Track Listing

1. Divine Intervention
2. I've Been Waiting
3. Girlfriend
4. Looking At The Sun
5. Winona
6. Evangeline
7. Day For Night
8. Thought I Knew You
9. You Don't Love Me (You Don't Care)
10. I Wanted To Tell You
11. Don't Go
12. Your Sweet Voice
13. Does She Talk
14. Holy War
15. Nothing Lasts

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #77425 in Music
• Released on: 2005-05-09
• Number of discs: 1

Amazon.co.uk Review
After being dropped from A&M Records thanks to Girlfriend's rough edges, Matthew Sweet might hardly have expected great commercial success when another label brought the album out toward the end of 1991. But an alternative, welcome climate at rock radio stations, along with undeniably great songs and aggressive lead-guitar work by ex-Voidoid Robert Quine and former Television member Richard Lloyd, made the disc an eventual gold-selling hit. Years later, Girlfriend's probe of romance found, lost and found again continues to sound fresh and daring. --Rickey Wright

CD Description
Matthew Sweet had been around for a number of years before captivating fans of great pop with this masterpiece. Whereashis early works had hinted at his ace songwriting chops, subsequent releases were never this cohesive, and often were marred by over-the-top production and a lack of a sure sense of identity.
On GIRLFRIEND, everything came together. Themix has just the right amount of crunch and texture, and masterful accompaniment from the likes of Robert Quine and Richard Lloyd (guitarists from seminal punk-era groups the Voidoids and Television respectively), provides an incisive, much-needed edge that perfectly plays off Sweet's easy vocal style. More than anything, though, the songs carry the day. The title track, "Divine Intervention", "Evangeline", and several others have the earmarks of perfect post-Beatles pop: soaring hooks, great arrangements, and impassioned playing. There are some down-and-dirty garage sounds on tracks like "Does She Talk", and elsewhere the mood is leavened by gentle, eloquent ballads like "Winona" (about a certain "little movie star"), "Your Sweet Voice", and bittersweet acoustic snapshots like "Thought I Knew You".

Customer Reviews

Sweet.
Lose your heart to 'I've Been Waiting', break your heart to 'You Don't Love Me, then dance holes in your carpet to 'Girlfriend'. This is a truly classic album: every song is fresh, yet has an immediacy which makes you believe it's been your favourite album for years. Matthew Sweet's melodies here may be deceptively warm and chiming, with shades of the Beatles, Byrds and Tom Petty, but some of the lyrics carry a hidden dose of the weariness which comes out on his later albums, adding a little bite to the arrangements. 'Girlfriend' has been with me through school, college, cataclysmic and catastrophic relationships, and I still never grow over-familiar with it. Don't understand why England's never gone for Matthew Sweet - he's fantastic, and this is his best album. Buy it.

Good solid power-pop
Matthew Sweet ought to be a bigger name in the UK, no doubt about it - and this was the album that should have made his name. 1991 was a fine year for big pop songs played hard on guitars, and there are few better examples than this album to demonstrate why that is. From opener 'Divine Intervention' through to 'Winona' and 'Evangeline', the album has so many peaks of lush harmonies and guitar hooks that it's almost as if Matthew Sweet distilled the essence of pop music into a handful of songs and then turned up the amps to play them. Think of a punkier Big Star mixed with a Matchbox 20 on happy pills, and you'll be close.

Ex-Television guitarist Richard Quine offers some typically angular guitar parts, experimental in places but always suiting the mood of the track, and the vocals (including harmonies) can't be faulted. The only irritation with this album comes from the unnecessary over-production, one layer of varnish too many on Sweet's songs which makes you feel a little bit like you're watching the band through glass, that they aren't in the room with you. Sad, but you can't have it all and this album should have made Matthew Sweet the household name his talent deserves.

A glorious set of powerpop songs with melodies to die for
If you only buy one record of the nineties this has to be the one. Every song is either a lovelorn ballad of genius that calls your favourite girl instantly to mind or a stomping shaking boogie woogie riff that makes you wish she was with you in body and not just spirit.

For lovers of classic 60s pop looking for that slightly more modern touch. Guitars are everywhere and Sweet's voice has never been more appropriate.