Fine Young Cannibals Finest by Fine Young Cannibals

Fine Young Cannibals Finest

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Fine Young Cannibals Finest

Reader Reviews
This short-lived late-80s band produced some compelling musical hooks that are on display in this collection of greatest hits from a two-album career. Their style draws mostly from 60s to early-70s R&B, updated with crisper 80s bass and percussion. Lead singer Roland Gift sometimes sounds like Al Green, and has the genuine appeal of a sincere imitator. The two best songs are "Good Thing" and "Take What I Can Get". "Good Thing" is driven by the repeated hammering of piano power chords. For you 60s fans unfamiliar with it, it has the pounding beat of "Can I Get a Witness?" and the chord progression of "Liar Liar, Pants on Fire", but it also has a snappy guitar, a great lead vocal, and I love that "dwee-dwee doo-be-doo" in the background. This song is so much fun, I like to play it twice in a row, and you can see the Cannibals perform it live in the movie "Tin Men". "Take What I Can Get" features Roland's best vocal, a nice melody and good brave lyrics about unrequited love. Other good songs are "Since You've Been Gone", and the rocking "Don't Look Back". Nice but not great are the echo-y "Funny How Love Is", the sweet, reggae-tinged "Tell Me What", "The Flame", and the best Al Green impersonation of all in "I'm Not the Man I Used to Be". "Couldn't Care More" is interesting - I thought I didn't like it at first, but it has grown on me. The rest of the songs are no better than listenable, including their hit "She Drives Me Crazy" and their reinterpretation of Elvis' "Suspicious Minds", a song not well suited to them. I would summarize Fine Young Cannibals by paraphrasing Mother Goose: When they were good, they were very, very good, but they weren't good often enough or over a long enough period of time to compile a really classy retrospective. I like these guys, so I'd like to give them 4 stars, but when I compare this to other "4-star" music I've rated, this comes up short so I give them 3. But their best hooks are addictive and loads of fun, which is why I bought it.

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