This album was released at about the same time that I was starting as a freshman in college. My brother had bought Penn's debut album March back in 1989 on the basis of the minor radio/MTV hit "No Myth." I liked the original album moderately, but it wasn't necessarily something I listened to very much. I didn't even have a copy of it, and we always copied each others tapes at the time if we wanted a copy to listen to ourselves. Anyway, my brother had bought the new tape and offered to let me take it back with me to school (2.5 hours away) and listen to it. I still remember that because I listened to the album over and over again on the way back to Tuscaloosa. With only ten songs and a running time of slightly under 40 minutes, that's nearly four times through. It was so interesting, different, and enjoyable, I didn't want to stop listening to it.
This album features some fine acoustic guitar playing, lyrical complexity, dark themes, and catchy, singable tunes. At the time of his debut, Michael Penn seemed poised to take the mantle of poet singer from the likes of Bob Dylan. However, the grunge revolution led by groups like Nirvana changed the music world by the time this album came around, and Penn's career has never reached the popular heights of his first release. Free-For-All is an example then of what might have been, and is perhaps Penn's finest effort.
My favorite track on the album is "Long Way Down (Look What the Cat Drug In)," which features a pure, clean acoustic guitar that sounds like Penn is in the room with you and a biting, cynical lyric about the girl he loves who is returning from a night on the town without him. There are other acoustic gems in "Coal" and "By the Book" with fast-paced rockers like "Free Time" and "Seen the Doctor" to liven the pace. This album is highly underrated, and gets better with every hearing. And it looks like Amazon has it for 1 cent, so how can you beat that?
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