Claude says:Counting Crows' fourth record arrived in 2002 as a conscious reset — tighter, crisper songs after the sprawling drift of the mid-'90s, with critics calling it their best since the debut. The title track nods to the Byrds, "Richard Manuel Is Dead" channels The Band with twin guitars, and their Joni Mitchell cover became an inescapable radio hit (though it earned brutal backlash for steamrolling the original's spirit). You had a few stray encounters over the years before it clicked in early 2024 — twenty-two years after release — when you worked through "American Girls," "Holiday in Spain," and the whole front half in a short burst.