"well it's the biggest thing in my life, I guess"

The Replacements, "Talent Show" (Matt Wallace Mix)

Don't Tell A Soul divided Replacements fans at the time as being "too pop" but I dunno, I was listening to this on cassette pretty much non-stop in high school along with (ahem) Appetite For Destruction.  My hormone-addled teenage brain saw no contradictions in this.

Dead Man's Pop is a new Replacements box set, and it's a doozy -- in addition to rarities, a hard-to-find jam with Tom Waits (!), and a smoking live set from Madison, Wisconsin in '89, the highlight is a "pre-mix," or a re-imagining of Don't Tell A Soul after it had been "polished" for radio by Chris Lord-Alge.  If I've got it right, original engineer Matt Wallace sat down with the original tapes, pre-Lord-Alge, and pushed them into rougher, more intimate terrain.

Given that the entire project seems to have Paul Westerberg's blessing, it really is a must-have.  Also, the idea for the re-mix came from Bob Mehr, who is the author of the fantastic Mats biography Trouble Boys.

Honestly, there's a lot going on here and all of it is great.

I actually really like Don't Tell A Soul and have since it came out in 1989.  But being outside the Minneapolis scene, it was easier for me to just appreciate the album for what it was and not get caught up in the "Paul is selling out for mainstream success" stuff.  Mind you, this was only two years before the neutron bomb of Nevermind, and already lines were being drawn that would pave the way for the capital-I Indie Rock movement and the inevitable backlash against, well, success.

If anything, I'd argue DTAS is really a try-out as Paul's first solo record.  We all know his first real solo record was All Shook Down, which of course was The Replacements' last record.

Simple.

As for the sound, it's definitely rougher in a good way, and more ragged.  The acoustic guitar doesn't disappear once the hook of "Talent Show" kicks in, but kind of fills and warms the whole thing.  I'm willing to bet the drums aren't synced to a click track -- there are some interesting little fills, if not minor mistakes.  The whole sounds more like it's recorded in a mom's basement than a real studio.  The outro keeps in all the warts and all, which seems about right.

Anyhow, I really can't wait to get my hands on this and do a track-by-track comparison.

Pitchfork review here.