Search - Counting Crows :: August & Everything After (Dlx)

Disappointing release

Nadyne Mielke | Mountain View, CA USA | 09/23/2007

(3 out of 5 stars)

"I wanted to like this album. I really wanted to like it. When I first heard about its release, the first thing I did was come to Amazon to pre-order it. "August and Everything After" is one of the seminal albums of the 90s, and a deluxe edition seemed like it simply couldn't disappoint. But it does.



The first disc contains the original "August and Everything After", and a handful of demos. The demos are interesting to learn more about the genesis of the band. You can hear the beginnings of the songs that you know so well. With the exception of the inspired cover of "This Land Is Your Land", I'm not sure if they'll stand up to repeated listenings, but I can't complain about their inclusion on the album.



The second disc is a live recording. Counting Crows live is an experience not to be missed. They put on a great concert. But this just doesn't sound like it. One major problem is the mixing of the album. The vocals are much too far forward in the mix. The rest of the band sounds tight, but it's hard to tell because the vocals overpower everything. I was expecting something more along the lines of their live release "Bird on a Wire", which Is a fantastic live album. This one just doesn't measure up.



If you already have "August and Everything After" and if you're not a Counting Crows completist, I wouldn't recommend picking up this album. If you don't have that album, I'm not sure if I would recommend getting this one anyway. I don't think that it adds enough to the album to justify the difference in price between the original issue and this new deluxe edition."

Nice Addition, Fond if Not Understood Memories

SkewedPerspective-dbrowell | VA United States | 09/23/2007

(4 out of 5 stars)

"It's funny, revisiting an album in your new body with eyes and ears far aged from when you first encountered it (nay, became obsessed with it). such is the case with the Counting Crows deluxe edition of August and Everything After playing as I type this. They've cleaned up the masters and it does sound noticeably fuller. The extras are very nice from the demo-side and the complete concert from Paris in 1994.



But worth the entire somewhat overpriced cost of admission for the package is the liner notes. Adam's confessional tale of the signing, recording and subsequent shattering of the band from 1991 to December of 1994 (where the Disc 2 comes in) is an interesting and at times very emotional read. You forget how big Counting Crows actually was, and even more than that, you likely didn't know how close some of the musical families were (i.e. the idea of Adam Duritz at a backyard lunch with Frances Bean). The small tales are very much worth digesting, if sometimes over-written. It's probably best that Adam wrote these out instead of letting someone else interpret it in a syrupy documentary or fluffy autobiography. And while I didn't need a mini-poster of Adam in a pretty absurdly good photo shoot with some birds in motion, by the end of the notes you realize why it's there and it's pretty cool.



A nice double disc, and I'm glad I didn't do the iTunes thing, missing the liner notes."

Extra live show is great, while the other stuff is...uh...

Craig Atulp | PA | 09/20/2007

(4 out of 5 stars)

"If you're checking this special edition out, chances are you already know about the original album, so I won't talk about it. (If not, check it out...it's a classic, for sure.)



I'm not wild about the demos that follow the album on disc one. I suppose they're notable for historical reasons, to show where the band came from.



The live show on disc 2, on the other hand, is pretty spectacular. Supposedly, it's from the last show of the August & Everything After tour, a time I remember as being pretty difficult for the band (if the numerous show cancellations of the time period are any indication). The angst and energy really shows through...in particular, "Round Here" is as brilliant here as it's ever sounded.



My Biggest Complaint: I only wish the Deluxe Edition series would go down in price. $24 for two CDs? Maybe back in 1994 when this album first came out..."