REVIEW: Grandaddy—Under The Western Freeway (1997)

Perhaps appropriately, I finally got around to this album 28 Years Later.

Getting into albums before your time is one thing: we’re all playing catchup to some degree. But when it’s a band or an album that you knew about, but somehow never got to, it feels like that’s on you. Grandaddy have somehow managed to exist almost entirely in my blind spot for closing in on three decades. Quite impressive when you think about it.

I say almost entirely. I’d have had to have lived off the grid entirely to have avoided hearing A.M. 180—a signature song of theirs that has taken on a life of its own, and is ultimately responsible for regularly reminding me I didn’t know much else by this band bar Crystal Lake. Part of the problem is one of availability—their albums don’t seem to stay in print for long, and then take an age to get repressed. Finding a copy of this 20th anniversary reissue this side of the Atlantic for a reasonable price was impossible.

But with that particular quest finally ticked off, I’m pleased to report that it was worth the effort—this is one I ought to have had in the collection all along, but better late than never I guess. I think there was some noise back in the day about them being America’s answer to Radiohead, but that sounded absurd even then, and especially so with hindsight. Immediately it struck me as more like a satisfying mashup of Neil Young’s vocal style with elements of ELO.

Band leader Jason Lytle was clearly on a hot streak with his songwriting at this stage, but apart from the excessive earwormery of A.M. 180, there are few obvious “radio hits” on the album, bar the fizzing lost Pixies-esque stomper Summer Here Kids. It’s a mostly laid back, understated kind of record. One that took me a good half a dozen spins before the it hit me how great it actually is—some of the best records are like that.

The record starts as it means to go on, with Nonphenomenal Lineage delivering that chilled, slightly weary vibe that Grandaddy do so well. All sparse guitar lines, cheap synths and the kind of distorted drums that were a legal requirement in 1997. The way it acts as lead-in to A.M. 180 is genius.

But after this relatively energetic classic, the pace dips back to their default lollop, as Collective Dreamwish of Upperclass Elegance affords Lytle the opportunity to softly croon “here I sit/play guitar/drink beer/out in the country/having narrowly escaped my trip into town/now it’s sunday….count stars/out in the country”. The slovenly pace of another single, Laughing Stock suggests that maybe the pop charts weren’t really for them. Fair enough really.

They tend to sound their most comfortable strolling through these mid tempo numbers, with their slow buildups and weary choruses. I can quite imagine a suited V2 record company executive of 1997 leaning back in a giant leather office chair, fretting over how they were going to break them, as Everything Beautiful Is Far Away steadfastly refuses to deliver the required indie rock hook. In 2025, such things feel unimportant, but you can bet that this approach frustrated the hell out of the suits then.

The record only continues in this vein, with a run of songs even less interested in playing the game—probably why it still sounds so relevant 28 years later. Poisoned At Hartsy Thai Food, Go Progress Chrome, Why Took Your Advice all dial down the pace even further, while Lawn and So On decides to end with fully five minutes of crickets chirping—underlining the escape to the country. Lytle did very clearly have big radio friendly tunes in him, he just didn’t want to play that game just yet. Sorry. Not Sorry.