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  • Release Date:
If I Had A Hi-Fi Image
Metascore
74

Generally favorable reviews - based on 14 Critic Reviews What's this?

User Score
7.9

Generally favorable reviews- based on 8 Ratings

  • Summary: Experience has only made their work richer, bringing gravity to the subject matter and lightness to the sound of this new album. Keeping things honest--and often rapturous--has become a modus operandi.

Top Track

Enjoy the Silence
Words like violence Break the silence Come crashing in Into my little world Painful to me Pierce right through me Can't you understand Oh, my little... See the rest of the song lyrics
Score distribution:
  1. Positive: 11 out of 14
  2. Negative: 0 out of 14
  1. It's the best sort of covers album, reverent to the source material but not beholden to it.
  2. This is how the covers album should be done, with tight technique and loving affection blending together to give the new versions life and bite.
  3. Alternative Press
    80
    Cover albums are usually a contractual cop-out, but the diverse scope and amount of thought put into each track on If I Had A Hi-Fi prevents it from sounding superfluous or self-indulgent. [Jun 2010, p.107]
  4. Their approach avoids downright imitation of their source material, and they somehow capture a broad swathe of popular music in their own style.
  5. Covers, of course, are always fraught with peril, and at times singer/guitarist Matthew Caws’ inflection has a way of fermenting the source material’s latent cheese.
  6. On If I Had a Hi-Fi, Nada Surf accomplishes the rare feat of producing a covers album that won't just waste space on your CD shelf.
  7. Were Nada Surf not so comfortable with their own style, If I Had a Hi-Fi might play entirely as an indier-than-thou stunt performance instead of a fun, if somewhat slight, one-off record.

See all 14 Critic Reviews

Score distribution:
  1. Positive: 1 out of 2
  2. Negative: 0 out of 2
  1. Nov 20, 2019
    10
    It's a great album of covers. They chose some really good ones including a few of my favorites (Go-Betweens, Depeche Mode, Spoon). But theIt's a great album of covers. They chose some really good ones including a few of my favorites (Go-Betweens, Depeche Mode, Spoon). But the ones I didn't know - it's been a chance for me to discover those artists, and dig into their history and catalogues. Nada Surf! Expand
  2. Aug 27, 2010
    5
    If I had a hi-fi, I would listen to the originals, Nada Surf's and everybody else's. When Tori Amos covers Slayer, makes "Raining Blood" herIf I had a hi-fi, I would listen to the originals, Nada Surf's and everybody else's. When Tori Amos covers Slayer, makes "Raining Blood" her own and manages to be far more disturbing than the original - I see the point of the cover and tip my hat. When Nada Surf covers Spoon... I refuse to participate. Expand