Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #35228 in Digital Music Album
• Released on: 2007-05-15
• Running time: 0 seconds

Customer Reviews

Half a great album
I have sympathy for the many reviewers who obsess over this band and what might have been, but I don't think they were the revelation that many others do. As far as San Francisco bands go, the Grape were more commercially oriented than all but the Jefferson Airplane. Lyrically, they wrote interesting but hardly unique songs--nothing on the order of the best of Country Joe and the Fish; instrumentally, they were more than competent, but Quicksilver Messenger Service was more accomplished and more adventurous. As for the kind of hyperbole that talks about "5-part harmony"...well, harmony can only extend to 4 parts, and the Grape often sang in 3-part, but doubled voices so that the texture was thickened.
The real story here is that the Grape was more than just the sum of its parts. However impossible Skip Spence must have become, his contributions to the first two LPs were crucial, and each subsequent album pales in comparison to Moby Grape and Wow! Thus, the songs from these two LPs are the heart of this compilation, and as competent and earnest as the remainder are, they can't measure up to the songs from the first two. This is a very good one-disc sampler (though I, too, miss It's a Beautiful Day Today), but my advice is to try to obtain the deleted Sundazed CDs of the first two LPs until such time as they are rereleased in "authorized" versions. Avoid the terrible Matthew Katz-owned San Francisco Sound CDs--they were mastered at incredibly low dynamic levels and sound horrible; in addition they are criminally over-priced.

ok..i know..its a greatest hits album! but.....
ok..say you have read all my other reviews and you have never heard moby grape?
maybe you were too young when they were first around?
maybe you never liked them back then and now you may be scared to buy all thier newly reissued cds(albums!).
welp..buy this one.its a super way to start on them.
it includes all thier main songs known to grape heads as well as a few gems .
and it sure has a mean cover doesnt it?
id buy this first if i never heard them.
why did i buy it anyways after knowing them for 40 years?
because i like them! wink.its a good cd!
buy it for your kids!

The West Coast Sounds Like the Grape
Just a singles kid in the 60's I bought most of the first album that way-"Omaha" being a favorite-and being in the Great Lakes area I was torn between that feedback-loud and the harmonies of the Byrds. Grape, Buffalo Springfield and Notorious Byrd Brothers VS Cream, the Who and Stones-San Francisco VS Britain.

This collection is fantastic, not as complete as Vintage but a sweet trip back. As nice as the uncensored poster
from the debut album, oddly in-your-face but satisfying. I recommend "8:05", "He", "Motorcycle Irene" and of
course "Omaha". Enjoy the vibe, man.