Spin Doctors Album: “Nice Talking to Me”

Wow, who knew?

This album just plain rocks... superior songwriting, humor, great musicianship (who plays drums better than Aaron Comess? WHO?), wicked guitar playing, utterly distinctive bass playing, and the beautiful humanity of Chris Barron's voice singing some of his coolest lyrics ever.

Some people are lucky to know how good the Spin Doctors are and were...others have yet to find out. If you liked Pocket Full of Kryptonite, you will really like this record..I'm not sure I could say that about any other Spin Doctors studio album. All of the qualities that made that a for-the-ages album: catchy songs, hard rockingness, humanity, funk, are here, too, but with a decade of life experience (not just for the musicians but for us listeners). Give this album a try...

This is a little different than I remember the Spin Doctors being but that's not bad. It's slick sounding but still "edgy" enough to be interesting. If you dig the old stuff you'll probably dig this too. There should be a bit more jamming to it but hey what can you do. This album is still a nice progression. Good to see the boys back.

The Spin Doctors' tale is enough to make any aspiring band think twice. After achieving explosive highs with their multiplatinum funk-rock-pop infused record "Pocket Full of Kryptonite," the band collapsed, producing two more albums that flopped miserably, losing their guitarist due to serious in-fighting, and then losing their lead singer to a rare form of vocal-paralysis.

Yeah, it was THAT bad. However, sitting atop such a disaster is a delightful comeback story that comes to us in the form of "Nice Talking to Me."

The Doctors' last album, "Here Comes the Bride", was quite a departure from their earlier fare, transforming them from funk-pop jammers to a studio-heavy, pastiche-minded straight up rock band. Though admirable in its own right, it certainly didn't provide the same high as 'Pocket Full of Kryptonite' did, much to the dismay of the band's fans.

"Nice Talking To Me" sees the band returning to its roots, and in high form. Never bogged down by the sloppiness of their 'Pocket Full of Kryptonite' follow-up, 'Turn It Upside Down' or by the strangeness and studio-reliance of 'Here Comes the Bride,' the album romps through 10 tracks of pure funk-pop.

This is no massive musical revolution, so picky listeners and snooty critics look elsewhere; 'Nice Talking To Me's strengths are the strengths of pop-rock at its best: catchiness, conciseness, and approachability. None of the tracks, save for "Can't Kick the Habit" extends to jam-band lengths, nor do any of them ever fail to entice the listener to sing along. But, for all their popiness, they never seem to fall prey to the copycat syndrome to such an extent that you feel like you might as well tack the tracks onto a Matchbox 20 album; for all their similarity, one instantly knows by the hard-driving funkiness of the title track to the warm upbeat clap-your-hands "Candy" to the soft, even thoughtful "Can't Break the Habit" to the happy, incisive, and revenge-driven "Margarita" that this is ear candy that won't make you nauseous.

Plus, the lyrics aren't the standard tiringly over-serious, over-written Matchbox 20 fare--they fit their tunes with a bit of goofy wit and straight-forward poetics. Chris Barron's voice fits in well in the funk grooves, carries the melody lines in the pop fills satisfactorily, and is agile enough to produce the occassional mile-a-minute vocal without butchering words or losing momentum.

Though it won't win any words for ingenuity, "Nice Talking to Me" delivers the goods; Spin Doctors fans can rejoice, as they've just received the album they've always wanted, and everyone else can bob their heads and tap their feet to the delightful pop melodies that stay in your head without making you sick to your stomach.

I found this CD by accident at a music store. I was a big Spin Doctors fan around the time of their debut CD when I was in college. I used to play it at my college radio station before it caught on commercial stations. This CD later got played to death and I think anything the Spin Doctors came out with thereafter (good or not so good) was ignored by the public. This CD is great and has the freshness of their first success. My two favorite songs are Safety Pin and Candy, but there are so many others. I have no idea why mainstream radio stations aren't picking this up, but I forget that most FM stations are crap anyway these days no matter where you are. I guess it's time to get satelite radio and an Ipod. I hope the Spin Doctors stay together and make more releases like "Nice Talking to Me". They deserve another look by everyone. This is one of my prized CDs.

I was a dedicated Spin Doctors fan back in the day, but lost track of them over their 10-year sabbatical. I was pleasantly surprised to find a new album sitting on the shelves while I was Christmas shopping. I snatched it up right away and have never looked back.

This is their best album. Insanely clever lyrics wrapped in a much more mature, funk-blues-folk package. A great deal of fun.