Archives for August 2019

Certain Songs #1621: The Posies – “Ontario”

August 30, 2019 by Jim Connelly

Album: Amazing Disgrace
Year: 1996

The second time I saw the Posies they weren’t really the Posies, they were Big Star.

Or half of Big Star, anyways.

Instead of immediately jumping back into the studio to leverage the momentum they’d acquired from the (relative) success of Frosting on the Beater, Ken Stringfellow and Jon Auer instead filled in for the Chris Bell and Andy Hummel for a series of shows where Alex Chilton and Jody Stephens finally kinda sorta cashed in on a legacy that had been growing for a decade.

The show I saw was at the Fillmore in San Francisco on June 15, 1994, and it was just fine, though — as expected — Alex Chilton still didn’t really understand what the fuss was all about, even as one of the biggest rock bands on the planet at the time, The Counting Crows, opened the show under a pseudonym.

Certain Songs #1620: The Posies – “Solar Sister”

August 29, 2019 by Jim Connelly

Album: Frosting on the Beater
Year: 1993

. . .

My favorite song from Frosting on the Beater, “Solar Sister,” was described by Ken Stringfellow on 120 Minutes as “kind of an anthem of admiration for a person who doesn’t appreciate themselves,” which I have no doubt is true, but it’s never been a song that got over to me because of the lyrics.

Which isn’t to say that “Solar Sister” isn’t an instantly memorable title, because it totally and completely is, but what I really love is the perfect balance between loud guitars, exquisite harmonies and dynamic song structure.

Certain Songs #1619: The Posies – “Dream All Day”

August 28, 2019 by Jim Connelly

Album: Frosting on the Beater
Year: 1993

. . .

A lot happened to Seattle between the release of Dear 23 in the summer of 1990 and the release of Frosting on the Beater in the spring of 1993. You might have heard about it. It was in all of the papers.

But it must have been weird for The Posies to watch their grunge peers suddenly take over the world with the guitars cranked up to eleven without sacrificing the hooks in the process. No doubt Ken Stringfellow & Jon Auer looked at each other and were all like “hey, we can do that too!” and so Frosting on the Beater — produced by Don Fleming rather than John Leckie — was the only Posies album that kinda sounded in step with the times in which it came out. Which might be why I didn’t like it nearly as much as Dear 23: while in theory I’m always gonna love pop melodies lashed to loud guitars, I’m not sure that the tunes were as distinctive as on the previous record.

Certain Songs #1618: The Posies – “Suddenly Mary”

August 27, 2019 by Jim Connelly

Album: Dear 23
Year: 1990

. . .

The second single from Dear 23 is the one that I actually remember as a single, of course that’s probably because I ended up buying the CD single in order to hear one of the b-sides, a cover of Big Star’s “Feel.” Which, of course, was the first time I realized just how much of Big Star fans Jon Auer and Ken Stringfellow were.

A soaring swirling piece of mid-tempo power-pop goodness which steals the beat from XTC’s “Towers of London,” Jon Auer’s “Suddenly Mary” is another cautionary tale about getting married too young and perhaps to the wrong person.

Certain Songs #1617: The Posies – “Any Other Way”

August 26, 2019 by Jim Connelly

Album: Dear 23
Year: 1990

. . .

There was a bit of a speedbump in terms of my fully appreciating Dear 23, and it happened about a month after I bought the album, which I liked, but still wasn’t sure I loved.

It happened when Doc and I went down to Hollywood in January 1991 to see The Posies open for The Replacements on what we kinda knew without knowing was going to be the final Replacements tour — at this point, Chris Mars has already left — and they seemed like a strange fit to me. At the time, of course, I didn’t realize that they were worshipers at the altar of Chilton just like Westerberg, and in fact the only thing I knew about them was that they all had the same hair.

Certain Songs #1616: The Posies – “Golden Blunders”

August 25, 2019 by Jim Connelly

Album: Dear 23
Year: 1990

It was a weird time in my life when I got obsessed by Dear 23. It was December 1990, a fucking cold cold month which climaxed with a surprise snowfall during Sedan Delivery’s opening set for the Miss Alans. My brother John had recently moved into the house I’d originally rented with my recently-departed girlfriend, and my drums and band had overtaken the living room now that she had gone.

And here was this Posies record, which had been out a few months before I purchased it, and while I was suspicious of DGC records and the generally big production, the songwriting — always credited to Jon Auer and Ken Stringfellow — won me over. And while “Golden Blunders” wasn’t the first song that won me over, at some point, it became my favorite song on the record.

Certain Songs #1615: Pop Art – “The Party”

August 24, 2019 by Jim Connelly

Album: A Perfect Mental Picture
Year: 1985

. . .

In 1985, Pop Art fulfilled the promise of their self-titled EP with their first full-length album, A Perfect Mental Picture, filled with fourteen intricate guitar-pop songs filled with smart details about the search for love — or at least lust — among twentysomethings.

And, as I don’t have to tell you, it totally and completely took over the world, becoming the biggest-album of 1985, totally and completely turning the music business on its ear, as all of the major labels rushed to sign and release lo-fi guitar pop bands.

Certain Songs #1614: Pop Art – “Cover Me”

August 23, 2019 by Jim Connelly

Album: Pop Art EP
Year: 1984

. . .

While there are loads and loads of bands with a pair of brothers in them — The Kinks, Oasis, Rank and File, Screaming Trees, Sedan Delivery — it’s much rarer to have a band with three or more brothers where they’re not the entire band.

Off the top of my head, I can think of two, both based in Southern California. The Beach Boys, of course, and the far less famous Pop Art. (UPDATE: I found another one! Turns out that the first two Bachman-Turner Overdrive album featured three Bachmans: Randy, Rob and Tim.) Consisting of singer David Steinhart, his brothers Jeff and Rich on guitars and a couple of other guys as the rhythm section, Pop Art some pretty great records of majestic jangle-pop, and even started their own label to release those records.

Certain Songs #1613: The Pooh Sticks – “Baby Wanna Go Round With Me”

August 22, 2019 by Jim Connelly

Album: Million Seller
Year: 1993

. . .

The Pooh Sticks started their life as Scottish indie jokesters, releasing singles with inside joke titles like “I Know Someone Who Knows Someone Who Knows Alan McGee Quite Well” and “Indie Pop Ain’t Noise Pollution” or album titles like The Great White Wonder.

But, of course, if you joke about something long enough, it’s often because you truly love it, and so it came to pass that the third album by the Pooh Sticks, the optimistically titled Million Seller, is a true power pop gem, with couple of songs that match what fellow Scots Teenage Fanclub were doing at the time. Million Seller was filled with songs like the joyful “The World is Turning On,” the gorgeously twee “Rainbow Rider,” and the absolutely irresistible “Baby Wanna Go Round With Me.”

Certain Songs #1612: The Police – “Synchronicity II”

August 21, 2019 by Jim Connelly

Album: Synchronicity
Year: 1983

. . .

So, as probably wouldn’t surprise many of you, I’ve been thinking a lot recently about what it means to be in a band again. Or be in a band at all. Back in the day, I used to joke that being in the band — at least a local band — meant you had all of the responsibilities of both a job and a relationship, only you didn’t didn’t get paid and you didn’t get laid.

And given that I’m writing this just a couple of days before my band’s first gig since January 18, 1992 (not that I’ve been keeping track) — though it won’t post until afterwards — and in the intervening time, I think I’d forgotten all of the logistics, compromises and work involved. All of which is worth it when everything clicks, of course, and you’re making a sound that nobody has ever quite made before and everybody is contributing equally to that sound.