Sour Mash

(for the Lemonheads)

originally published January 24, 2007

From beany suburban Boston they sprang,

put out a trio of albums on Taang! -

kid stuff, wild oats, hardcore thrash, ‘Mats-meets-Dü,

“Amazing Grace” thrown in w/ hodgepodge & glue.

Fast-and-loud’s a blind alley. Before long

a little melancholy creeps into the songs,

a swaying sense of melody & swoon,

enamored of GP and other bayers at the moon.

Cover songs reveal the roots : “Luka” on Lick,

Lovey’s “Brass Buttons.” Still, though, not much sticks -

everything a little too woozy & canned.

Major-label debut, no real mess of fans -

biding time in that early-'90s anteroom,

pre-Nevermind alternative gold rush & boom,

one of a dozen bands bubbling under.

Dando goes dodo, goes really Down Under,

uses Australia to incubate Shame About Ray,

launches that baby into the sweet light of day -

the Breakthrough Belle of 1992!

Whole thing just felt cooked right, sweetness shot through

w/ lightning & junk, decorated w/ stoner’s proverbs

& enough hooks to send your car into the curb.

The pop album’s promise of all wrongs reversed,

along w/ good looks, sends Evan ascending into the curse

that is fame, or our strange culture’s version of it.

Pinup boy! Alterna-hunk! Reward of bit

part in Reality Bites, his name on the lips

of a million 13-year-old girls, sudden friendships

w/ people so famous they look funny up close.

All the smack & crack a lonely boy’s lungs & nose

& head & heart could hope to stomach. Push the hair

back from your eyes, look around, wonder how & why & where

you are, and by then your time has passed,

gone like a lizard in the summertime grass.

The albums after are as scrambled as you’d expect,

w/ enough moments scattered through them to make you inspect

the heavens for entrance into a firmament

that never existed, but should have : scent

of wildflowers & hard candy in the air,

every footfall on the pavement in time

w/ the next one over, every voice in rhyme

w/ its neighbor. Kurt Cobain’s still alive.

Jangle & stomp rules the radio & all five

known dimensions. There’s still room to move around,

there’s still an America made up of towns

& people who actually know each other.

Kids play the national anthem on steel guitars.

Weirdness preserved, elbow room amongst the spheres -

something along those lines. A few too many beers, here?

Making entirely too much of some pop songs, for God’s sake?

Well, sure. But look at what’s at stake :

everything. And nothing. And the whole traverse between.

How rock’n’roll works - let it get to you in your teens,

really get to you, and your life’s a map

of its promises kept & unkept, its sap

& its seedlings, its litter of three-minute moments.

A whistling break in a song makes no real sense,

but it makes more sense than a lot of other things.

Lemonheads! In town! Saturday night! Let the wires ring.

Jeff Fallis

The Lemonheads are playing at the 40 Watt Club on Saturday, Jan. 27. New York's VietNam is opening, and tickets, available in advance, cost $15.