Flashback - student music reviews: The Fun Lovin' Criminals, The Posies, Melissa Etheridge

In my wasted youth at University of Hull, I penned the odd review for Hullfire, the student newspaper. For the sake of both completeness and comedy value, I'm adding them to this blog and then listening to the original if I can track it down to see if I agree with 20 year-old me.

This week, some bite-size singles reviews

Fun Lovin' Criminals - The Grave and the Constant (their first EP)

Dour cack-handed rap-funk with an Italian mobster fixation and a talent bypass, which manages to wrap all the unappealing aspects of the genre in a drab macho package. Yummy!

Yep, I was such a naif that I took the Fun Lovin' Criminals seriously. Despite the video where they're fighting a man in a bear suit. And sorry, Huey et al, You did improve with age.

The Posies - Please Return It

A delicate, relatively whinge-free grunge (can we still call things grunge?) number that aspires to be a Foo Fighters B-side, a lofty mission in which it just about succeeds, carried across the line by chugging guitars and plaintive guitars

This is even more embarassing, as about ten years later I discovered Frosting On The Beater, which I absolutely love. Please Return It doesn't quite hit those heights, but I still sing it to myself as I walk down the street, so it's got to have quite a lot going for it.

Also, I love the fact that I'm asking the readers if I can still call things grunge. Awwww.....

The recorded version seems not to be available on You Tube, so here's a link to a live version.

Melissa Etheridge - I Want To Come Over

Rolling of the dadrock assembly line this week is another inoffensive, if soulless ballad for your parents to wave lighters to.

Oooh, trust no-one over 30 eh, young Magpiemoth!

However, a more energetic B-side and adequate live tracks provide something approaching entertainment, and at least allow Melissa's throaty vocals free reign. Better than Bryan Adams, if that's any sort of recommendation.

Perhaps I'm slipping into my dotage, but from my vantage point today I ... I quite like this. There's a wounded passion in Melissa's voice that comes through despite the overcooked production I objected to at the time. 

And the video appears to have a young Gwyneth Paltrow in it.