Track Listing

1. Letters From The Wasteland
2. Hand Me Down
3. Sleepwalker
4. I've Been Delivered
5. Witness
6. Some Flowers Bloom Dead
7. Mourning Train
8. Up From Under
9. Murder 101
10. Birdcage
11. Sleepwalker
12. Sleepwalker

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #118581 in Music
• Released on: 2000-10-09
• Number of discs: 1

Amazon.co.uk Review
Although three albums in nine years hardly classifies The Wallflowers as prolific, Breach does go some way to proving the old adage about "quality not quantity" true. Picking up almost exactly where their 1997 album, Bring Down The Horse, left off, this is another beautifully crafted collection of sweetly strolling and country rocking tunes. With the monumentally weepy soul searchers "Mourning Train" and "Up From Under"--an acoustic ballad that shuffles tenderly along to subdued hand claps and a gorgeous introspective country boy tale respectively--The Wallflowers languid laments, aimed straight at those 4a.m. moments when there's nothing left to do but think, could easily steal the show, were it not for their equally potent jangly rock. As it is, the prize of Breach's greatest asset goes to Jakob "Son of Bob" Dylan's deep and gruff voice and his beer-swilling melodies. Not as popular as it once was, Breach is irrefutable proof that if done with style and songs as good as toe-tapping rocker "Letters From The Wasteland", middle of the road US rock still has plenty of miles left in it. --Dan Gennoe

Customer Reviews

Worth the wait
Following both massive success (the Wallflowers' previous album, Bringing Down the Horse sold 6 million copies worldwide) and a long recording hiatus (the record came out in 1996), this is an album born ass-backwards into a world awash in teen pop, hip-hop, and rap-rock. It's something of a miracle that it lands squarely on its feet, making a much-needed case for folk-based rock of the sort that frontman Jakob Dylan's daddy used to make, and indeed, pioneered. Having sublimated his family name and become a success on his own terms with Bringing Down the Horse, the younger Dylan seems to find reclaiming some of his father's legacy acceptable here. He does that on "I've Been Delivered" , an enigmatic, image-filled quest of a song that rambles to a gnomic but seemingly satisfied conclusion. A more solid connection is made on the hidden track "Babybird," a soothing lullaby that can't help but call to mind "Forever Young," the song Jakob's father wrote for him and his siblings. Elsewhere, songs such as "Some Flowers Bloom Dead" and "Letters From the Wasteland" are of the sort found on the previous album, full of killer hooks and accessible, yet thoughtful, lyrics. "Sleepwalker" contains the clever chorus "Cupid don't draw back your bow/ Sam Cooke didn't know what I know." "Hand Me Down," meanwhile, tells the tale of a son ground into dust by his parents' putdowns. And speaking of putdowns, how about these lines from "Witness": "Another year, another candle's burning/ For the party girl/ No one even knows you're there/ Happy birthday/ No one cares." It's almost enough to rival his father's preternaturally nasty song "Positively 4th Street." Jakob Dylan has other modes to write in, of course, and musical models to follow besides his dad. Listening to Breach, the meat-and-potatoes rock of Bruce Springsteen and especially Tom Petty comes immediately to mind, and he's rightfully earned a spot next to them on playlists, the concert stage, or wherever. Breach is one of the most anticipated rock releases of the year, and it clearly is worthy of all the talk it has generated State side.