional cover albums, it still leaves a nasty taste in my mouth. The album is labeled Volume I for a reason, as Streetlight and three other bands will be releasing a total of eight cover albums, covering a total of 99 songs.† On its own, “99 Songs” is a solidly decent ska album.† It has a few songs which hit the mark dead on, a few that are just barely off, and a few which miss entirely.
What’s Good:
I’m going to go right ahead and say that the cover of Radiohead’s “Just” is hands down the best song on the album.† It’s a lot faster than the Radiohead version, but that works just fine with the blaring horns and Streetlight frontman Tomas Kalnoky’s distinct vocals.† The cover of the Paul Simon song “Me and Julio Down by the Schoolyard” will get stuck in your head for days, and you’ll like it, too.† The best songs on this album, are the ones that are just plain fun, and “Me and Julio” is definitely a good time.† It’s nothing special, a ska cover at its most basic, but maybe that’s where its charm comes from.† The intro of “Such Great Heights” óoriginally by The Postal Serviceó† is an awesome exercise in layering horn parts, but the rest of the song is fairly unremarkable.† Honorable mentions go to “Red Rubber Ball” (originally by The Cyrkle), “Linoleum” (originally by NOFX), and “Hell” (originally by Squirrel Nut Zippers).
What’s Not:
“Punk Rock Girl” is a classic by “punk” band The Dead Milkmen, a frankly. a song that doesn’t need any covering.† Admittedly, if you’re unfamiliar with the original, you’ll probably find this cover fairly decent, but next to the original it’s mostly just saddening.† On iTunes, the band Bad Religion has 256 songs for sale.† I’m sure a few of those are doubles, but in general, that’s a lot of songs.† So can someone explain to me why Streetlight chose to cover one of the worst ones?† “Skyscraper” was never a particularly good song to begin with, but Streetlight’s cover is somehow worse than the original.
A dishonorable mention goes to the band’s† cover of “They Provide the Paint for the Picture-perfect Masterpiece That You will Paint on the Insides of Your Eyelids” (seriously, that’s the title), originally by Bandits of the Acoustic Revolution.† Not only is this a sub-par song, BotAR is Kalnoky’s side project band, so he’s covering his own music which is either mental masturbation, cheating, or both.
All in all, this album is solidly decent.† Do you like ska music?† Do you like any of the songs I mentioned in the good section?† Then you might want to check it out.† Otherwise, I’d recommend buying their previous album instead.