Good afternoon from the bar in the mall! I’ve been picked for this week. Wooo!
If pressed to name an album that more people should hear, Grandaddy’s The Sophtware Slump is one of a select few that come to mind. When this album dropped in 2000, my friend group was instantly enamored with it. It seemed like a lot of people I met loved it as well. It got a lot of buzz (think comparisons to Radiohead) and then —poof—. Admittedly, Grandaddy’s discography is (to my ears) uneven. Every album has a bonafide gem or two, but they never managed to string together a more melodic and memorable gathering of songs than this one. The music is a combo of synth and fuzz, dirge and rage, with Jason Lytle’s fragile, sometimes nearly childlike vocal delivery bringing it all together on the emotional level. The lyrics are all futurism and technology (like another band we all happen to love, there’s a self-aware robot!), with some environmental and relationship themes mixed in. The slower songs (about half the album, and the absolute best parts, if you ask me) have a shoegazy feel that stays melodic and is easy to get pleasantly, hypnotically lost in. And the flow from track to track is just impossible to argue with. I could go on and on, but I just want you to press play. Hope you all dig it. (And if you do, here are some ancillary recommendations.)
From Signal to Snow Ratio, the EP before Sophtware:
From Sumday, the full-length album follow-up to Sophtware:
They released another EP after Sumday, titled Excerpts from the Diary of Todd Zilla that features this awesome and hilarious track:
And on the 20th anniversary, Lytle re-recorded the entirety of The Sophtware Slump unaccompanied on wooden piano:
Thanks for reading and listening. Pour one out for Jeddy 3!