(Virgin)
Pop isn't sunny anymore. It's kind of pink and bright, but not sunny. But grunge was sunny. Remember Nirvana's "Heart-Shaped Box" video? It had lots of sun. Cracker is the grunge band of sun, so sunny they're almost country.
Garage d'Or is yet another greatest-hits-with-a-few-new-songs album. Unfortunately, it shows Cracker hasn't really made any good songs since 1993, when their Kerosene Hat album came out. It had "Low," the best Cracker song (it's the one with the huge, buzzing guitar opening and the chorus "Be with you girl/Like being low/Hey Hey Hey like being stoned"). "Low" is not a first-class grunge anthem only because it was too simple and was never canonized. It was probably never canonized because Cracker are always fashioning themselves as hayseeds.
Cracker's oeuvre since 1993 has capitalized on the marginal staying power granted any band who left the garage of gold for the barn, like Wilco or the Counting Crows, and much of Garage d'Or has hints of country in its sound. The music gets janglier and vocalist David Lowery sounds more like a has-been. The new material is actually pretty good; but instead of being genius and entertaining, it's merely "haunting." Garage d'Or preserves the good songs from their horny days; the rest is only patly interesting. B -Benjamin E. Lytal