Aw C'Mon

Judicious distillation might have provided sharper focus, but this is an appealingly ambitious sprawl. [combined review of both discs; 27 Feb 2004, p.99]

As ever Wagner’s voice is rich and warm, the instrument of a faltering singer that just gets better with age, cracked and croaked and delivering lyrics with a strange phrasing that makes the most indecipherable and idiosyncratic observation take on a wealth of meanings for the listener depending how they first, or last, hear it. [combined review of both discs]

Aw C'mon is lovely, compelling, mysterious, and confounding.

This is deep, rich, slightly unnerving and very very beautiful music. [combined review of both discs]

Throughout the two albums, Lambchop effortlessly and repeatedly cross country, rock, soul, jazz, and cinematic borders. [combined review of both discs]

Wagner has achieved a fusion of the outgoing, string-driven country-soul heard on 2000's Nixon... and the reluctant intimacy of 2002's low-key Is A Woman. [combined review of both discs; Feb 2004, p. 68]

Keeps the orchestral Americana on an ambient, after-hours simmer. [Mar 2004, p.123]

An enticing dip into melancholy.

The albums are interchangeable, neither one being the stylistic leap that was Is A woman in comparison to its predecessor, Nixon. [combined review of both discs; Mar 2004, p.112]

[These albums] are as much of a pendulum swing from Is A Woman as Is A Woman was from Nixon. [combined review of both discs; Feb 2004, p.90]

Admittedly, there's not exactly the strictest of divides between the two, although 'Aw C'mon' is arguably the more upbeat of the pair.

Aw Cmon is the most relaxed of the two discs, the most instantly pleasing, the most Lambchop-like, boasting the strongest lyrics of the two CDs.

Over the course of 24 tracks, we get taut grooves set on Al Green cruise control, lots of havin'-fun-in-the-studio byplay, and the occasional spritz of rude fuzz-box gutiar to give all the gold-leaf detailing some shape. [combined review of both discs; Mar 2004, p.97]

To say one of these albums is better than the other is basically beside the point-- anyone who buys one will certainly want the other, and both are fairly comparable as far as quality is concerned, anyway.

If Aw C'mon pales in comparison, it's due to a pronounced downbeat atmosphere and an over-reliance on cutesy, clunky titles.

Out of these two good albums, a great single album is fighting to break out. [combined review of both discs]

It doesn’t take long for the characters to come alive the way ...Is a Woman’s seemed too exhausted to. [combined review of both discs]

A cohesive collection of brisk, poppy songs in the accessible mode of the band's 2000 breakthrough Nixon.

AwCmon is the stronger of the two, with a trio of outstanding instrumentals acting as the backbone for a suite of typically moody songs.

Notice the way whole songs skulk past without you ever noticing; how half the material here is ornate but unmemorable muzak, with all the emotional force of a feather. [combined review of both discs]

A double album slough of easy listening instrumentals. [combined review of both discs; #9, p.108]