When the strong debut album Beautiful Freak was released in 1996, we still thought that Eels was a trio. In the following years, however, it turned out that we mainly had to see Eels as the one-man band of singer and professional pessimist E (real name: Mark Oliver Everett). On the waves of Beautiful Freak, Eels scored several hits (Novocaine For The Soul, Susan's House, Last Stop: This Town) and
… the band gave convincing performances at Pinkpop and Crossing Border. After that it all went less smoothly, with the very inaccessible and flopped Souljacker (2001) as the low point. On the fifth album Shootenanny! Luckily E / Eels sounds a lot fresher and therefore more attractive. In fact, seven years later, you can determine that Shootenanny! is the only true sequel to Beautiful Freak, both musically and lyrically. On this album it is again an old-fashioned way of enjoying the beautiful, poetically designed thoughts of 'sombermans' E. Moreover, we know very few singers who can sing so lightly and yet so moving about their own misery. Try to keep it dry with beautiful miniatures like Love Of The Loveless, Somebody Loves You or Rock Hard Times. With Shootenanny! proves E wrong of everyone who had already written Eels off. Great class! (MvP) proves E wrong of everyone who had already written Eels off. Great class! (MvP) proves E wrong of everyone who had already written Eels off. Great class! (MvP)more
