Bob Seger: Smokin' O.P.'s CD Track Listing

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Bob Seger Smokin' O.P.'s (1972)
Originally Released 1972\nCD Edition Released January 1993\nRemastered CD Edition Released June 7, 2005\n\nAMG EXPERT REVIEW: Bob Seger closed out his Capitol contract with Brand New Morning, a singer/songwriter album quite unlike anything he had yet released. Following its release he moved to the Detroit-based label Palladium and returned to hard-driving rock & roll with Smokin' O.P.'s, the polar opposite of Brand New Morning. According to legend, the title stands for "smoking other people's songs," which makes sense since this is a cover album that even covers Bob Seger & the Last Heard. In other words, it's nothing like the intimate, reflective, risky Brand New Morning, but that doesn't matter since it rocks so well and since it reveals that Seger isn't just a first-class bandleader and rock songwriter, but that he's a terrific interpreter of other writers' songs. Even well-worn tunes like "Bo Diddley" and "If I Were a Carpenter" get made fresh by internalizing the hooks, turning them into something fresh and original. That's also true of songs by such contemporaries as Stephen Stills ("Love the One You're With") and Leon Russell ("Humming Bird"), and he also breathes fire into blues and rock stalwarts like "Let It Rock," "Turn on Your Love Light," and "Jesse James." Smokin' O.P.'s closes out with two originals, one new (the fine, but not especially noteworthy "Someday") and one old (the perennial "Heavy Music"). Neither change the essential character of the album, which is just a really fun, hard-rocking record that bought Seger some time while reasserting the fact that he could really rock. He could -- and he could rock really well -- which is why Smokin' O.P.'s remains a lot of fun, even if it's a relatively minor work in Seger's canon. -- Stephen Thomas Erlewine \n\nAmazon.com Editorial Review\nA much requested official CD reissue for an album that was difficult to locate even when it was out on vinyl in 1972, Smokin' O.P.'s finds Bob Seger covering "other people's" favorites, including a few of his own. Accompanied by a tough three piece band with Skip Van Winkle's churning organ often more prominent than guitar, Seger sizzles through a short but intense 35 minute set of nine tunes. Even when reinterpreting warhorses such as "Bo Diddley," "Turn on Your Lovelight" and "Let it Rock," the band charges through with such a crisp, no-nonsense attack. These versions sound fresh, if not quite new, upon this album's remastered reissue in 2005, 33 years after it was recorded. The feeling is that these tunes were already crowd favorites, so the recording has a live electricity to it, only enhanced by subsequent years of slicker music from Seger. The slow burn rearrangement of the once folksy "If I Were a Carpenter" captures the singer at his most vibrant, mixing sensitivity with leathery, roiling rock that explodes into a throbbing crescendo, all in about 3

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