Minus the Bear Band • Page 20

I think these are the strongest candidates:

Absinthe Party
Knights
Throwin' Shapes
Into The Mirror
My Time
Cold Company

 

If you could bottle up the magic of MTB from 2001-2005 as a drug I would gladly ruin my life chasing that high.

 

Just finished going through their discography last night, starting from This Is What I Know About Being Gigantic and endings with Fair Enough. Haven’t listened to a lot of these releases in years and some (Gigantic, Fair Enough, a lot of the b-sides) never.

Some quick thoughts:

- This Is What I Know About Being Gigantic is a lot better than I expected. I don’t know what exactly I was expecting…something rough I suppose? This EP is actually good!

- I think Highly Refined Pirates is very good. This album has never quite clicked with me the way it has for so many of their fans, but I still really enjoy it and recognize the importance of it within their discography.

- I think the peak of this band’s career includes They Make Beer Commercials Like This, Menos el Oso, and Planet of Ice. I think these releases push the band juuuuust enough away from the very math rock stuff they did before these releases, but before I think they started to lose a bit of what made them so interesting. I’d go to bat for these three any day.

- I think Omni is good. I actually found myself enjoying it more yesterday than I did when I last listened to it, like, four years ago. Still, I think it’s certainly one of their weaker releases and one of their least interesting. Hold Me Down is great though.

- I think Infinity Overhead is underrated. I don’t think it’s quite as good as Beer Commercials, MEO, or POI, but it’s a very good album. My hot take is that I think it’s better than HRP, but that feels like an opinion that could be swayed by whichever one I most recently listened to.

- Voids is…okay? I think this album is closer to bad than good. I don’t think there’s a single song on here that I love, but there are a few that I like. The mix is whacky and sucks a lot of life and energy out of the album for me. I thought Fair Enough was going to suck, but I was pleasantly surprised by it and thought it was pretty good.

That didn’t feel so quick lol

 

“Just Kickin’ It Like A Wild Donkey” is one of my favorite MtB songs

I don’t really care for anything after Omni but I remember Fair Enough being pretty good

 

I agree with Infinity Overhead being underrated. Great album.

 

Minus the Bear's Jake Snider Ranks the Band's Six Albums

Back in 2018, these were Jake Snider's rankings for Minus The Bear albums

1. Menos El Oso
2. Infinity Overhead
3. Planet Of Ice
4. VOIDS
5. OMNI
6. Highly Refined Pirates

 

Damn, that’s kinda wild

 

Infinity too high and Pirates too low but other than that... sure

 

I must have read this back when it was published, but reading his thoughts on their discography, I get where he’s coming from. Pretty neat stuff

Well, except for Voids. Easily their worst, but new album bias and whatnot

 

His ranking was wild but I gotta respect it. Mine would probably be:

Highly Refined Pirates
Planet of Ice
OMNI
Menos El Oso
infinity Overhead

VOIDS

Menos and OMNI are probably interchangable depending on what version of the band I'm feeling. A lot of this also comes down to what I heard first and got me into the band. VOIDS is their only bad album. Maybe I'll do a discog run, too.

 

time for a disco run i guess

 

Sure why not:

Planet of Ice
Highly Refined Pirates
Menos el Oso
Infinity Overhead
Omni
Voids

 

Menos
Planet
Pirates
Omni
Infinity
Voids

 

Beer Commercials is the absolute pinnacle for me... just flawless. LPs:

Planet
Menos
Omni
Pirates
VOIDS
Infinity

I guess I see the final 3 differently than ppl have said on this page. I loved Omni when it came out and saw it as a successful experiment confidently trying something new. Whereas Infinity felt so aimless, like a few token tracks half-assing their old sound and then a lot of poppy stuff that didn't work that well. VOIDS followed the same formula but I found the highs to be higher than IO.

 

I love OMNI.

 

I'll do a discography run later but off the dome I'd go:

Menos
Planet
Beer Commercials
Omni
Fair Enough
VOIDS
Gigantic
Pirates
Infinity

I think Infinity is the only bad one, but Pirates just never quite clicked with me.

 

Planet of Ice

(These ones are basically a threeway tie)
Menos el Oso
OMNI
Highly Refined Pirates

Infinity Overhead
Voids

 

Oh man, if I include the EPs…

Menos el Oso
Planet of Ice
They Make Beer Commercials Like This
Infinity Overhead
Highly Refined Pirates
OMNI
This is What I Know About Being Gigantic
Fair Enough
Voids

 

1. Beer Commercials
2. Pirates
3. Planet Of Ice
4. Menos El Oso
5. OMNI
6. Infinity Overhead
7. Voids + Fair Enough
8. Gigantic

I think Planet Of Ice is "objectively" their best full length album, but most of my favorite songs are on other releases, and Beer Commercials is ny personal favorite

 

I kinda agree with you about Planet of Ice. I can only listen to Knights as a standalone song, all the others work best as part of the album.

 

I could see last kiss being another non Menos song they might play

 

Menos
Pirates

Ice Ice Baby

Omni
Infinity
Voids + Fair Enough

 

Ice
Español
Pirates/Omni
Infinity
Voids

 

I have no idea if they've ever played it, but I would love to hear "The Lucky Ones" live.

 

More news coming tomorrow.