at a glance...

Hometown: Northampton, MA
First Recordings: 1989

Personnel:
Lou Barlow -guitar, vocals
Jason Lowenstein -bass, vocals
Russ Pollard -drums

Bands in the family :
Folk Implosion, Deluxx, Sentridoh, Dinosaur Jr.

Notes:
Historically, Sebadoh has an ever-shuffling band roster, and The Sebadoh is the first to feature this particular trio (Bob Fay pounded the skins on Harmacy, their 1996 release). Sebadoh's premier recording, Freed Weed (1989), included founding member Eric Gaffney, who intermittently disappeared and re-appeared on the scene until he left the band for good in 1993. Barlow is known for his never-ending side-projects, which include Sentridoh, an often laughable bedroom tape-recorder project that brings lo-fi down to no-fi. Particularly amusing is his horrendous cover of Bryan Adams '80's top-40 hit "I'm Gonna Run to You." On the other end of the spectrum is The Folk Implosion, whose 1995 Kids soundrack album raised eyebrows and garnered this notoriously low-profile commercially invisible rocker both airtime and a nanosecond in the MTV Buzz Bin.

While Sebadoh has been many things to many people throughout their decade-long reign as kings of indie rock, I have to admit that for me, it's pretty much always been all about Lou Barlow. His brilliantly crafted songs, sensitive-guy lyrics, and heart-on-my-sleeve romanticism just set the heart of this indie rock chick all aflutter.

These days, I don't fast-forward through as many of the noisy songs as I used to. It seems that Sebadoh has undergone a sort of convergent evolution - the melodies rock a little harder and the noise piggybacks on a little more melody. I think that's why they chose to name their semi-eponymous new album The Sebadoh - because it's classic Sebadoh, but with a different spin.

Without a doubt, The Sebadoh is their most cohesive album to date. Gone are the schizophrenic leaps from soul-searching to head-banging - instead, each song is a synergistic blend of both which tickles the ear. Dipping into his bag of studio tricks, Barlow has worked some the same magic here that he did with John Davis (a.k.a The Folk Implosion) on the Kids movie soundtrack, particularly on "Natural One" and "Nothin's Gonna Stop." On several tracks, hypnotic grooves are layered with sparse yet inventive instrumentation, samples, reverb, and backmasked guitar, all showcased to spectacular effect on "Flame," the standout track of the album.

As usual, Jason Lowenstein produces the crunchiest, meatiest, and fuzziest bass tones you're likely to hear. He's also written some great hooks and romping grooves that positively swagger. Russ Pollard provides percussion ranging from driving marching band snares to whatever he plays on "Tree" -- which I can only describe as sounding like cardboard timpani drums - but whatever it is, it's perfect. And of course the production is brilliant throughout, at times the best 4-track garage-rock demo ever, or the worst studio album, or vice-versa.

Yeah, there are still a few ditties I just don't get, such as "Cuban," a sloppy improvisation with a samba beat, but nothing worth getting up off the couch to fast-forward through. This album's on heavy rotation in my living room, and it all works. I wouldn't change a thing.