Review 1 of 1

THESAINT writes:

4of 5 Stars

There's a lot of material offered on this collection. The first part of this disc contains the unreleased, "Crack a Smile" album that Poison had been working on in 1994. The album was never released commercially, mostly due to an unforgiving market who had moved on to the new, "Seattle Sound." Poison tried to carry on without their guitar player CC Deville, who had been kicked out of the band after the Flesh & Blood tour ended in 1991. For most people, the new Poison could never be the same. The band first tried to replace CC Deville with Richard Kotzen, who first appeared on the album, "Native Tongue" back in 1993. Kotzen made trouble with the band and was replaced by Blues Saraceno. The band tried to record new tracks for an album tentatively titled, "Crack a Smile" in 1994,but the album was shelved. This album finally got its due in the year 2000. For the fans that grew up with CC Deville on guitar, the album contains a rare B-Side from the Open Up and Say Ahh album called, "Face the Hangman" and four tracks the band recorded for MTV Unplugged back in 1990. Although this isn't the complete show, the tracks do work well on the acoustic guitar. The tracks that would have been, "Crack a Smile" are certainly better than anything Poison has done since that period. “Best Thing You Ever Had”, “Sexual Thing” (Also on the Greatest Hits Album), and the bands rendition of, "Cover of the Rolling Stone" really stand out. The tracks aren't as loud as material you'd find on Open Up and Say Ahh, but it is the sound of Poison maturing as a band, I only wish they would have continued on that path.

Aug 11, 2006 17:59:53