The Album
Unknown Soldier: Are you surprised at the choice of covers here or are they more or less what you'd expect from the band?
Anteater: Mostly yes, but like any Toto outing there's a few curveballs.
Anteater: Anyone who has followed these guys awhile would probably be expecting Beatles, Hendrix or Bob Dylan covers, and you get a bit of that. But to also see Elvis Costello and Bob Marley among the covers is leaning towards left-field.
Unknown Soldier: For some strange reason, whenever I think of this album I always think that there is a Hendrix song somewhere on the album, but of course there isn't as he was covered elsewhere as you just mentioned.
Unknown Soldier: I don’t think that Bob Marley is surprising as bands like Led Zeppelin were really into him but Elvis Costello is a real surprise here.
Anteater: Lukather actually had something to say about that cover during an interview I saw awhile back. "The Elvis thing was a piss-take, because we knew he hated us. We thought it would be fun — he writes great songs. But yeah, we did it on purpose. Willfully baiting them. F— you guys! We’ll do whatever the f— we wanna do. But still, it was an interim record, and a lot of that stuff was very tongue-in-cheek, and I don’t think a lot of people got the sarcasm."
Anteater: I think those feelings in general fuel this album to one extent or another: the guys in Toto want to show off their influences and also have some fun at the expense of the critics.
Unknown Soldier: Most people liking Elvis Costello would probably dislike Toto anyway but personally I think the Costello cover here is one of the best on the album "Watching the Detectives"
Unknown Soldier: I also think that the George Harrison penned "While My Guitar Gently Weeps" one of the strongest as well, but it's such a fantastic song anyway and it seems like a million artists have covered it.
Anteater: That's an understatement, but Lukather makes a really good go of it.
Anteater: My favorite cover here is probably Herbie Hancock's Maiden Voyage, but Toto are good with jazz-oriented material in general, so it’s in their arena.
Unknown Soldier: That's the seven minute instrumental and of course the jazz orientated material would be right up their street.
Unknown Soldier: The Steely Dan cover of "Bodhisattva" is one of the obvious covers here and the one I always remember from the album.
Anteater: That's one of my picks too, and I would have found it funny if we hadn't gotten at least one Steely Dan song here lol
Anteater: On the whole though, I don't know how to rank this album overall compared to other Toto albums. It's like trying to compare Queensryche's Take Cover or insert other long standing rock/metal act cover album to their classic original works. Not sure if it’s fair or not.
Unknown Soldier: Well I prefer it over Tambu and Kingdom of Desire
and it has the decency to be a decent length.
Anteater: Haha, I almost think Toto could have cherry-picked the best material from KoD, Tambu and Mindfields and did a new greatest hits.
Anteater: In any case, this is a good covers album and different songs will appeal to different people.
Unknown Soldier: That would have been an awesome album, by taking the cream of those three albums.
Unknown Soldier: Now talking of Cream "Sunshine Of Your Love" is probably the heaviest cover on the album along with "House of the Rising Sun".
Anteater: Enjoyed both of those as well.
Unknown Soldier: I actually think the cover of the Cream song is actually quite poor, I don't think Lukather vocally pulls it off for some reason.
Anteater: If I'm not mistaken, you’re not the biggest fan of Lukather as a vocalist from KoD onwards
Unknown Soldier: Well strangely enough I think minus that song he does a good job on this album and no I didn't like him as the sole vocalist of the band, but with Bobby back on the last album proper I kind of liked him again.
Unknown Soldier: But he does a superb job on the Elvis Costello song and sounds like Elvis himself.
Anteater: The irony is telling lol
Unknown Soldier: Hahaha
Anteater: 'Through The Looking Glass' on the whole does a good job at demonstrating Toto's diversity as a group. The only thing really missing was maybe a Yes cover or some of their AOR contemporaries.
Unknown Soldier: I think the big hole here, is a really heavy cover rather than a 60s bluesy one.
Anteater: I could see Toto covering Black Sabbath or the like
Unknown Soldier: I had Deep Purple more in mind here actually, with Kimball covering a Gillan vocal for example.
Anteater: That would have actually been a perfect fit.
Unknown Soldier: Finally we get David Paich turning up for the final song which is a Dylan cover and I guess his now rough voice suits it, but hell did his voice go downhill.
Anteater: Makes sense he would do a Dylan cover then
Unknown Soldier: Well, Dylan's a pretty crap vocalist, which is why when everybody else covers his material it always sounds great.
Anteater: For novelty's sake, I would have found it hilarious if they had thrown in a Backstreet Boys cover or Britney Spears.
Unknown Soldier: Luckily they didn't. but what would you say was the poorest cover here?
Anteater: Probably either the Dylan one or the Stevie Wonder cover, simply because they're just too by the numbers.
Anteater: Nothing interesting from a production or performance standpoint: they're just true to the originals and that's it.
Unknown Soldier: I'd agree with the fact that they're very true to the originals or try to be, rather than pulling the songs apart like some bands would do here.
Anteater: There's nothing really that "weak" here though, since all the songs themselves are fine compositionally.
Unknown Soldier: The album cover is related in style to both Mindfields and Livefields as well.
Anteater: Yeah, it's got a painted postmodernism thingy going on
Unknown Soldier: Finally of note the Bob Marley track "Could This Be Love" was the chosen single from the album, which kind of made sense as it's a track that everybody knows.
Anteater: I like it well enough, but who can out-Marley the Marley?
Anteater: I know I can't....
Unknown Soldier: A good point there and straight after this, out came the Toto live release Live in Amsterdam the 25th anniversary thingy.
Anteater: Oh right
Unknown Soldier: This album would of course bring the band into the current century.