his CD is a reissue of two EPs released by the Oranges Band before their 2003 full-length debut All Around, which I have not heard. This means I won’t be able to write a paragraph about how it sounds compared to their later work. I have heard Spoon though, and I know damn well that bandleader Roman Kuebler has too.

I’m not saying that because the guy was Spoon’s touring bassist for a while, I’m saying this because the music found here, aside from Kuebler’s yelping, is a photocopy of what you’ll find on great albums like A Series Of Sneaks and Telephono. He’s incorporated it all: the staccato lurch, minimalist hooks, a drum sound with plenty of room ambience, Kim Deal-style background vocals on “Today, Are You Nervous”, dub echo on “Stars Are Ours (Stuck)” (the song most likely to inspire cries of “oh no, you didn’t!”) and single keyboard notes held over entire bars on “All Those Marching Feet”. The first track is even about an A&R guy (a subject Spoon gave a whole seven-inch to). I have to wonder how the hell Britt Daniel felt when he heard this stuff. Oh sure, its good to know a backing musician can handle your style, but didn’t it all feel a bit Single White Female? Did they have similar haircuts while on tour? Was Daniel’s gay upstairs neighbor missing for a week and later found in a trash bin?

This creepiness isn’t necessarily a bad thing for us listeners. Spoon first appealed to me because “Don’t Buy The Realistic” was a Pixies rip worthy of the Pixies themselves, and it’s not like I have too much Pixies. But just as Spoon’s differences from their influences became gradually evident, there are some idiosyncrasies to be found here as well. The vocals on “One Parts” are an infectious, incoherent holler (I appreciate that Kuebler doesn’t even go near Britt’s vocal style) and Spoon would never end a song with an interminable dragging coda like the Oranges Band does on “All Those Marching Feet”. If you prefer the elder band’s late 90s material to the recent Kill The Moonlight these collected EPs and unreleased material might be a sweet slice of nostalgia. And while I’m disappointed that corny indie fuxx aren’t more audibly screaming foul over the conceptual thievery here (that’s their job, isn’t it?), I figure the juvenilia of one band could do a lot worse than sound like the juvenilia of a superior one.