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After many years as a sideman for other people's projects — including Aimee Mann, the eels, Fiona Apple, Elliott Smith, Jellyfish, and the Wallflowers, among dozens more — multi-instrumentalist, producer, and general "it man" Jon Brion stepped behind the microphone for his debut solo album in late 2000. Much-anticipated by diehard fans of guitar-based pop music, and especially the rabid cult following of the fractured early-'90s pop outfit Jellyfish, Meaningless delivers. It's impossible to deny that Brion's collaborations have had an effect on him; the influence of Mann is especially strong here (in fact, she co-wrote the jazzy "I Believe She's Lying"), although Brion surpasses the "singer/songwriter" tag by pulling in many of his power pop roots (a cover of Cheap Trick's "Voices" closes the album) and his diverse background in pop music. It could be said that Meaningless cops the style of many of those whom Brion has collaborated with, but in reality it is a representation of the purest form of what Brion has given to the production of those other artists' work. Brion is a wary frontman. Only on the now-legendary (and extremely out-of-print) 1994 Grays album Ro Sham Bo did he take lead vocal and writing credits. That project imploded largely because the premise — four solo artists who share a band together — was almost too ambitious. And while Jason Falkner, the most obvious "frontman" of the group, went on to release some enjoyable solo albums, Brion continued on with work mostly as a multi-instrumentalist or a producer. He became somewhat of a legend among the power pop underground, on par with former Jellyfish frontman Andy Sturmer, constantly backing other deserving artists but never releasing any albums himself. When Meaningless appeared at the tail end of 2000, Brion was fresh off substantial buzz created by Grammy nominations for his work on the score for the movie Magnolia; the reaction from the pop community was immediate, and, in fact, probably more than Brion himself even expected. Given that it is self-released on Brion's Straight to Cut-Out records, he seemed to feel the record would fail. That's not to say that Brion will be an immediate breakout success of the pop world, because that, too, is unlikely. But Meaningless is a lovely, catchy, and personal pop album on par with (and in many cases, superior to) the albums and artists that he has worked with in the past. The catchy, almost circus-like "Walking Through Walls" (co-written with Grant Lee Phillips of Grant Lee Buffalo) screams for radio airplay, while the quiet, piano-based ballad "Ruin My Day" wouldn't sound out of place on Let It Be. The album's opener, the personal "Gotta Start Somewhere," beckons that "I might not have anything to offer you/I might not have anything to say that's new/But you've gotta start somewhere." But that's where Brion's wrong. He certainly does have something to offer. — Jason Damas
1. Gotta Start Somewhere (Brion) - 4:14
2. I Believe She's Lying (Brion/Mann) - 3:27
3. Meaningless (Brion) - 3:23
4. Ruin My Day (Brion/McGregor) - 3:50
5. Walking Through Walls (Brion/Phillips) - 5:43
6. Trouble (Brion/McGregor) - 3:29 br> 7. Hook, Line, and Sinker (Brion) - 4:26
8. Dead to the World (Brion) - 2:23
9. Her Ghost (Brion) - 4:09
10. Same Mistakes (Brion) - 1:59
11. Voices (Nielsen) - 7:33
OOP = OUT OF PRINT
HTF = HARD TO FIND
s/t = SAME TITLE
JPN = JAPANESE
IMP = IMPORT
IMPORT INFORMATION:
Any CD that says in the description "import" JAPANESE or otherwise is in ENGLISH as the regular Domestic ones are. The lyrics and artwork are all the same and in english. They are usually more desirable due to the superior mastering on a lot of them.
REMASTERED INFORMATION:
Any CD that says REMASTERED means that it is the original recordings but they have been REMASTERED. In other words they have usually taken the ORIGINAL LABEL MASTER TAPES and REMASTERED them into the digital format for FAR SUPERIOR SOUND QUALITY. A lot of the older CD's had been rushed released and they used poor quality reference masters. The newer Remasters not only benifit from the original first generation mix-down masters but the newer technology in equipment that is available recently has improved the sound quality dramatically. These are NOT re-recordings. They are the original recordings.
H D C D INFORMATION:
This is a format in CD mastering that improves on sound quality and adds to the band width available. Any CD that says H D C D plays on any CD player but sounds even better on a player with H D C D compatibility.
I do not sell CDR's so anything you are bidding on is a regular retail CD. CHECK MY FEEDBACK if you are worried.
