Can't Stand the Rezillos - The (Almost) Complete Rezillos

Album Review

The 1993 re-release of the Rezillos' sole album as such lives up to its name perfectly — Can't Stand the Rezillos: The (Almost) Complete Rezillos is indeed almost the complete collection of work that the band officially released during its heyday-of-punk lifetime. As such it's an absolute killer, divided between the original Can't Stand the Rezillos album and the live Mission Accomplished album, along with both sides of the "Destination Venus"/"Mystery Action" single. Ira Robbins' detailed and appreciative band history also makes note of what's missing for completists' sakes — the original recording of "I Can't Stand My Baby," a remake of the Beatles' "I Wanna Be Your Man," "20,000 Rezillos Under the Sea," and the single version of "Top of the Pops." There's one other excision — the live "Destination Venus" had to be dropped from Mission Accomplished to fit everything else on the disc. But the end result really can't be argued with — the remastering of the studio tracks is solid, the live tracks, while not recorded as clearly as they could have been, get shined up as best as they can. The bemusing killer touch is J Mascis's brief scrawl of appreciation — if anything, he maintains his reputation for being as reticent in print as he is in real life (but his claim that this could be the best bass playing on the Sire label is probably accurate).