Soul Asylum

Certain Songs #2380: Soul Asylum – “To My Own Devices”

June 11, 2022 by Jim Connelly

Album: Let Your Dim Light Shine
Year: 1995

. . .

My first jobs in San Francisco were both in what was known as the South Park area. This was in 1995, so long ago that not only did I park in a parking lot that was where the Giants now play baseball, I attended the groundbreaking for what was then called “Pac Bell Park.”

Anyways, one of the nice things about that area was that it had two record stores that were right there on Third Street: one of which was a cool indie store whose name has now escaped me, and the other one was a Tower Records Outlet, which featured discounted CDs that didn’t sell enough in their regular stores.

Certain Songs #2379: Soul Asylum – “Summer of Drugs”

June 10, 2022 by Jim Connelly

Album: Sweet Relief
Year: 1993

. . .

One of the weirder things that happened during the exact moment Soul Asylum were blowing up on the back of “Runaway Train” was that the Victoria Williams tribute album Sweet Relief was released.

Obviously, it wasn’t planned that way — Sweet Relief was conceived after Williams was diagnosed with MS in 1992. American healthcare being the corrupt shitshow it’s been for decades, Victoria’s friends organized this 20th century version of a GoFundMe to help pay her bills.

Certain Songs #2378: Soul Asylum – “Somebody To Shove”

June 9, 2022 by Jim Connelly

Album: Grave Dancers Union
Year: 1992

. . .

It should have been this one. Goddamnit, it should have been this one.

I mean, the time was right: Grave Dancers Union came out at the exact moment that Nirvana had blown the doors open for punk rock songs with massive hooks, and “Somebody To Shove” was objectively exactly that kind of song. Not to mention objectively the greatest song that David Pirner ever wrote.

Certain Songs #2377: Soul Asylum – “Cartoon”

June 8, 2022 by Jim Connelly

Album: Hang Time
Year: 1988

. . .

For a couple of years there, I thought that “Long Way Home” was going to be the only song by Soul Asylum that I loved, as nothing from their next record, While You Were Out — their second album in 1986 — really resonated with me.

And in fact, I’m absolutely positive that I dropped the needle on 1988’s Hang Time when it got to KFSR and didn’t find anything I liked either. It was only after I saw the video for “Cartoon” on 120 Minutes that it jumped out at me. But it really really did.

Certain Songs #2376: Soul Asylum – “Long Way Home”

June 7, 2022 by Jim Connelly

B-side, 1986

. . .

Dave Pirner was enough of a fixture on the Minneapolis-St. Paul music that the legend is that he was the one who yelled “fuck you!” at the Minneapolis police during the party being busted at the beginning of 1982’s Stink EP by The Replacements. And while his band, Soul Asylum, ended up having some huge success in the 1990s, that was absolutely unthinkable when Soul Asylum’s 1984 debut, Say What You Will… hit KFSR.