Doing a 180: Soul Coughing

Only a few weeks back, we added Soul Coughing's three Warner Brothers albums to our digital catalog as part of a package called The Studio Album Collection 1994-1998. This was particularly great if you wanted to secure the band's WB trifecta in one fell swoop, but what of those youngsters - or oldsters - who prefer the crisp, clean sound of 180-gram vinyl? Well, if that's the crowd you run with, then this is a good week for you, because we've just released all three of those albums - 1994's Ruby Vroom, 1996's Irresistible Bliss, and 1998's El Oso - in that exact format.

If you're completely drawing a blank on who Soul Coughing is and why you should know who they are, then we'll quickly educate you: they delivered a blend of jazz, hip-hop, and alt-rock sounds which quickly made them a cult sensation and - for one brief moment - even found them in the Modern Rock Top 10 with their 1998 single “Circles.”

All three of the band's albums have their merits, although Ruby Vroom, which emerged when Soul Coughing was still finding their commercial footing, is the one that's most likely to have been missed by most folks, so you'll definitely want to check that one out if you've never heard it. You still might actually have heard at least one of the songs, though: “Down to This,” otherwise known by its most-repeated lyrics, “You Get the Ankles (And I'll Get the Wrists).” Of course, Irresistible Bliss is pretty good, too - that's where the band picked up their first significant airplay, thanks to the single "Super Bon Bon” - and then there's El Oso, which features the aforementioned Modern Rock hit, “Circles,” so you know that's good.

Yeah, so basically we're saying that all three of these Soul Coughing albums are good, and since they sound better than ever on 180-gram vinyl, you really should just go ahead and invest in them