Todd Rundgren – Something / Anything?

Looking for just the inserts - send me a message if you got em for sale:-)

I'm pretty mixed about this Rundgren release. IMO, he can write a decent song, he has an average voice, he can punch out a reasonable keyboard part, his guitar playing is mediocre, and his drumming is sketch. When a multi-instrumentalist turns out a 2-disc solo record like this, the expectations are naturally very high. The music ranges from psychedelic light rock, to Motown, to Beatlesque. Plenty of variation.

Side 4 includes studio musicians and is really a breath of fresh air after the stiff playing on the first three sides.

This is a first pressing, clean copy, and I expected it to sound really great, but it's an average sounding mix, rather boomy, lacking dynamics, and the vocals do not sit well in the mix.

The man is an accomplished producer and has a couple great singles on this record even, so I will stop being critical at this point. I just expected much more.

2.75 stars.

Condition note: collectors, if you can find an original 1st USA press with a NM sleeve (NO ring wear on the front or especially the back) then you have found a unicorn!! Even some sealed originals still appear to have it. The culprit was the sleeve dye used! When you do find one in NM condition store it properly and hold onto it for dear life! It’s valued 10x more considering how rare the condition is to locate.

I’ve a version that is “manufactured and distributed by Kinney music of Canada” in a gatefold

Rising from the ashes of Nazz on the under current that he knew he was an antihero genius and that it was just the world who was out of step with him, Todd Rundgren brought us this one man band album in 1972 that never seems to go away. I actually saw him perform these songs before I owned the record ... there he was at a very small venue, Todd, his tape recorders filled with tape loops, guitars and progressive electronics with cables and wires running everywhere, equalizers, along with rudimentary step on step off switches, all bathed in the glow of tiny faint red and green lights indicating that the equipment was on, merely waiting to spring to life. Sadly the show never progressed as I imagine Todd had envisioned it ... but you know, perhaps that made it all the better, at least the mad genius had taken things from conception to reality.

This was the first really introspective album I was ever aware of ... an album where a young man just lays it all out for the world to either accept or tread under its foot. Something, Anything? was filled with the sweet angst and the pain of clumsy attempts at love we all know too well. There is a purity to this record that I don’t believe has ever been equaled by anyone, with his previous release Runt, acting as a sounding board or script for this body of work. This is pop music at its very best, invasion it as Jimi Hendrix meets Gilbert and Sullivan, through the crazed eyes and ears, mixed with the zeal of a true musical pioneer.

This is one of those albums that does not transpose to compact disc at all. Most people only hear the pop numbers that flow through this release, little realizing that these songs simply tie the material together. Yet in reality, each of the four sides of this double record is a concept in and of itself. Side One draws you in with with a flavorful offering of ear catching melodies. Side Two is introspective and cerebral, demanding that you pay close attention. Side Three is where, as Todd says, This is where the kid gets heavy, taking you on a undefinable journey, though he really only manages to crack the door. Side Four switches gears one hundred and eighty degrees, bringing a welcomed cool breeze from an opened window. Here Todd pulls out all the stops in almost operetta fashion, recording this side using a full band, which included the Sales Brothers.

Aside from the amazing tight pop songs, there is Todd’s bizarre sense of humor, which brings things together on the human scale ... his purposeful false botched starts of several tracks, snippets of dialogue and his tour of the studio, which is actually a metaphor for his own head. Something, Anything? is prophetic on the larger scale, though that idea would not have been considered when the album was released, with Todd looking back, forward, and into the future. For all of it’s quirkiness, “Piss Aaron” bespeaks the irreverence of the punk scene that is just around the corner, and “Wolfman Jack” is more Motown than Motown has a right to be. “Couldn’t I Just Tell You” is a blinding power pop song the likes of which won’t be heard until the 80’s, and for psychedelic rock, Todd lays out “Black Maria.” Of course he doesn’t forget his Philadelphia roots, handing us one of the most tender blue eyed soul numbers of all time, “Dust In The Wind.”

Something, Anything? was created as state of the art for its day, working within the constructs of vinyl records and what this media had to offer. Remove these songs from this format and you loose nearly half of what Todd was attempting to say and how he intended to say it. But hearing this music is the most important thing, so get it anyway that you can.

And that is why Something, Anything? never goes away ...

Review by Jenell Kesler

Have a variant with no side number on the label in the circle for record 2, side A/B. Record 1 has the expected values populated in the side area.
Printing error I suppose.