The Mighty Mighty Bosstones

The Mighty Mighty Bosstones: Pay AttentionPay Attention (2000)
Island Records

Reviewer Rating: 3.5

User Rating:

Contributed by: CrookedSuperheroCrookedSuperhero
(others by this writer | submit your own)
Published on April 22nd 2005Once upon a time, I used to sit for hours playing Starcraft. I remember always being Protoss, as they had high-tech weapons, cool yellow armour and generally seemed more organised than the crazy Zerg and quite frankly pathetic Terran. While playing, I often had Windows Media Player running in the ba.

Once upon a time, I used to sit for hours playing Starcraft. I remember always being Protoss, as they had high-tech weapons, cool yellow armour and generally seemed more organised than the crazy Zerg and quite frankly pathetic Terran. While playing, I often had Windows Media Player running in the background, playing a shuffle on all the music currently on my computer. Within the dozens of albums was Pay Attention, the Mighty Mighty Bosstones 6th full-length album, and also their final fanfare in the world of pop music.

It had been three years since "The Impression That I Get" had been unleashed upon the world, and ska was beginning to die, at least in the mainstream's eyes. The poppyness of their previous effort, Let's Face It, had now been lessened considerably, increasing the harder aspect of the band we last saw on 1994's Question The Answers. This is evident enough in the storming opener "Let Me Be," which after some light dinner party music roars into life, bringing the immortal line "Let me rant and let me ramble, you're looking at a lunatic in shambles." Other songs, most noticeably "The Skeleton Song" and "She Just Happened," bring an all around jollier edge to the album, and remain songs that always bring a smile to my face when they grace my shuffle function. The Irish-themed "Riot On Broad Street" and the potent "The Day He Didn't Die" both contribute two more different styles to the sound, while "Temporary Trip" sounds like a throwback to the Question The Answers days.

Sadly, this album isn't all doves and civilians. Some tracks *cough*"One Million Reasons"*cough* never seem to get off the ground, despite having over three minutes to get there. "High School Dance" just seems like a slightly poorer version of "Another Drinkin' Song," and how they managed to drag on "Finally" for nearly four minutes, I'll never know. Annoyingly enough, this is the soundtrack I had when watching the last movie from the Protoss campaign, slightly ruining my astonishing victory. It's a shame that these songs aren't even bad ones, but mixed in with the others they end up sounding more like filler than anything else.

I love this band and everything they've put out, but for some reason this has always seemed their weakest effort. You could say this is the Bosstones' Terran, or you could say that while being a great album, this simply makes too many small mistakes to be held as high as their Protosses (Jacknife To A Swan) or even their Zergs (Let's Face It).

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Fine Print: The following comments are owned by whoever posted them. We are not respon sible for them in any way. Seriously.

keithus (November 14, 2009)

I love the Bosstones dearly, I've seen them live more than any other band but this album blows. They abandoned their ska-punk roots and were trying too hard to get more radio hits, there's way too many songs here and most of them suck.

klonny (December 12, 2007)

Zerg > Terran > Protoss

Fuck the Protoss.

AdamSocial (April 28, 2005)

The Bosstones are pretty amazing. This record is pretty weak, overall though.

Adam.
www.pittpunk.com

ubershep (April 24, 2005)

"Anyone know when Starcraft 2 comes out?"

From the looks of it, never. Although, a mod group is making a Starcraft mod for Warcraft 3. The graphics look pretty sweet.

jamespastepunk (April 24, 2005)

Once I put some firebats in there, my medics were untouchable.

Anyone know when Starcraft 2 comes out?

Fuzzy (April 24, 2005)

The songs on this album rip it up live, as well. There's some really good lyrics and songwriting, especially given the times that the band was going through when this was written. I still think that 1 Million Reasons is Dicky's plea to Kevin, Nate and Dennis not to leave.

Anonymous (April 23, 2005)

I can't decide how much i like this album. It's got some killer songs on it, a few that suck, but overall just doesn't do it for me. However, i always kinda liked 1 million reasons.

Cut out "high school dance", "bad breaks", and "temporary trip" and it's better. Check out "together" and "just as much", they are two b-sides that came with the album when i bought it back when this came out. Damn, has it really been 5 years since this, and 3 since Jackknife?

mikeinflames (April 23, 2005)

there was blood in my semen this morning after i masturbated

Crookedsuperhero (April 23, 2005)

I destroyed Rome Total War a long time ago. Irritating as hell when they riot. I fucking hate it when they riot. Fucking riots.

iheartadam (April 23, 2005)

"Bah this review sucked.

But yeah, score is for "Riot On Broad Street". Such an amazingly good song."

Man, Link 80 fucking sucked. I had to get some background before I figured out you also fucking sucked.

Anonymous (April 22, 2005)

Cut out the five shitty songsand this is their best album.

opivykid (April 22, 2005)

Bah this review sucked.

