Artist	Song
Halfnelson	Chile Farm Farney (demo)
Halfnelson	Arts & Crafts Spectacular (demo)
Halfnelson/Sparks	Wonder Girl
Halfnelson/Sparks	Biology 2
Halfnelson/Sparks	(No More) Mr. Nice Guys
Sparks	Girl from Germany
Sparks	Here Comes Bob
Sparks	Moon Over Kentucky
Sparks	Do Re Mi
Sparks	I Like Girls (demo)
Sparks	This Town Ain't Big Enough for Both of Us
Sparks	Amateur Hour
Sparks	Talent is an Asset
Sparks	Hasta Manana Monsieur
Sparks	Here in Heaven
Sparks	Barbecutie
Sparks	At Home, At Work, At Play
Sparks	Bon Voyage
Sparks	Something for the Girl with Everything
Sparks	Who Don't Like Kids?
Sparks	Don't Leave Me Alone with Her
Sparks	Alabamy Right

Comment:

Volume 1 of a 3-disc set encapsulating the music of one of my all-time favorite bands. This volume covers the span from their earliest recordings when the band was called Halfnelson (their first LP, a self-titled 1971 release on the Bearsville label, was originally released as "Halfnelson" by Halfnelson. It was quickly withdrawn, given a new cover, and with no change in the song order, reissued as "Sparks" by Sparks) through 1974's "Propaganda" LP and it's concurrent B-side, "Alabamy Right".

Further reading, from the liner notes I authored for the set:

"Three discs simply isn't enough. To present the full scope of music Sparks has created over the past three and a half decades (!) - the various styles and sub-genres in which they've dabbled - would require twice that, if not more; to fully appreciate all of the nuances, references, in-jokes, puns and whatnot they toss into their work takes years.

"The Mael brothers, Ronald and Russell, and an ever-revolving troupe of musicians, have for over thirty years been creating some of the most brilliant, challenging, and prescient music around. Rarely has anyone had such an inherently perfect sense of what a pop song should sound like, and still stubbornly refuse to write a "normal" pop song. That they were well ahead of their time, and that their influence can be heard in any number of bands that followed, is obvious from the first listen. Their echoes can be heard in bands as diverse as Queen and Devo; without their 1974 album Kimono My House, the entire genre known as "power pop" may never have come to fruition. Yet, by the time everyone else had caught up with them, they were already either around the next corner, or taking a few steps back to record with a full orchestra, or mix-mashing sounds to create hard rock in waltz time. Swing, glam, art-rock, chamber music, new wave, electronica.you name the genre, they've done it.

"The real brilliance of Sparks, however, is found in the lyrics they write. Wickedly clever, often hysterically funny, and usually throwing unexpected, ironic twists on anything they write about, Sparks have never been a band known for writing formulaic lyrics, or for singing about the usual mundane things. And it sneaks up on you: you'll be tapping your toes, caught fully by an amazing pop hook, and suddenly realize that you're listening to a song about someone's descent into Alzheimer's Disease ("The Decline and Fall of Me"), or a lover who has come out on the losing end of a Romeo-and-Juliet-styled suicide pact ("Here in Heaven"), or the story of Noah's ark told from the perspective of one of the animals who didn't get go ("Bon Voyage"). They'll make topical references that assume the listener's intelligence rather than take the traditional dumb-it-down approach ("Amateur Hour" creates a metaphor for losing your virginity with the line, "It's a lot like playing the violin/You cannot start off and be Yehouti Menhouin"). A friend of mine hit the nail on the head by saying, "You know, you almost need to have Cliff Notes to understand all of what they're talking about!"

"Even in their choices of covers, that biting wit is obvious: what other "rock band" would have covered Rodgers and Hammerstein's "Do Re Mi" in 1972? And the beautiful irony of redoing the Beatles' "I Wanna Hold Your Hand" - as nearly perfect a pop song as you will find - in the style of the then-current corporate-manufactured pop shlock of 1975.well, that's simply freakin' brilliant!

"I've tried to represent all eras of Sparks here: the art-rock of the "Bearsville" era, the glam rock of the Island years, the dance-schmaltz of their late seventies work with Giorgio Moroder, their new-wave era, and their current stuff, which nearly defies description. Personally, I love it all. I'm anxious to find out what you think."

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