EELS (ABO #105)

EELS
FREAK SHOW

Eels is basically Mark Oliver Everett. The man, previously known as E. started his "band" in 1996 and became one of the first band to get a deal with Dreamworks SKG (Spielberg, Katzenberg, Geffen) and the first successfull act of the new-born label too with a debut album, "Beautiful Freak", that combined the melodic talent to release memorable melodies and an artistry few other bands demonstrated back then. Eels was a three piece or so we thought... Starting with "Eletro-Shock Blues" (1998, a much more experimental album that, sometimes, shown a Tom Waits influence) we had to witness that the band was essentially its leader with accompanying musicians, not that there's anything wrong with it... Four albums followed that saw the band changing style on each of them: a return to a more easy pop sound with "Daisies Of The Galaxy" (2000), a more blues rock side with Souljacker (2001) while "Shooteranny!" (2003) and "Blinking Lights And Other Revelations" (2005) showed E's songwriting going, with few exceptions, to a more folksy sound. All in all, what marks Eels' style is its leader talent to craft great melodies and, of course, his voice, a highly recognizable one that is.
For this compilation, I chose to make two cds. CD1 is, basically, the best songs from Eels' 6 srudio albums while CD2 offers rare and non-album songs. Each link below has one cd in its entirety. I hope you'll enjoy Mr. Everett's music as much as I do.