Puddle Of Mudd - Re:(Disc)Overed (click the cover to buy from Amazon.com)

Puddle of Mudd is known for their lead singer, Wes Scantlin’s gravelly, nasally voice. Having sold over 7 million albums proves that his voice is not a detriment though, it actually adds a certain emotion and an urgency to some of their most popular songs like “Blurry” and “Away From Me” and a snarky attitude to songs like “Drift and Die” and “Psycho”. After releasing “Icon”, a best of CD, in 2010, the obvious next step was to record and release an album of influential songs from their collective pasts that they have been mixing into their live sets for years. This cover CD is called “Re:(disc)Overed” and includes songs from the 60’s, 70’s and 80’s, and ranging from a spectacular rendition of The Rolling Stones “Gimme Shelter”, which happens to be the first single off the disc, to Billy Squier’s “Everybody Wants You”, in which Wes puts in an over-the-top performance to an already party-ready song.

 

From the opening chords of “Gimme Shelter” to the fading guitars of “Cocaine”, Puddle of Mudd delivers on the promise of some great covers. The “Hey… Hey… Hey…” and infamous guitar hook of AC/DC’s “TNT” gets you singing along in a hurry. And while “The Joker” may sound like a drunken frat boy trying to impress his friends at a karaoke bar, it actually works! I can bet that both songs are awesome when they play them live and all their fans are singing along. On “Funk #49”, Scantlin does a better impression of James Gang era Joe Walsh than Joe Walsh himself has been capable of in recent years. Maybe PoM can get into that lucrative area of post hockey and triple A baseball game concerts if they ever fall on hard times. J.J. Cale’s (and later, Eric Clapton’s) “Cocaine” is a bonus track and it gets a dirtier, tuned down sound. Wes seems to give it a bit more feeling and insistence. In this same vein, when the band rolls into Neil Young’s “Old Man”, the second track of the disc, they play it beautifully and Wes’ voice lends itself to the song wonderfully.

Overall, a terrific effort by Puddle Of Mudd to reintroduce an audience to the songs that influenced them as a band.

-reviewed by Brian Kieckbusch for Coverville