Suburban Home
2001
The Party's Over
About This Album
Recorded and submitted to Capitol Records in 1998, this finale from the Smoking Popes wasn't released until 2003 on Double Zero Records. At the time of its recording, the band was in disarray, primarily due to frontman Josh Caterer's exhaustion and newfound Christian devotion. Looking for a way out of their Capitol contract, they offered this collection of ten cover tunes. Their plan worked, as Capitol promptly rejected the album and allowed them to pack their bags. So the big question is if the fans' five-year wait for The Party's Over was worth it. While the answer is mostly no, there's still enough vigor and crackle on display to pump up the diehards. Album opener "Seven Lonely Days," a song made famous by Patsy Cline, gets things off to a rocking start, and indeed, the song's stop-start dynamics and Caterer's passionate vocals match those of Born to Quit. The band's take on the Rodgers & Hart song "Bewitched, Bothered and Bewildered" feels like a tender companion to their "Pure Imagination" cover from Destination Failure. Elsewhere, the Popes tackle Kris Kristofferson, Willie Nelson, Burt Bacharach, and other standard bearers, but the primary problem is that every cover simply feels like a Smoking Popes rendition of the original.
Track List (try tracks 1,3,5 and 8)

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