Re-Listening: Smash Mouth - Astro Lounge
Published Oct. 28, 2008
It's been almost a decade since Smash Mouth released "All Star," but I'd be willing to bet anything you still have that song stuck in your head. Maybe it's buried under the names of all 150 Pokémon or intertwined with the horrid live-action "Inspector Gadget" movie, which featured it on the soundtrack. Regardless, it stuck. It shouldn't be any surprise, then, that the other 14 tracks on Smash Mouth's Astro Lounge tend to do the same.
The first indication that this record is more than just a vessel for that hit single comes right at the beginning. Opener "Who's There?" - an intense pop-punk song about aliens making an appearance on Earth - sets the tone for the rest of the record. It is immensely catchy, extremely produced and obviously '90s. In fact, nearly every track on this record is composed of at least one hook that will eat its way into your head and stay there.
Although the first few songs are plenty of fun, the album doesn't really shine in any critical sense until track four, "Waste." This is the first real indication that the band isn't just about living the good life. It opens with one of the precious few minutes of minimalism on the record, with just an acoustic guitar and keyboards that give way into the typical Smash Mouth heavy drums and layered production. Lyrically, it stays short of brilliant, but that just helps to make it more relatable. "Waste"'s subtle acknowledgement of the consequences inherent in the rock 'n' roll lifestyle makes its way into the best songs on the record. Almost every moment that shines on Astro Lounge hints at regret, including the unapologetic drug addict's anthem "Stoned" and the depressed, almost desperate "Fallen Horses".
Tracks to skip over are few and far between. Of course, there's "All Star," which, nine years after America fell in love with it, seems to have lost its luster. The only other mundane moment is "Road Man," a song where lead singer Steve Harwell manages to assure the world that he is nowhere close to being Jamaican, no matter how much ska he plays.
Astro Lounge isn't perfect, but the moments that shine stay brilliant long after taking off the headphones. Smash Mouth's contribution to seemingly every animated or kids movie between 1999 and 2002 might have caused them to look like something akin to the Disney music craze infecting the charts today, but there's more substance here than our childhood memories let on. Just skip over the hits.