The impossibly good-looking stoner with perfect bone structure
Yippee-ki-yay, the new Lemonheads is out today. And eMusic’s got it, which makes me a happy camper-and-a-half.
Eric over at Marathonpacks has penned exactly what I feel about Evan Dando and the Lemonheads. He captures it so perfectly that no one ever needs to try and encapsulate them in writing ever again; just link to him.
“Dando was the pop-culture exemplar of the guy that each high school and dorm floor had one or two of—the impossibly good-looking stoner with perfect bone structure, but also the guy who would manage three or four ‘girlfriends’ at once and write impossible-to-ignore moody pop-rock songs about longing and nostalgia and memory and probably those girls too. The guy who everyone tried to hate, but could never actually hate because he was essentially harmless and would screw himself over consistently with the fervor of a religious ascetic, and would finally put that on record.”
Read the rest here. I love how he says the new record has “guitars that still sound like late ’80s Boston, lyrics sung from a bedroom floor, trying with all of their sleepy might to end a relationship without sounding like a complete dick.” Yes. Exactly, my man.
Here is one of my current favorites off the new disc, I recommend you get the rest (there’s also one more free track for download on the MySpace page):
Become The Enemy – The Lemonheads
(This song is ridiculously catchy & I am in love with it)
Name: Heather Browne
Right on — it took me a few listens to get into “The Lemonheads” (I first heard an advance copy back in late July at work), but now I really like it. The album slides a bit after “Baby’s Home,” which is one of its peaks, but Dando’s golden pipes are still intact (even if he’s not trying that hard), the melodies are still intact, and the memorable lyrics are still intact. Let’s hope Dando keeps the promise he’s made in recent interviews to quickly follow up “The Lemonheads” with another (possibly solo) album.
Mulberry Panda 96 — September 27, 2006 @ 12:16 am
i became a lemonheads fan by accident after i wandered into an albany record store one afternoon in the early 90s to find dando putting on an acoustic set. there were about a dozen people there. i was an instant convert.
glad to have them back.
moe "simon metz" berg — September 27, 2006 @ 9:11 am
This record scares me. I wanna run out and get it, and love it, but….
On one hand, I love the LH output through the It’s a Shame About Ray record, but then he kind-of slacked off a bit, and then there was that horrible jumping-around-like-a-stoner-chimp-on-quaaludes thing that he did as one of the frontmen for the MC5 reunion shows a few years back. He was getting abuse in almost every city, while Mark Arm from Mudhoney was tearing it up as the closest thing we could get to a Rob Tyner in the ’00s. Dando was truly appalling in that role.
But he has the Descendents/All, or most of ‘em, backing him up on this, and the guy is a genuine talent, so I like to think that there’s hope. Thanks for the review, Heather…It’ll likely be the thing that pushes me past my ambivalence to take one more chance on Mr. D.
Holden — September 27, 2006 @ 10:07 am
via ALL!
via MUDHONEY!
RIGHT ON!
I can not wait to hear the cd.
I always loved the Lemonheads…
even when they were a punk rock band. Listen to the songs “Ever” or “Sad Girl”.
I like your blog kid!!!
SINEDDIE — September 27, 2006 @ 4:44 pm
i agree that evan dando is one slutty crack head that is just irrationally, impossibly hard to resist.
c — September 28, 2006 @ 8:22 am
Puh-leez … the man hasn’t been a slutty crackhead in a long, long time. He’s not drug-free, by his own admission, but he’s not doing crack, and he’s been with Elizabeth Moses since 1998.
Mulberry Panda 96 — September 28, 2006 @ 12:15 pm
Yes, but I think c meant “slutty crackhead” as a term of great endearment, not necessarily a factual assessment.
heather — September 28, 2006 @ 12:40 pm
“Slutty crackhead” is a term of endearment? Oh well, to each his own. Just don’t yell that out at a Lemonheads concert. Could be taken the wrong way by Dando.
The liner notes list Josh Lattanzi as playing bass on 4 of the album’s 11 songs. I wonder where Karl Alvarez was for those songs. Sounds like Lattanzi deserves some more credit as a new Lemonhead, especially since he’ll be playing bass on the tour.
Mulberry Panda 96 — September 28, 2006 @ 1:52 pm
let me rephrase:
i agree that evan dando is one ex-slutty ex-crack head that is just irrationally, impossibly hard to resist.
c — September 28, 2006 @ 9:32 pm
“i agree that evan dando is one ex-slutty ex-crack head that is just irrationally, impossibly hard to resist.”
Now we’re talkin’ …
Mulberry Panda 96 — September 29, 2006 @ 5:40 am