Can You Do Me Good?
Studio album by
Del Amitri
Released8 April 2002
Recorded
GenreAlternative rock
Length49:42
LabelMercury / A&M
Producer
Del Amitri chronology
Hatful of Rain
(1998)		 Can You Do Me Good?
(2002)		 Fatal Mistakes
(2021)
Singles from Can You Do Me Good?
  1. "Just Before You Leave"
    Released: April 2002[1]
Professional ratings
Review scores
SourceRating
AllMusic[2]
Encyclopedia of Popular Music[3]
PopMatters(favourable)[4]

Can You Do Me Good? is the sixth studio album by Del Amitri, released on 8 April 2002 by Mercury / A&M.[3][5]

The album showcased a radically different sound from which Del Amitri fans had become used to. With five years having elapsed since Some Other Sucker's Parade (1997), Can You Do Me Good? featured a new approach: drum loops, samples and synthesisers were the band's new tools. Though the songs retained their usual melodic characteristics, the overall impression was a very different one.

Theme

Guitarist and songwriter Iain Harvie admitted in the run-up to the album's release that the band's record company considered Can You Do Me Good? to be Del Amitri's last chance. "It's a pretty straightforward equation. If we don't sell 300,000 copies of the new album, we're out. It's that simple."[6] With this in mind, many of the album's lyrics seem to convey a tone of finality; the feeling that this is a band's last stand. Song titles like "One More Last Hurrah" and "Last Cheap Shot at the Dream" contribute to this, and "Just Getting By" seems almost to lament a career spent as rock's nearly-men:

Look at me

I'm the one who got away
The one who could've shone
I tried to do my best
But I guess your best don't last for long

Look at me
Standing with my tattered pride
Of toothless little lions
We tried to make a difference

Do something no one else had tried[7]

Even for a lyricist like Justin Currie, whose songs have often dealt with missed opportunities and failure, Can You Do Me Good? is significantly more concerned with these concepts than previous albums.

Track listing

All songs written by Justin Currie, except as noted.

  1. "Just Before You Leave" (Currie, Iain Harvie) – 5:14
  2. "Cash & Prizes" – 4:38
  3. "Drunk in a Band" – 2:44
  4. "One More Last Hurrah" (Currie, Harvie) – 4:52
  5. "Buttons on My Clothes"[8] – 4:05
  6. "Baby, It's Me" – 3:34
  7. "Wash Her Away"[9] (Currie, Harvie) – 3:07
  8. "Last Cheap Shot at the Dream" – 4:12
  9. "Out Falls The Past" – 3:13
  10. "She's Passing This Way" – 2:44
  11. "Jesus Saves" – 3:39
  12. "Just Getting By" – 7:35
  • "Just Getting By" is followed by a hidden track: an instrumental excerpt from "The Septic Jubilee" (a song released as a B-side on the "Just Before You Leave" single) which lasts for roughly 2:20.

Personnel

Credits adapted from the album liner notes.[10]

Del Amitri
Additional musicians
Technical
  • Gordon "Commissioner Gordon" Williams – producer (tracks 2-4, 7, 9-11), additional producer (tracks 1, 12), mixing (tracks 1, 2, 4-9, 11, 12) (at The Headquarters, Teaneck, New Jersey)
  • Pete Smith – producer (tracks 1, 3, 10, 12), mixing (tracks 3, 10) (at Livingston Studios, London)
  • Kevin Bacon – producer (tracks 5, 6, 8)
  • Jonathan Quarmby – producer (tracks 5, 6, 8)
  • Jamie Siegel – engineer (tracks 2-4, 7, 9-11)
  • Ben Darlow – mixing (tracks 3, 10) (at Livingston Studios, Wood Green), additional mixing (track 7) (at Westside Studios, London)
  • Dave Bascombe – mixing (track 5) (at Whitfield Street Studios, London)
  • Stylorouge – design, art direction
  • Jeff Cottenden – photography
  • Kevin Westenberg – photography (Del Amitri portrait)

Notes

  1. ↑ "Discography". delamitri.info. Retrieved 24 June 2022.
  2. ↑ Allmusic review
  3. 1 2 Larkin, Colin (2011). "Del Amitri". The Encyclopedia of Popular Music (5th concise ed.). Omnibus Press. ISBN 978-0-85712-595-8.
  4. ↑ PopMatters review
  5. ↑ "UK chart peaks". Official Charts Company. Retrieved 24 June 2022.
  6. ↑ Official Del Amitri website Archived 25 February 2005 at the Wayback Machine, which cites "Del Amitri: We Don't Even Like Ourselves" (5 April 2002), The Independent.
  7. ↑
    • Currie, Justin (2002). In Can You Do Me Good? [CD liner notes]. London: Mercury Records.
  8. ↑ The track is named once as "The Buttons on My Clothes" in the CD inlay booklet, but twice as "Buttons on My Clothes".
  9. ↑ The track is named once as "Can't Wash Her Away" in the CD inlay booklet, but twice as "Wash Her Away".
  10. ↑ Can You Do Me Good? (Media notes). Del Amitri. Mercury / A&M. 2002.{{cite AV media notes}}: CS1 maint: others in cite AV media (notes) (link)
  11. ↑ Presumably producer Jonathan Quarmby.
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