Dad's Take:
This may be the ultimate "studio hermit" album. It's a long double album, clocking in at almost an hour and a half, with the three of the four sides recorded by Todd Rundgren all by himself, playing every instrument, much of it in a home studio.
What strikes me about this record is the variety of styles. In addition to the straight up pop hits "Hello It's Me" and "I Saw the Light," the album has harder rock, singer/songwriter fare, and experimental studio noodling.
In a collection this big, one would hope for some great songs, and it doesn't disappoint. There are a lot of highlights. In addition to the hits, I've always been fond of "It Wouldn't Have Made Any Difference." "The Night the Carousel Burnt Down," is also very good, showing humor, pathos, and Rundgren's studio talents. On the heavier side, "Little Red Lights" stands out to me.
It's easy to see why this album makes our list, as well as placing at 173 in Rolling Stones list of the top 500 albums. It is loaded with good-to-great songs. That most of it was recorded by one man alone is pretty amazing. On the other hand, despite the variety of material, it sometimes suffers slightly from the sameness that is perhaps inevitable in a solo project of this length. Between several highlights and a few lowlights is a large pack of songs that don't stand out much either way. That's not to say they are bad, just that there are so many songs. Sometimes it feels like the album should be called "Something/Anything/Everything."
This album was a tremendous effort, and the work paid off. This is obviously a labor of love. It's enjoyable, sometimes great, and seldom dull. Todd Rundgren's enormous talent and range is showcased well. An excellent album all around. It's just, there's so much of it.
Brad's Take:
The problem with super long albums is that they're... well... super long. It's hard to get through an hour and a half worth of music. Something/Anything? is no exception, unfortunately. This album feels the same as other double albums; the top quarter of it is really enjoyable, the middle half is when you realize you've been daydreaming for about 20 minutes and can't remember the last 10 songs you listened to, and then the last quarter of the songs is just you impatiently waiting for it all to end.
Obviously, this didn't grab my attention much. After 5 or 6 songs, I knew what the rest of the album was going to sound like. There isn't much different from song to song, probably because Rundgren wrote and recorded every instrument on 3/4 of this record. It all just blends together, with a couple great songs sprinkled throughout.
There's no doubt that this guy is extremely talented. Being able to write and record quality songs like this is a great accomplishment, but this would have been much more enjoyable if it had been cut down to his best 12/13 songs, rather than making it a 25-song double-album. But people were into that kind of thing back then, I guess.
"It Wouldn't Have Made a Difference" and "Couldn't I Just Tell You" were the ones I liked the most out of all of these. But don't assume that those are the only two good songs. All of the others are very similar to those two, but those are just the ones that caught my attention the most, for whatever reason.
The last 1/4 of the album is different though. He has a band with him and you can totally hear a change in sound on these songs. They're good, but it didn't feel new enough for me to separate them from the rest of the pack.
Like I already said, Rundgren is obviously very talented, but this is just too much of a (pretty) good thing. It's not bad, it's not great, it's just too much.
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