Before he released his first solo album and just after his band Radish disbanded, Ben Kweller released a series of self-released ep's. They were mainly homemade that consisted of recordings from Radish's unreleased Discount Fireworks and demos that would eventually end up on his solo debut, Sha Sha. Many of these demos were recorded in his apartment on a laptop computer.
I knew about these ep's but have never heard or seen a copy until I stumbled upon 2 of them on a an outstanding blog, Wilfully Obscure. These are awesome recordings and are a must of any Ben Kweller fans, this kid displays his prodigy-like talent with these self-produced, self-financed releases without sounding amateurist or self-centered.
Bromeo features songs that are mainly exclusive to this release except for I Don't Know Why and Different But the Same that were re-recorded and included on later albums. Freak Out It's Ben Kweller...features songs that were more or less demos for Sha Sha, but they are different and altered recordings and in some ways more satisfying. Freak Out...apparently caught the attention of Evan Dando of the Lemonheads who invited him out on tour with him.
Freak Out It's Ben Kweller! (2000)
Wow! Thank you! I've been looking for these for so long!!
ReplyDeleteHoly crap. Thank you so much.
ReplyDeleteRock, rock on.
Dude...do you happen to have the Radish album Discount Fireworks? I've been looking for the song "Cally" by Kweller/Radish for forever and absolutely cannot find it.
ReplyDeleteSorry, still haven't found Discount Fireworks. I'll keep my eyes peeled, hopefully someone posts it eventually. Thanks for asking!
ReplyDeleteI first got these tracks from limewire back in like 2001/2002 and was lucky enough to see BK live a few times that same year. My friends couldn't believe how much better (in our opinions) Make It Up and Lizzy 1 sounded over the Sha Sha versions. He also sounded better live I though which is pretty rare for artists, especially these days. Thank you for these :)
ReplyDeleteWowowow can't believe I ran into these after all these years. Love Ben K, was searching for him wondering where he'd gone? Anyhow... Just wanted to say thank you!
ReplyDeleteThanks for keeping these up all these years later.
ReplyDeleteI was so stoked to find your Radish/Kweller posts. Any chance you can post these again? Thank you in advance!
ReplyDeleteI don't know what's wrong with Box.net? The links seem to un-link themselves. Anyways, the links should work now! (Oct. 15, 2022)
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