Stone Temple Pilots – Tiny Music…Songs From The Vatican Gift Shop
This was STP’s third, and in my opinion, their best album from 1996. While Core was a decent debut and Purple remains a classic; Tiny Music established STP as one of the best bands from the 90’s. The album was, and still is, incomparable to the rest of STP’s catalog.
Scott traded in his rougher pipes for a smoother set and proved that he had one of the best voices around. The DeLeo brothers beautifully blended some jazzy riffs with some 60’s style psychedelia. And, let’s not forget the underrated Eric Kretz holding it down with his sweet drumming. All of this created some magic that would become Tiny Music…Songs From The Vatican Gift Shop.
Tiny Music contained three big singles for the band, which were “Big Bang Baby”, “Lady Picture Show” and “Trippin’ on a Hole in a Paper Heart”. “Big Bang Baby” had obvious similarities to the Rolling Stones’ “Jumpin’ Jack Flash”, while “Lady Picture Show” was a beautiful ballad that showed STP’s real talent and “Trippin’ on a Hole” is still a solid rock track that was excellent during their live shows.
The album also featured some of my all time favorite STP songs, “Seven Caged Tigers”, “And So I Know”, “Tumble In The Rough” and “Adhesive”. Not only were these songs great, they were also diverse. “And So I Know”, for example, was a great loungy song that once again showed Scott had a lot to offer vocally. “Tumble In The Rough”, on the other hand, was a straight forward rock song that really brought out the brilliance of the DeLeos. “Adhesive”, my favorite STP song, is 5 minutes and 34 seconds of bliss.
While Tiny Music may not have been easy to digest, compared to Purple or even No. 4, it was STP’s masterpiece. The album where they finally separated themselves from the pack and established themselves as one of the greats from the 90’s. If you don’t own this album then you are missing out on a gem.
3 Comments
I agree that this was their smoothest — (that’s a good way to put it) album. Still, in my mind I have to go with Core. There are just too many songs on it that were important to me (for the time). But, having said that, I’ve met folks who don’t even have this album and I heartily agree that you must get it. It runs a real close second. Good eval.
Thanks for the comment, it’s nice to have some positive feedback about STP.
STP was one of a few bands that I followed throughout their career. Core certainly had some great tunes, Sin and Piece of Pie are killer, I think I just got tired of it. Tiny Music I just can’t get enough of. It really is a shame that some people don’t even know that it exists. But, one thing I love about music is that it is subjective, we all love music for their own personal reasons and then we share.
[...] that, here’s my post from last August: Stone Temple Pilots – Tiny Music…Songs From The Vatican Gift [...]