All Music Guide review.)
In addition to the expanded and remastered CD, the hat. Special Edition also contains a region-free NTSC DVD featuring bonus tracks, rare studio footage, vintage live concert material, interviews with participants, and video from a 2006 reunion of the original core band (Mike Keneally, Doug Lunn and Toss Panos) performing songs from both albums. And of course, the first 3000 copies of each Special Edition will be personally signed and numbered by Mike.
The hat. DVD includes
- Footage from the 1992 recording sessions
- An entire concert from 1993-- the first Mike Keneally show under his own name, featuring the live debut of many hat. classics
- A 2006 reunion session with Keneally, Doug Lunn and Toss Panos playing "Cheddar," "Here Is Why" and "Here Is What I Dreamed"
- Interview footage with key album participants
- Other odds and ends, mostly odds
- The "hat salad" function, which allows you the choice of experiencing these items in random order, an unpredictable banquet of entertainment chunks much like the original album.
- Also-- the DVD has an audio archive with nearly 30 additional tracks, including home demos, alternate mixes and the promo-only "Rosemary Girl" single mix
"This album is the sound of someone who can't believe he's finally being allowed to make a real live solo album. I was giddy while making this album," Mike wrote of his 1992 debut, hat.. "One listen to this thing and you'll know a lot about what makes me tick." Out of print for years, hat. has been remastered and music previously cut to fit a 1992 CD has been restored. "You'll now be able to hear 'Lightnin' Roy' the way it was supposed to be heard," explains Mike, "and songs like 'Snowcow' and 'The Car Song' will have their guitar solos reinstated to their full fullness. All-in-all we were able to add in another three minutes of music which you should have heard fourteen years ago, so I'm plenty jazzed." All Music Guide gives hat. four-and-a-half stars out of five. Mike is supported on hat. by the likes of Doug Lunn, Scott Thunes, Toss Panos, Mark DeCerbo and Kevin Gilbert.
Here are the songs on the remastered hat. CD:
- Your Quimby Dollars At Work
- I Can't Stop
- Ugly Town
- Open Up!
- Dhen Tin
- Spearmint Pup
- Fencing
- Always Man
- My Immense Superiority Over The Silverfish
- Eno And The Actor
- The Car Song
- Heaven Likes You/Apple Pie
- Backstage With Wilson Phillips
- Here Is What I Dreamed
- Here Is Why
- Performing Miracles
- Spoon Guy
- And That's Why It's Called Spunk
- Johnny One-Note/The Exciting New Toothpaste From Mars
- Day Of The Cow 1
- Snowcow
- Day Of The Cow 2
- We're Rockin' All Night With The Tangy Flavor Of Cheddar
- Rosemary Girl
- Lightnin' Roy