When
Tommy Stinson
and
Paul Westerberg
reunited
the Replacements
for a concert tour in 2013, plenty of fans were hoping against hope that the new edition of the band would grace the world with a new album. That didn't happen, but maybe it's just as well. In the wake of
the 'Mats
' reunion hitting the ditch in 2015,
Westerberg
released one of his spunkiest rock & roll records in years, 2016's
Wild Stab
, in collaboration with
Juliana Hatfield
under the name
the I Don't Cares
. And
Stinson
has followed suit, reviving
Bash & Pop
, the short-lived but well-loved band he formed after
' original 1991 implosion. Outside of
, no one who played on
's 1993 album,
Friday Night Is Killing Me
, appears on 2017's
Anything Could Happen
, but the two records share a very similar sound and feel.
has said that he wanted the return of
to sound like a band with a good vibe playing live in the studio, and that's exactly what
delivers. For these sessions,
was joined by his core accompanists (
Steve Selvidge
on guitar and vocals,
Justin Perkins
Tony Kieraldo
on keyboards and vocals, and
Joe Sirois
on drums), with a few other players making guest appearances (including
Luther Dickinson
Chip Roberts
), and here the pieces fall together just right. The performances on
have the sort of loose-limbed drive that
the Faces
made their trademark (and
strove to emulate), especially when
Kieraldo
attacks his electric piano with loving enthusiasm.
performs with a perfect fusion of street-kid cockiness, regular-guy smirk, and occasional flashes on heart-on-sleeve philosophizing, and married to these rough-and-ready tunes, smart but never cocky about it, the effect is magic. Though
is rarely as perceptive as
in his songwriting, here
Tommy
still sounds engaged with rock & roll in a way his former bandmate can't always muster these days, and he strikes a more satisfying balance between middle-aged responsibility and arrested-adolescent swagger. We'll probably never get that
Replacements
reunion album, but like
's
,
effectively channels the best of what
brought to
, and this unexpected
"reunion" has made an album just about as good -- and every bit as much fun -- as their minor classic from the '90s. [
was also released on LP.] ~ Mark Deming