Pitchfork

The Replacements were a teenager's band. Led by Paul Westerberg, who yearned for high notes more often than he actually hit them, they gave voice to all those knotty emotions that overwhelmed your 16-year-old self. Any band can do that, but Westerberg sang with the benefit of hindsight, and the message he sent from his twenties was crucial and reassuring; all those bursting, longing feelings were worthwhile and even useful out in the real world. In fact, the Replacements presented that emotional confusion as a kind of moral code with which the world could be understood, a compass with which to navigate life's disappointments and tragedies. Heard at the right age, this band truly could be your life.

On his first collection of post-Replacements material, Besterberg: The Best of Paul Westerberg (which is a great title and begs a companion rarities comp called Resterberg), the former Replacement no longer sounds like a teenager in a twentysomething body. He's resolutely adult, more mature and perhaps more cautious of the world. He gives himself over completely to the na-na-na's on the "cutesy" (his word, not mine) "Dyslexic Heart" and the piss-and-vinegar of "World Class Fad", but Westerberg sings songs like "Runaway Wind" and "Love Untold" from a distance, a mere observer rather than a participant. Even the B-side "Man Without Ties", about spending Friday night with a frozen pizza, seems to be about someone else. "A Star Is Bored" (ironically, from the Friends soundtrack) trades adolescent disaffection for celebrity disaffection-- maybe Winona digs it, but the rest of us can't really identify with four-star hotel anomie.

There are, however, a few moments on Besterberg when Westerberg deftly captures that sense of youthful confusion: On "Stain Your Blood" he sings "Stay the night just for fun" with the desperation either of a kid whose parents are away for the weekend or of an adult who really doesn't want to face the morning alone. His characters are essentially the same no matter how many years separate them, but searching for the boy inside the man proves much more fruitful for Westerberg than finding the adult in the boy. On "Love Untold" he sings of a young romance that ends before it starts, but besides the grinding guitar solo, the song sounds saccharine.

Amazingly, Besterberg works better as an album than his first three proper albums. Not only does it reject the worsterberg, but it also presents its own solid story of high hopes and low pay-off. The first half of the album finds him playing it relatively safe, perhaps in a bid for post-Replacements respectability (and who doesn't deserve it more?), but as 14 Songs and Eventually tank, he grows pricklier and his music sounds rawer and more inhabited, his trajectory mirroring that of his idol, Alex Chilton.

This prickliness becomes Westerberg, even when he assumes his Grandpaboy persona. As a result, Besterberg gets better as it proceeds and as Westerberg grows more comfortable just left of the spotlight. "Let the Bad Times Roll" roils with offhanded resignation, and he sings "What a Day (for a Night)" with the dreamy sigh of someone who can't believe his dumb luck. On "All That I Had", which was inexplicably relegated to B-side status, Westerberg erases any distance between himself and the song and explains himself better than anyone else can: "Didn't follow my dreams/ I lost the map/ I lived my fantasy instead/ Until I found it was a trap/ Gave a life, got a living/ Hey, that's all right, all's forgiven."