If you like sugary sweet power pop with stunning harmonies and excellent guitar work, this is a great box set to own. It features two discs of Rubinoos hits (the only odd one of the bunch being the Revenge of the Nerds theme which they were commissioned to do) as well as a third disc of live material and a nice set of liner notes to round out the package. My only gripe is that the discs are in cardboard sleeves rather than proper cases, but because I ripped this set as soon as I got it, the discs have had minimal wear. The music is fantastic. I just can't get over how well the band harmonizes (we're talking near Beach Boys levels here. As a matter of fact, there is a very nice recording of "Heroes and Villains" on disc two.) and how well the harmonies match the instrumentals. It's just the sort of finely-crafted pop you hardly ever hear anymore. A few of these songs even made it onto the mix my wife and I played at our wedding reception ("Fallin' in Love" and "As Long As I'm With You", the latter being one of the best power pop songs in the universe. Listen to it here and try to tell me it isn't). Oh, and how could I forget to mention that The Rubinoos were one of the great bands on the Beserkley label back in the day. All the Beserkley bands were great (especially the early Jonathan Richman and the Modern Lovers stuff) but The Rubinoos are a head above the rest of the bands on the label. This box set is just too good to not be owned by every serious power pop fan.
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