Grant McLennan - Simone & Perry

All Music Guide

The biggest value of this single is the chance that someone who doesn't have Grant McLennan's wonderful third post-Go-Betweens solo LP, Horsebreaker Star, might stumble on this and be introduced to its charms. Anyone who hears "Simone Perry" and "Don't You Cry for Me No More" on this CD will immediately want to hear the other 17 lovely, wistful tracks (plus four others if you get the import). For those already quietly in love with that album, you still get a really nice version of the Byrds' "Ballad of Easy Rider," with more sonorous lap steel. Tracks like this make you think that every great singer/songwriter should pull a Dylan or Neil Young and go to Nashville to make a country-ish LP. But the "original," self-produced, acoustic version of Horsebreaker's greatest track, "What Went Wrong," loses much of what made that song such an epic, emotional battle. Without the backing band, it's still at war with itself and still has its haunting lyrical tenacity.

- Jack Rabid, All Music Guide