Post-Black Flag, Henry Rollins certainly cultivated an image of drill sergeant-meets-motivational speaking guru, and no matter how tortured he tried to come across in any of his musical projects, I can’t shake that overall view of the guy. The other prevailing view of him is, he has an acerbic, funny side to him, but you know what? Other than some deadpan or in-character performances on the big and small screen, not much actual humor comes across in his act – from a sheer music/performance perspective, at least, and it’s especially hard to come across on The End of Silence. That’s just one of my issues with this disc, which, despite some of the talents pooled and players involved falls short in a lot of ways. Another, more pertinent issue, is the overall length of the experience – ten songs that run over 72 and a half minutes, and I would say and a good half to two thirds of the music turns out to be well technically-played filler, dragged out to oblivion because Rollins seems to be on a quest to lay bare the deepest recesses of his so-called tortured soul, one way or another.

There's no real reason to check out this Chilliwack album which cut in not long before they elevated to bigger commercial status, other than - it's well done! It's reasonably similar to an early 80's Cheap Trick record, but the songs are a bit more adventurous, and there was no reason - other than the standard excuse of lack of promotion - that tracks such as "148 Heavy", "Communication Breakdown" (nothing to do with the Led Zeppelin version), and "Road to Paradise" shouldn't have stormed a chart or two somewhere in this world. Solid album.

Grand Prix feels like a fresh, uncluttered start. For the first time, they made an album which was natural and not forced. Some people will deride the album as “simple music”, or maybe because it’s not thick and heavy like grunge or metal, or even as in-your-face as their now-colleagues Oasis and Blur, but they are missing the point. Call it “power pop” or “jangle pop” or whatever, but the clear aim here is – make sure the song connects with the listener in the surest way a rock song should. This is easily the best start-to-finish TFC listening experience money can buy.

TFC brought their indie/slacker sound to a major label and managed to squeeze out a victory for "Album of the Year" over Nivrana in 1991 (at least according to Spin Magazine). But compared to later albums the contents are a bit underwhelming.

A decent surface collection of Steely Dan's key tracks from their commercial heyday. If you don't feel like getting all of the records (which I highly suggest) or a deeper compilation this is a good bargain bin pick-up.