But yeah, score is for "Riot On Broad Street". Such an amazingly good song.

Anonymous (April 22, 2005)

i agree with the dude talking about bomb the industry. that is the best new ska ive heard in a while

theownzenator (April 22, 2005)

Dude whatever...Terran kicked ass. Way to be loyal to human kind you traitor.

Anonymous (April 22, 2005)

Starcraft used to kick ass until it got lame.

iheartadam (April 22, 2005)

I'm too "oldskool" elitist to enjoy this album I guess. I am however going to listen to it again whilst I go play some Rome Total War, so who knows.

Review score - 4 out of 5
Reviewer score - 17 out of 20
Reviewer ass - 5 out of 5

Anonymous (April 22, 2005)

i love the people who review the review like they're fucking literary agents or something.

10 stars for you wankers

TheOneTrueBill (April 22, 2005)

I'm pretty sure he means it needs to be reviewed.

Anonymous (April 22, 2005)

"And the live album needs to be done."

Welcome to 1998!

sickboi (April 22, 2005)

They have a live album, 'Live from the Middle East"...

I was there at there for it.

Crookedsuperhero (April 22, 2005)

And the live album needs to be done.

Crookedsuperhero (April 22, 2005)

I used to use siege tanks as a defence.

The main aim of the game for me was to invest as many terran headquarters with the queens as possible.

To queens and dork talk, natures two most proud creations.

Anonymous (April 22, 2005)

No one gives a shit what you used to play. Stop reviewing.

Anonymous (April 22, 2005)

this album was just terribly inconsistent. no flow. too long, too all over the place. definately their weakest release, BUT it did have some classics, skeleton song and She just happened are great great songs. there were a few other real solid ones too. finally does drag. 'one million reasons' is horrid.

Paul

XmeepX (April 22, 2005)

I agree that this is their weakest album, but I still enjoy it. I think the MMB have always put out solid releases, and the skeleton song is so good it makes the rest of the album seem better*even though the demo is better).

Anonymous (April 22, 2005)

"Wow, I bailed on this review pretty quickly, what with all that dork talk."

cosign

Anonymous (April 22, 2005)

someone review the bomb the music industry cd. cmonnnnnnn best ska punk release in awhile.

www.bombthemusicindustry.com

jamespastepunk (April 22, 2005)

TERRAN, baby. Medics and marines, my friends, medics and marines.

Anonymous (April 22, 2005)

Is that the 5th MMB review this year? Still holding out that they'll make an awesome return, but I can't see it happening.

Joe

wannabepunktony (April 22, 2005)

For the use of Starcraft in this review - good laughs.

I need to go crack mine out and play the night away on Battle.net....

Anonymous (April 22, 2005)

Decent album but it should have been shortened to about 12 instead of 16.

The demo version of the skelton songs kills.

ubershep (April 22, 2005)

Score is for Blizzard and what they have done to the once amazing Zerg.

joeg (April 22, 2005)

a decent record but it's their weakest to date.

now somebody review more noise and other disturbances and we can finish the bosstones catalog on this site.

TheOneTrueBill (April 22, 2005)

this review is pretty spot on. It had a lot of potential but was just too damn long in some spots.

And as for the comment on the demo version of The Skeleton Song, I can't agree any more! I just downloaded a folder with about 30 B-sides (I finally found them!) and that version fucking rips the album one apart!

i-type-poorly (April 22, 2005)

Good review. I enjoy this album a lot, and agree where the "low points" are except for the fact that I think "Finally" is a great fun song that doesn't get boring. "I Know More" will always be my favorite Bosstones song I knew I'd never hear live.

Anonymous (April 22, 2005)

i really liked this album a lot. more than lets face it.

Anonymous (April 22, 2005)

and that was to the poster a few posts down.

Anonymous (April 22, 2005)

they never officially "broke up" jackass.

theundergroundscene (April 22, 2005)

the skeleton song is in their top five songs of all time

Fuzzy (April 22, 2005)

The production killed this album. The demo version of the Skeleton Song on the 12" fucking rips.

Anonymous (April 22, 2005)

Wow, I bailed on this review pretty quickly, what with all that dork talk.

Anonymous (April 22, 2005)

This band has never done anything worth a fuck. I'm so glad they broke up-- except for the fact that their talentless bum of a fatass singer is going on to be the new Ed McMahon or the new Paul Schaeffer or whatever. I hate seeing his ever-widening, fratboy gone 40 face. Fuck that guy.

swingline (April 22, 2005)

using terran was the most fun. i had so much fun using the ghosts to nuke the zergs. what i would do is attack some of their structures with siege tanks to get it start bleeding so that it would make the red dots from the ghosts harder to find. it also helps when the zergs were red teamed.

Anonymous (April 22, 2005)

Starcraft is for jerks and lesbians