E – A Man Called E (1992)

Mark Oliver Everett is one of my absolute musical heroes. He later founded the band Eels which is one of my favourite bands that ever existed. Before Eels, he used to perform under the name E. He had already made a self-released album under his own name, but this was his first major label record. Later on, E felt like his music was more of a band effort so he wanted a band name and he came up with Eels so that his solo stuff would be found close to his band stuff. He didn't realise that there are actually a great many bands between E and Eels in the alphabet (like Eagles for example). I've liked music of Eels since 2002 when I first saw them live at the Makasiinit in Helsinki. This show blew my mind and ever since I've been a huge fan. It wasn't until a few years ago though that I got my hands on E's solo stuff, because I had never before seen his CDs anywhere.



I found this CD at Fopp in Covent Garden. The CD definitely isn't that beautiful of an object. An old type of jewel case and the cover is just black and white typography. Nevertheless, I was extremely thrilled to find this CD that I had been looking for for years. To this day, I haven't found E's second album Broken Toy Shop anywhere.

You can really hear that this album was released by a major label record company. In E's autobiography, he says how he didn't like the studio musicians and the polished sounds that Polypro made him use at the time and I think it's great that Dream Works gave him more artistic freedom. The sounds are quite massive and I'm not a big fan of echoey pianos on the album for example, but the songwriting is already guaranteed quality. E's voice is just amazing in its raspiness and intimacy.

This album is not on Spotify. This is why I'm now listening to this album in a wrong track order. You should take this into account if you listen to this album via my youtube link. Goes to show that there's still a place for actual records.

There are many great songs on this album, but my favourite is probably You'll Be the Scarecrow. This song gives some small taste of what Eels will become later on. The intimate and adorable sound of E's voice is heavily present in this song. Hello Cruel World was the big hit from this album. You can really hear immediately that this song is a hit. The sounds are really usual for late 80's and early 90's. This kind of sets E in time neatly. Eels has always sounded quite timeless for me, but this album is really tied to a certain period in pop music. I also have to mention the song Mockingbird Franklin, because this song is very similar to some later Eels songs. Fitting In With the Misfits is probably the most ambitious song on the album and having read E's autobiography, this song has certain importance as he found a home with artistic people after moving to Los Angeles after living in a small town with conservative values.

Typical of the time, E made music videos already at this point. The video for Hello Cruel World looks quite ambitious for a starting out artist. Then again, I feel like E has always wanted to have a cool visual image as well to go with his music. I like how in the 90's music videos actually had proper storylines.

I will write a lot more about Mark Oliver Everett with all the Eels albums I have, but it's kind of appropriate that I get to introduce him in this blog with the earliest recording of his that I have. E has had a huge impact on my life through his music and I cannot underestimate his significance to my musical taste.

Listen to the album on Youtube.