I've had Perfect From Now On laying around for a few years, and never thought much of it. Decided to give it a shot this morning on the commute, and it totally carried me through.

Kinda jammy, with stops & starts like Pavement. Not sure about the lyrics yet, but good stuff. Should I track down other releases? I guess Keep It Like A Secret is next?

My personal favorite is
There's Nothing Wrong With Love
But, yeah... Keep It Like a Secret is a really good one to get next, too.

You just started with what is probably their most "difficuult", and certainly their most jammy record. Although "I Would Hurt a Fly" is fucking genius.

Glad you're digging 'em.

I saw them once live, too and they were brilliant.

Keep It Like A Secret is my favorite. I highly recommended the Live album as well. Their April '99 show in Denver is still the best concert experience I've ever had.

I think I'm in the minority but I like Ancient Melodies pretty well. Keep it Like Secret is better but I still like it overall. I think it might help that it's the first Built to Spill album I ever listened to.

Also, I saw they have an album due out in 2005. Anyone know anything about this?

I'm also a big Ancient Melodies fan.

i love keep it like a secret. makes me wonder why i havent got around to getting the rest of their stuff.

I would agree with getting Keep It Like A Secret next, but everything is good, including the early stuff. Ultimate Alternative Wavers has some really amazing songs on it.

Yeah, that's one of my favorite goto type albums, the ones you can pull out just about anytime and never get tired of hearing. Always sound fresh, but at the same time like an old friend. It was my introduction to Built To Spill, back sometime in 1997 when it came out on Warner Bros. Records. Indie rock on a big label. This was their first album for the WB. I picked up the double vinyl on the Up label, I think partly because I thought the cover was pretty cool. But I had probably read something about it too, can't remember exactly now. I was buying quite a bit of indie rock type vinyl back then, much of it unknown to me. This one took awhile to turn into a favorite though. I knew from the first listen that it was something special, but it's not the type of music that slaps you into submission. More like a slow acting but habit forming drug...you don't quite know how you feel about it but can't stop taking it. And after about ten times you're totally, hopelessly addicted.

All the records have a lot to offer. I know some think that Ancient Melodies doesn't quite live up to the legacy, but it has some great songs. My only complaint is that some of them are cut off before fully played out, but it's a minor complaint. The closer "The Weather" is a classic, along with a couple of the others like "In Your Mind". Seems like first time BtS listeners prefer this one over the older ones, while long-time fans tend to diss it. But me, well, as Doug Martsch sings in that Ancient Melodies closer, "As long as its talking with you, talk of the weather will do."

I have an old post I made about it saved at my site that has a cool quote from Doug Martsch about Perfect From Now On that appeared in a Pulse! magazine interview at the time Ancient Melodies came out.....

"That was one time when I thought I was in way over my head. [But] it worked out fine. And I love that record; I think it's the best thing that we've done. It was supposed to be kinda epic-sounding, but I was never able to get it where I wanted it and that was really disappointing to me, but in retrospect I think that's what makes it a cool record ... If it'd sounded the way I wanted it to sound like a Blur record or Radiohead or something; I imagined it being massive and I'm glad that it's not; I'm glad that it's still sort of like a guy in his room but kind of epic."

You can't go wrong with any of their albums.

Check out The Halo Benders and Treepeople too.

Steve

Keep It like A Secret is my favorite and There's Nothing Wrong With Love, Ancient Melodies and Perfect From Now are tied for second. I even like Doug Martsch's solo album from a couple years ago. I hoipe '05 sees a new release!!!

I can't really recommend There's Nothing Wrong With Love (much too inconsistent for my tastes), but the albums that came out after that are all good to great. Definitely avoid the pre-There's Nothing Wrong With Love material.

Oh man I love them. I would also recommend Keep It Like a Secret as your next purchase.