Flipping This Quarter

Release Date: 11 November 1997
Date I Got: 30 December 2001
Best Track: Woke Up This Morning
Other Notable Tracks: Ain’t Gonna Goa, Mao Tse Tung Said

If Alabama 3, known as A3 in the US for copyright reasons, is known at all, it’s for Woke Up This Morning: the song over the Sopranos opening credits. The song is pure strut and works as a perfect introduction to the show.

It’s a bit out of place on this album. The other tracks are a mash of country, gospel, blues, and dance. It doesn’t always work, but it works enough to make the album compelling more than once.

I’ve had this album for nearly six years and have yet to determine if it should be taken seriously. There are obvious reasons to conclude the negative, like the tear-in-your-beer country of "U Don’t Dans 2 Tekno Anymore" and the copious references to Mr. I.V. Lenin. But there’s a lot to like as well.

The track that best exemplifies this is "Mao Tse Tung Said." What did Mao say? Change must come through the barrel of a gun. Referencing the good word of both Lenin and Mao is tricky at best if serious. The opening of the song is a sermon-like sample (I think) decrying the ability of love and trumpeting the power of hate. It’s an argument that can’t be dismissed out-of-hand, but, really…? It’s too early in this blog’s life to get into some bullshit philosophy of love and hate, so I won’t. Maybe later. I linked to a live version of this song that, well, check it out.

In some ways, Alabama 3 on this album is the music equivalent of Paul Verhoeven or professional wrestling: damned entertaining if not serious, dangerous if it is. This is one of only half dozen albums in my collection that I hope aren’t earnest.

Earnest or not, I do like it like I like wrestling and Verhoeven.
 

"The righteous truth is there is nothing worse than some fool lying on some Third World beach wearing spandex psychedelic trousers, smoking damn dope–pretending he’s gettin consciousness expansion. I want consciousness expansion I go to my local tabernacle and I sing!