Some claim this to be Paul's first "solo" record. While others claim a final whimper from an incredible rock and roll band. When it's all said and done it's 13 more beautifully crafted Paul Westerberg songs. Listen to the words sung in "Nobody". Facing marriage and still flipping it the middle finger. The longing and desire for a woman in "Bent Out of Shape". The frightening "All Shook Down" which to me really describes what this band state of mind/shape it was in when this was recorded. Then to the final song on the record,"The Last". Total closure on a ten-year ride in rock and roll.

The great thing about Paul's songs is that you do not need to know what he was writing about or what his feelings are about a specific song or record. I truly believe more than any other rock band on this earth that no one has written songs where once you let them into your life those same songs when heard ten years later you still feel that same emotion that you first felt when it reached your ears.

It's amazing that this man, his band and his music fell through the cracks. The biggest crime of all is that not enough people were aware of a band in a decade of vapid pop and schlock heavy metal bands that all sounded the same and looked the same. A true original goes unnoticed again. Isn't that always the way.....

The bad news is that All Shook Down is not truly a Replacements album. The great news is that it is a Paul Westerberg album. Many longtime Mats fans, already jaded by the glossy "Don't Tell A Soul", probably ran screaming when they heard the fine tunes on this effort.

Even though it ain't really the Mats, this CD has some of the best songwriting Paul has done. 'Sadly Beautiful' is an excellent tender ballad. 'Nobody' and 'One Wink at a Time' are also great songs. This CD also is a great example of Westerberg's evolution as a songwriter. Yes, these songs were written by the very same man who wrote "Customer", "Bastards of Young", and "Alex Chilton."

The album is quiet and introspective and very good if listened to in the right perspective. Give it a try, but spread the listening out between doses of the classic Replacements albums

the replacements album that replacements fans weren't thrilled about is my personel favorite (and I had been a fan for years,in fact,when I was putting a band together several years before,while advertising for a guitarist,I requested that anyone auditioning should have a rolling stones mind and a replacements heart.) All Shook Down probably has a sentimental value to me,but I dunno,I think Westerberg's song writing on trhe record had finally hit a real apex,a real roll,one that he would carry over into his solo work.(Another complaint from replacements fans was that it was really a Paul Westerberg solo album. I saw them twice during the All Shook Down tour. Once at the Beacon in nyc and at Madison Square Garden where they opened for Elvis Costello and believe me,they sounded like THE Replacements (only not a drunken mess.)

Inconsitant and often frustrating, this album is hardly the way most pictured the mats going out. Yet it certainly has its moments of raw power, albiet quiet moments. "Sadly Beautiful" and "Nobody" are stunners and "Merry Go Round" bounces with that patented mats strut. "Happy Town" may be embaressingly silly but the albums closer more than makes up for it. Is "The Last" about the band, about Bob Stinson, as it was so eloquently put below, or is it just Paul trying not to give up? Anyway you look at it "The Last" is one of the most desperatly beautiful songs ever recorded. "Would it hurt to fall in love a little slower? I know it hurts at any speed." We miss you guys.

a lot of people crucify this album, but i really dig it. not as a 'mats record, but as the best paul westerberg solo record. what a lot of people forget, or just don't know, is that this was supposed to be paul's solo debut, but due to contractual obligations, the replacements' name was put on it. chris, tommy, and slim barely played on any of the tracks, and bob had been long out of the band by the time it was made.

what this is, is an amazing, calm, sober solo outing from an established artist, much like rod stewart's "every picture tells a story," and it rates right up there with the replacements' latter-day work on "don't tell a soul", and it's definitely better than most of the mainstream early-'90s pop that it inspired. and it's by far the best paul westerberg solo album.

if you're just all about the messy stuff the 'mats did in the bob days, then avoid it. but if you're open to it, it's a pretty amazing record. sure, it falls flat a few times, but there are very few albums that don't.