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Electro-Shock Blues

Electro-Shock Blues
Eels-Blues.jpg
Studio album by Eels
Released September 21, 1998
Recorded 1998
Genre Indie rock
Length 48:09
Label DreamWorks
Producer
Eels chronology
Beautiful Freak
(1996)
Electro-Shock Blues
(1998)
Daisies of the Galaxy
(2000)
Singles from Electro-Shock Blues
  1. "Last Stop: This Town"
    Released: September 14, 1998
  2. "Cancer for the Cure"
    Released: November 30, 1998
  3. "Climbing to the Moon"
    Released: 1998 (promo)
  4. "3 Speed"
    Released: 1998 (promo)
Professional ratings
Review scores
Source Rating
AllMusic 4.5/5 stars
Encyclopedia of Popular Music 5/5 stars
Entertainment Weekly A−
The Guardian 4/5 stars
Los Angeles Times 4/4 stars
NME 7/10
Q 3/5 stars
Rolling Stone 3.5/5 stars
Select 4/5
The Village Voice B

Electro-Shock Blues is the second studio album by American alternative rock band Eels. It was released in the United Kingdom on September 21, 1998 and October 20 in the United States by record label DreamWorks.

Electro-Shock Blues was written largely in response to frontman Mark Oliver Everett's (more commonly known as E) sister's suicide and his mother's terminal lung cancer. The title refers to the electroconvulsive therapy received by Elizabeth Everett when she was institutionalized. Many of the songs deal with their decline, his response to loss and coming to terms with suddenly becoming the only living member of his family (his father having died of a heart attack in 1982; Everett, then 19 years old, was the first to discover his body).

Though much of the album is, on its surface, bleak, its underlying message is that of coping with some of life's most difficult occurrences. The record begins with "Elizabeth on the Bathroom Floor", a sparse piece composed of one of his deceased sister's final diary entries. Later, the album's emotional climax is reached in two tracks: "Climbing to the Moon", which draws upon E's experiences visiting his sister at a mental health facility shortly before her death; and "Dead of Winter", a song about his mother's painful radiation treatment and slow succumbing. The album's last song, entitled "P.S. You Rock My World", is a hopeful bookend to "Elizabeth", containing subtly humorous lyrics that describe, among other things, an elderly woman at a gas station honking her car at E, incorrectly assuming he is the attendant, and E's decision that "maybe it's time to live".

According to the Eels official website, the song "Baby Genius" is about E's father, Dr. Hugh Everett III, a quantum physicist who authored the Many Worlds Theory. "Baby Genius" has, as the basis for its melody, the carol "O Sanctissima".

At the time of the album's recording, the only official Eels members were E himself and drummer Butch Norton, as Tommy Walter had left the band. Therefore, the recording features guest appearances by T-Bone Burnett, Lisa Germano, Grant Lee Phillips and Jon Brion.


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