Return to Eden, Volume One - The Early Recordings

Album Review

Even if you've never heard of a band, it's kind of nice to hear that they do special things for their rather small fan base. A good fan club, official bootlegs, etc. are what turn a small, under-the-radar band's fans into thankful and devoted supporters. For All About Eve fans, it was a small pain to have to hunt down on eBay and import record dealer websites all of the B-sides that were featured on their excruciatingly hard-to-find pre-Mercury output. Enter ex-guitarist Tim Bricheno to assuage those who had run out of luck. He has put together literally everything from those first few singles, collecting B-sides, demos, and extended mixes that have been out of print and out of sight for years. All of the tracks here are solid, from the first single, "D for Desire," all the way through the sorta tongue-in-cheek cover of Cliff Richard's "Devil Woman." Outside of the music, the quality of which speaks for itself, the only thing really to note is that this is a collector's disc. Those who are just beginning to explore the work of the Eves would do best to hunt down the official full-lengths, but if this is all they can find, it's a safe bet and a quality introduction.