Happiness

AMG Review of Happiness

j. poet
All Music Guide

Before they met and fell in love and started collaborating on their songwriting, each Weepie had a thriving career as a Boston area singer/songwriter. Steve Tannen was touring behind his first solo album, Big Seńorita, a rock record produced with guitarist John Gordon from Suzanne Vega's band. He'd won a handful of songwriting awards, including one from the John Lennon Songwriting Contest for "Vegas Baby," a tune that appears here. Deb Talan put out several albums of songwriterly punk as a member of Portland's Hummingfish before moving to Boston and going solo. She'd also won songwriting awards, released two solo albums, and placed tunes on television shows like Felicity and Dawson's Creek before starting the Weepies. Happiness was written, recorded, and released in three weeks, in the white heat of their artistic and personal connection. "Vegas Baby," an atypical country tune, opens the album. It's a bouncy car song about driving to sin city to escape the heartache of broken romance. Jim Henry's Dobro and twang-heavy guitar provide blue accents to Tannen's weary vocals. "Dating a Porn Star" is a bit darker than your typical Weepie song, the sad tale of a love affair with an "adult performer." It's hard to tell from the lyric if the poor guy has a real or imaginary relationship with the stripper, but he's clearly suffering and heartbroken. "All That I Want" is a mournful song of a bleak northern Christmas, warmed only by true love and the Weepies' balmy harmonies. "Somebody Loved" is a solo showcase for Talan, a gushingly happy ode to the first flush of true love. "Happiness" is the album's most rockin' track, another snappy tune celebrating the joy of the love that makes life worth living, even when you're broke and trapped in a mean town. The Weepies' blissful harmonies are in full effect here. Happiness lacks some of the studio polish of Say I Am You and Hideaway, and it's only 26 minutes long, but its low-key, living room charm makes it just as inviting as their later work.