5 out of 5
Label: Bulbous Monocle
Produced by: Mark Gergis (remastered by)
I looked upon a Thinking Fellers odds and sods compilation with a bit of trepidation. I would consider myself a huge fan of the band, but admittedly not to the extent that I’d tracked down singles and comp appearances – which should make this convenient collection of such songs quite appealing. However, I suppose I view TFUL albums / EPs as something of odds and sods sets already – the group waddling from epics to casual feller filler to ambient weirdness, track by track. So what would a not-intended-as-an-album set of such music sound like?
Answer: one of the best TFUL282 albums.
And this is not an accidental happenstance – clear love, care, and consideration was put into this by curator Mark Davies, easily evidenced by the lengthy liner notes, giving background on each track, and the fact that this isn’t a straight chronological set, or even necessarily grouping singles together: ‘These Things Remain Unassigned’ makes the most of its twenty tracks to remind us of TFUL’s often surprising catchiness, then to expand into their weirdness and beauty. So the A-side hits hard with pretty heavy and accessible riffing, affording room to get looser and more jangly on the B-side, with some Filler-ish tracks appearing as we get to C, and can show off the ever expansive gamut of TFUL 282’s compositions, inventive, delicate, broken, and somehow always sounding like team effort when tracks were solo affairs – a somewhat telling takeaway from how the group never chased the spotlight.
This mixing and matching, as mentioned, crosses through eras; the band was always this eclectic. But despite this stuff being culled from the earliest singles and up through sessions from their final album, the remastering brings everything up to a modern polish, rich and warm and weighty.
Alongside the liner notes, there are many images of historical flyers / posters, and lyrics! It’s quite a presentation, and whether a seasoned or casual fan, presents a slew of material you either must hear, or should hear anew.