Come Feel Me Tremble

By Bill Holdship [Launch.com]
(October 2003)

It's always difficult to accurately predict these things, but this writer believes that most real Replacements fans will find a great deal to love about this disc. At the very least, it's the best album of Paul Westerberg's spotty solo career. Partially a soundtrack to his new tour documentary DVD, the majority of the tracks here are pop-oriented, featuring a strong basic rock thrust--and it's simply delightful to hear something so upbeat, melodic, and life-affirming coming from someone who could've continued to make "mid-life crisis" documents. A lot of it does bring the Replacements to mind; there's even a drinking-and-pills song. "My Daydream" is full of pop magic. "Hillbilly Junk" would've been a showstopper in one of the 'Mat's live sets. Even the morbid "Crackle & Drag" (presented in two different versions, acoustic and rockin')--a graphic song about poet Sylvia Plath's 1963 suicide--is something you can't help but return to with fascination. "Another head cold/Another spirit old/Mmmm February..." he sings. Westerberg hasn't written lyrics that evocative since "Left Of The Dial." And his cover of Jackson Browne's "These Days" makes you forget both Browne's version and Nico's legendary treatment. Those lyrics--"These days, I seem to think a lot about the things I forgot to do"--make this a perfect Westerberg tune and a fitting conclusion to a nearly perfect Westerberg solo album.