Medialoper

Certain Songs #2568: Superchunk – “Digging For Something”

March 7, 2023 by Jim Connelly

Album: Majesty Shredding
Year: 2010

Superchunk put out just a single album after the turn of the century, 2001’s (un?)ironically-titled Here’s To Shutting Up before taking an extended break that felt for all the world like they were breaking up, even if they released live albums and compilations throughout much of the 2000s.

And it wasn’t like the band members totally faded into the woodwork, either. Mac McCaughan continued to release his solo albums under the Portastatic moniker and drummer Jon Wurster not only became a radio star from his work on The Best Show on WFMU — just as I only know him from his drumming (sorry gang, I don’t have unlimited time for everything I would love), other folks probably only know him from The Best Show — he also became the full-time drummer for both The Mountain Goats and the Bob Mould band and a shitton of other great great artists.

Certain Songs #2567: Superchunk – “Honey Bee”

March 6, 2023 by Jim Connelly

Album: Hello Hawk
Year: 1995

. . .

Unlike Here’s Where The Strings Come In, the album where the strings actually came in for Superchunk was their final album of the 1990s, 1999’s Hello Hawk, which was produced by Jim O’Rourke, just before he got involved with the Sonic Youth story and the Wilco story.

Obviously, both a softening and thickening of a guitar band’s sound is going to happen eventually, but what I wasn’t prepared for was Hello Hawk to sport a song that ranks with my very favorite Superchunk songs: after the eternal “Mower” and the blast of “Slack Motherfucker,” I rate “Honey Bee” at the very highest of their songs, on the shortlist of Prettiest Songs Ever Recorded, Indie Rock Division.

Certain Songs #2566: Superchunk – “Burn Last Sunday”

March 5, 2023 by Jim Connelly

Album: Indoor Living
Year: 1997

. . .

Superchunk kept it moving forward in the mid-1990s, releasing two records in 1995: the singles compilation Incidental Music (1991-1995) as well as a regular studio album, Here’s Where The Strings Come In. Just because I’m not writing about any of the songs from either of those records — though the song “Foolish” (left off of the album of the same name) from the former and the long and lovely “Sunshine State” from the latter are both worth checking out. As are both albums, honestly.

Certain Songs #2565: Superchunk – “Driveway to Driveway”

March 4, 2023 by Jim Connelly

Album: Foolish
Year: 1994

. . .

It’s always difficult when the people who founded a band — who founded anything, really — break up. Oft times, it signals the demise of the band, as they realize that the need for full separation outweighs everything else. Other times, though, they soldier on, which is what happened with Superchunk as singer/guitarist Mac McCaughan and bassist Laura Ballance broke up as Superchunk was working on their fourth album, 1994’s Foolish.

Honestly, I have no idea what happened: they were a couple. They founded Superchunk. They founded Merge Records. They broke up, and both Superchunk and Merge Records remained going concerns. Everything else would be speculation on my part, up to and including whether or not any of the songs on Foolish and the subsequent albums were about the breakup, though Ballance has discussed how difficult it was to tour Foolish.

Certain Songs #2564: Superchunk – “Mower”

March 2, 2023 by Jim Connelly

Album: On The Mouth
Year: 1993

. . .

At the same time that Superchunk were releasing all of the singles that ended up on the epochal Tossing Seeds (Singles 89-91) compilation, they also recorded two albums for Matador: 1990’s Superchunk and 1991’s Steve Albini-engineered No Pocky For Kitty.

Certain Songs #2563: Superchunk – “The Train From Kansas City”

March 1, 2023 by Jim Connelly

Album: Tossing Seeds (Singles 89-91)
Year: 1989

. . .

While Superchunk’s version of the immortal “The Train From Kansas City” wasn’t the first version I ever heard — that would be The Shop Assistants version from their 1988 album, which I’d purchased in the wake of my love for The Primitives — it was the first one that well and truly stuck with me. Probably because I listened to Tossing Seeds (Singles 89-91) way more than I listened to that Shop Assistants album, though I did put their version of “The Train From Kansas City” on a mixtape, so it musta stuck stuck out a bit.

Certain Songs #2562: Superchunk – “Garlic”

February 28, 2023 by Jim Connelly

Album: Tossing Seeds (Singles 89-91)
Year: 1990

. . .

As someone who learned early on that the stinking rose makes just about every type of meat that much more tasty — and once or twice ate the stuff raw (after several drinks, of course) — I absolutely couldn’t resist one of the other highlights of Tossing Seeds (Singles 89-91), the gloriously noisy “Garlic.”

Certain Songs #2561: Superchunk – “Slack Motherfucker”

February 27, 2023 by Jim Connelly

Album: Tossing Seeds (Singles 89-91)
Year: 1990

. . .

OK, so a couple of things here: I’m using a couple of technicalities to start off the Superchunk posts with “Slack Motherfucker.” First, while it was the first single to be credited to “Superchunk,” it wasn’t the first single they released, as they had released a single in 1989 — which has their great version of “Train From Kansas City,” — credited to “Chunk,” an inside joke based on the name of their drummer, Chuck Garrison, being misspelled in the phone book.

Secondly, while “Slack Motherfucker” also showed up on their 1991 self-titled debut, the album to hear it is their early singles compilation, 1992’s Tossing Seeds (Singles 89-91), which I think rivals the Buzzcocks Singles Going Steady or Squeeze’s Singles 45s and Under in terms of perfectly capturing a band that left it all out there on the 7″ single.

Certain Songs #2560: Super 5 Thor – “Gazelle”

February 24, 2023 by Jim Connelly

Album: Gazelle
Year: 1997

. . .

Unlike the first Super 5 Thor album, Ford, which had started as a bunch of guitar and vocal tracks recorded by Scott Oliver and Manny Diez with the bass & drums overdubbed later on, the second album, 1997’s Gazelle was a little bui more thought through. A little bit, as this time everybody played the basic tracks in the same studio, with Scott & Manny joined by Ron Woods on bass, and the mysterious Alisa on the drums.

Certain Songs #2559: Super 5 Thor – “Breath”

February 23, 2023 by Jim Connelly

Album: Ford
Year: 1996

. . .

After the Miss Alans wrote and recorded the batch of songs that eventually became Ledger, the final album of their initial run, Scott Oliver had a bunch of song ideas that he didn’t think were quite right for The Miss Alans, being a bit too simple. Meanwhile, Manny Diez also had some ideas that were maybe too avant-garde for the Miss Alans. So, like chocolate and peanut butter, they decided to combine, Manny and Scott working together just to get their ideas out of their heads.