The Wallflowers

When The Wallflowers first appeared in the early 90s,
the conversation was always about his relation to his dad. I was sort
of relieved that he doesn’t exactly sounds like his father, but more
like Bruce Springsteen or Tom Petty – at least vocally. However, the one thing he might
have gotten from his father is his gift for writing great personal
lyrics.

While the band maybe both gained and suffered from the Dylan
association, producer T-Bone Burnett disputes why they were successful:

As far as Jakob is concerned, I can’t imagine having
larger footsteps to follow in. But Jakob’s character is clearly defined
and he handles success with grace, which also says a lot about Bob as a
father… I don’t think Jakob sold a single record because he is Bob’s
son. I think he sold a lot of records because “One Headlight” is a very
good song. I wonder how many Wallflowers fans even know who Bob Dylan
is.

Interscope Records have collected a few of the band’s best-known tracks into a compilation called Collected: 1996-2005.
Why those years you might ask? Well, those are the Interscope years,
prior to ’96, they were signed to Virgin Records. Which, let’s face it,
didn’t exactly set the charts on fire with their debut self-titled.

The band’s debut single was “6th Avenue Heartache”, which did
OK on charts, but it would be “One Headlight” that would be the band’s
biggest hit song to date. I’m pretty sure, for a time anyway, that “One
Headlight” was being played on all modern rock stations across the US
every few hours. Even if you wanted to get away from the song, you
couldn’t because MTV was playing it all the time too! It’s a good song,
but maybe in small doses.

The Wallflowers have always been kind of Americana-pop music to me, a
little mellow, you know? The most rockiest song on the compilation is
“The Difference” from their Interscope debut Bringing Down the Horse
(followed closely by their massive hit song, “Sleepwalker”). Many of
their songs rely on this background ambient soundtrack, like “the quietest whisper“.

Whoever put together this album did a pretty good job with compiling
four or five songs from each of their four Interscope albums. However,
I will have to point out that Rebel, Sweetheart kind of got the shaft as there are only two songs represented here. “The Beautiful Side of Somewhere”, from Rebel, is actually one of the best Wallflowers song, although it failed to chart (as most of their songs in the later years).

The good news is that if you’ve already own all the albums and
know all the songs by heart, you’ll be happy to know that this new
compilation contain two previously unreleased songs: “Eat You Sleeping”
and “God Says Nothing Back”. I thought “Eat You Sleeping” is pretty
good, there’s an entro of violins, but it sounds to me as if Dylan is
saying “ain’t you sleeping”
for some reason. “God Says Nothing Back” is a multi-acoustic song,
which I feel might be better if it remain this like this demo: stripped
down with just one instrument and Dylan’s vocals.

Since the band took a break post-2005, Jakob Dylan did release a solo album called Seeing Things last year. His solo tour consists of his new band, Jakob Dylan and The Gold Mountain Rebels. However, you’ll be happy to know that The Wallflowers are back together and currently on tour.

So, hey, relive your favorite modern rock childhood with The
Wallflowers when you see them live – and while you’re at it, bust out
your Toad The Wet Sprocket, Michael Penn, and The Spin Doctors albums. Collected: 1996-2005
is out now at most music store. Hardcore fans may want track down the
version with bonus DVD, which is available from third party sellers
on amazon.