Meat Puppets II

3.32

I adore this record -- whatever "imperfections" anyone may hear in this music only seems to add to its charm. Acid soaked Neil Young punks who are really great musicians and gripping singers/lyricists.

Nirvana made me love this album even more

It's so funny listening to this so many years after and hearing so much of Kurt Cobain in it. Was this a band that has always been kind of under the radar? Even with the Unplugged album? I think so. I mean I can't say that I've ever heard Meat Puppets come up in any conversation about great/influential bands. But you listen to this and can see that a lot of the rock from the 90s and after owes a lot to this record. I'm not sure I would say that I necessarily like this album, or at least a lot of it, but I do think this is a great album. Not one I would listen to often but certainly important in the history of music. 4/5

Yeah, pretty ok sometimes. This album isn't amazing. Lake of Fire was good. The instrumentals are fine. I could see myself listening to a song from this album every now and then.

As most people I am familiar with Meat Puppets because of Cobain covering "Lake of Fire" in Nirvana MTV unplugged live in NYC legendary '94 concert. This is very punkish alternative album, which I've quite enjoyed listening to. One can definitely see how this band was massive influence to Kurt's style. But apart from Lake of Fire and maybe couple of other tracks it's not super memorable, at least 3.5 on RYM and 3 stars here though. Good music

Pre Listen:
Title sounds like an album Bender from Futurama would listen to. I've never heard of them, but the cover art is pretty. No expectations.

Notable Tracks:
Split Myself in Two - Fastest intro song to date that's instantly made me feel as though I'll either absolutely hate this album, or really love it. The distortion effects are bodacious.
Aurora Borealis - At this time of year! At this time of day! In this part of the country! Localized entirely within your album?! I like it.
Teenager (s) - Least favorite track on the album. My eyes almost rolled clean out of my head. "Guys, being a teenager is so hormonal and depressing!" someone sure got bullied growing up, I just know it. Skipped after 1m 40s.

Post Listen:
The vocalist cannot fucking sing holy shit.

Frustrating as fuck. I think I would've given this album higher, but the vocalist is so amazingly awful, it bumps it down to almost a 1. I've heard some bad, some meh, and some intentionally bad vocals on this project, but this might be the first one where I think he's actually trying and sucks this bad. I've heard children crying on airplanes that sound better.

To be fair the instrumentation is also inconsistent. Some songs I really did like, others sounded generic or boring. The psyche rock leaning songs were best, the folk leaning songs were never quite bad, but not good either. Despite that, a purely instrumental song was so, so much better than *anything* including the vocalist.

For both issues with this album, many, many such cases, and more to come I'm sure. If it weren't for the fact that this album was composed by more than just the vocalist, and leaving a 1 because of him alone would leave a bad taste in my mouth, I have to leave a 2/5.

Possibly my least favorite SST band. It's not terrible. They are obviously talented musicians. Usually I like "punk outside the box" and this certainly qualifies, but something at its base level here just doesn't appeal to me. Maybe it's the country influence? Tough for me to nail down the root of my disinterest, but it's real.

this kinda 80s rock is just not interesting to me at all.

The out of tune singing is really hard to overlook. I do appreciate that they tried to mix things up stylistically across the album (although within each song there is often a TON of repetition) but some of these notes have me wincing.

I listened to this and immediately forgot it. Can't remember it being offensive to the ears so must have been alright 🤷🏻‍♀️

3 ⭐️

I have always loved Plateau when Nirvana played it. Turns out I love the original as well. I almost docked a star for the jam bandinness of parts of the album, but what the hell I would definitely listen to this anytime.

AURORA BOREALIS?!? At this time of day, in this part of the country, LOCALIZED ENTIRELY INSIDE OF YOUR KITCHEN?!?!

Y pasó lo que más temía, que el álbum no estuviera disponible en ninguna plataforma de streaming de música. Solo los afortunados que tengan el disco en físico pueden presumir que lo pueden escuchar cuando sea. Afortunadamente, un buen samaritano subió las dos versiones del álbum. Y tengo que decir que me sorprendió lo mucho que me gustó, hay algunas canciones que combinan country con rock y haya esas me gustaron. A mi parecer no cantan bien pero aún así disfruté las canciones con letra, y aún más las instrumentales.

I really wanted to like this because of its ties to Nirvana Unplugged. And while I find the Meat Puppets tunes on that album to be the best of the bunch, the original versions here aren't as strong. The rest of this album is just okay as well. Glad I finally listened to it, but sadly it didn't hit the spot.

Enjoyed the variety on this.

3.0/5.0: Good

strong start that wanes over time

mid

Meat Puppets II was an album that came so close to getting 4 stars but just barely missed the mark. When i first heard this band's name, i thought that these guys would maybe be folk or blues but they are psychedelic rock which was kinda close to what i was thinking. I am very into the rough sound that this album is going for and each song had that fun groovy vibe to it which never really hitched but i still feel like there is a hint of laziness to this album which kinda holds it back for me. This album was paced pretty well though so there was never a point where i was begging for it to end. It is a good album, just not quite great.
Best Song: Aurora Borealis
Worst Song: What to Do

Clearly a Curt Cobain inspiration. I like how the vocals didn't match the instruments at all.