Blow Up (The Smithereens album)

The Smithereens followed their previous album, the relatively successful 11 (1989), with what Allmusic's Jason Damas called "their most straightforward and mainstream-ready release yet." Produced, like its predecessor, by Ed Stasium, Blow Up features songwriting collaborations with Diane Warren ("Nothing's Gonna Stop Us Now", "I Don't Want to Miss a Thing") and Julian Lennon on two of the album's most accessible tracks. Blow Up was released the same month as Nirvana's Nevermind, an album that would quickly have a huge impact on alternative radio formats, "squeezing out largely pop-oriented bands like the Smithereens," according to Damas. "If there was ever a time for an alternative band to opt for a slicker sound," he said, "1991 wasn't it."[1]

Songwriter Pat DiNizio was quoted on the band's website as saying, "It's an eclectic album in that it showcases every one of our musical influences." Described as an "edgy riff rocker" on the website, "Top of the Pops" has an analogy "that English rock fans should pick up on," referring to the British TV programme with the same name.[3] "Too Much Passion", with its full string section and Motown-style backing vocals,[6] is a result of DiNizio's desire to "write the sort of song Smokey Robinson might have written in 1966." The ballad "Evening Dress" is lyrically inspired by a short story by the Japanese author Yukio Mishima, and "Indigo Blues" is a R&B song on which Los Lobos's Steve Berlin guests as a "one-man sax section." Co-written with Dianne Warren, "Get a Hold of My Heart" features harmony vocals by Carlene Carter, and, according to DiNizio, "Tell Me When Did Things Go So Wrong" is the band's first overtly political song about "what I feel society has turned into." DiNizio described the Julian Lennon co-write "If You Want the Sun to Shine" as a thing between the Beatles' "I Am the Walrus" and Led Zeppelin's "Kashmir". DiNizio called the album "the ultimate pop sampler."[3]

When Blow Up failed to match the success of the band's previous album, they were dropped by Capitol and moved to RCA for 1994's A Date with the Smithereens.[7][8]

Dubois Daniels, writing for OffBeat magazine, wrote that the Smithereens "retain their combination of pop vocal melodies over big crunchy guitars, but add keyboards and strings on most of the cuts." He felt that the album is much softer than their previous albums, and that the band "seems to have traded some of their edge for a more pop sound ... but the pop sound has not taken over completely."[6] Rolling Stone's Wayne King wrote, "For those who'd shrug [the Smithereens] off as hopelessly retro, the group makes moves like inviting the Cowsills to sing backup on one song from Blow Up, a gesture either so warped it's cool or just plain pathetic. ... But to dismiss the Smithereens as mere revivalists would be wrong." King felt that, compared to the band's previous album, 11, where producer Ed Stasium "enlarged the group's sound", the band and their producer have made a more versatile and fluid album with Blow Up. He noted that Pat DiNizio "still examines romance as the distance sets in; almost every song deals with loss, resignation, regret."[2]

Among retrospective reviews, Jason Damas of AllMusic said that the Smithereens never released a bad album, and that Blow Up is "in fact a quite good one." He described it as a collection of "catchy, blue-collar power pop distinguished by DiNizio's often moody outlook."[1] Ira Robbins of Trouser Press wrote that the album gets off to a good start with "Top of the Pops" and "Too Much Passion," but then runs out of gas during the third track. Robbins felt that the material was "tired" and "unimproved by restrained playing and arrangements that cover the band's assets in guest keyboards, vocals, strings and saxophone."[9]

Blow Up's cover design is by movie poster/title sequence artist Saul Bass (Vertigo, West Side Story, North by Northwest, Psycho).[10][3][11] Being dedicated film fans, the Smithereens managed to convince Bass that Blow Up should be his first album cover work.[3] The album is named after Michelangelo Antonioni’s 1966 art house film Blowup.[12]

The Smithereens

• Pat DiNizio – vocals, guitar, harmonica
• Jim Babjak – guitar, vocals
• Dennis Diken – drums, percussion, vocals
• Mike Mesaros – bass, vocals

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