Another one of Cheap Trick’s best post-Dream Police albums, alongside Woke Up With a Monster and Rockford. Special One succeeds their 1997 self-titled, another solid album, but the two albums sound considerably different.

In fact, this is probably Cheap Trick’s most unorthodox record. It doesn’t have the poppy sheen-like production values of many of their other releases, and the band seems a lot more restrained in their playing rather than just rocking out, and the music isn’t as upbeat as some of their earlier releases.

The opening track, “Scent of a Woman” is a typical Cheap Trick rocker, but the track “Special One” is an acoustic ballad with a strong oriental influence (maybe yet another throwback to The Beatles or a simple tribute to their Japan following, either way it’s a highlight on this record) and a return to Cheap Trick’s dark lyrics; the song is about suicide. The band’s vocalist Robin Zander once commented that this album has a bit of all the styles of music the band likes and that the album is their most diverse record. He’s probably right.

While this does have a slight issue of causing the album not to flow together well (for the most part, each song sounds like it could be on a different album) it isn’t as important as the fact that all the tracks are solid Cheap Trick songs. There isn’t a stinker on the album, and as such I would recommend this album to fans, as it ends up being one of their strongest collections of songs. Save it for after the first 4 albums, Woke Up With a Monster and Rockford though.

Album track highlights: “Scent of a Woman,” “Too Much,” “Special One,” “Words,” “Sorry Boy”