Superchunk

Superchunk

Matador

25.Septmember.1990

This is Superchunk's debut record. It is very much the product of its time, a time when indie rock was more about punk than anything else. There is a certain punk aesthetic to this album, from the brash songs, to the general shortness of them, to the trebly guitars and warbling voice.

This music appeals to youth, to the general fury that the first flush of hormones enacts in a person. I was 19 when this came out, and i can relate to the music. For those that grew up in the hip-hop era, this music might seem strange and old fashioned. I don't think it has aged that well, as this is not a Superchunk album that i have continued listening to. Nonetheless, let's go over the tracks.

It's weird coming back to the Superchunk back catalogue and having it feel so...not there.  It's pretty much the exact opposite of how it felt re-engaging the old Archers of Loaf releases.  Icky Mettle hit you like a ton of lead, as fully of thrust and substance today as the day it was released.  The standards and anthems from Icky and Vee Vee feel timeless and undiminished.  The S'chunk debut feels almost flimsy, almost wispy.  It is almost completely an album of its time.  It didn't age well.

With that said, it's probably worth noting that the band that wrote and recorded (quite poorly) these songs was only half of what we would consider "classic Superchunk."  Only Mac McCaughn and Laura Ballance are present on this record.  Rhythm guitar is provided by some guy named Jack McCook, and drum credits are split between Chuck Garrison and an entity known only as "Chunk."  (Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't the band named after this mysterious original drummer "Chunk?")

The point, I guess, is that this is proto-Superchunk, both in style, technique, direction, and membership.  It's not until No Pocky that Jim Wilbur replaces McCook, and not until On The Mouth that Jon Wurster is listed in the credits as drummer.  And honestly, those are the two presences missing from this album's sound.  Wilbur's fuller, more fleshed-out guitar work countering Mac's flailing, and Wurster's much more emphatic percussive backbone backing up Laura's bass lines.

As we first started discussing this eponymous album, I was bit stunned by the blah response both Malimus and PostLibyan had towards this record. "But…but….how can you not love that brilliant cover of Brand New Love?" I thought. "And what about Train from Kansas City? That's another cover that works well." And then, as I read this review, I suddenly realized that, to my brain, Superchunk's first album is Tossing Seeds and not the Superchunk album discussed below. It's an understandable confusion, if you think of it, considering that the best tunes off this record are also on Tossing Seeds. All of this only goes to point out that PostLibyan and Malimus are quite right: Superchunk is not the most memorable release (and I unfortunately spent my review time listening to the wrong record….).

The album starts off with Sick To Move. The bass thunks and two guitars whirr against each other for half a minute, and then a staccato drum beat comes in, and the song is all fast power chords. Mac McCaughan starts yelling soon, and the song moves along like any number of late 80s punk tunes, three minutes of angular fury about over-drinking. As such, it's pretty good, and is an auspicious start.

This is one of the better tracks off of this album. It seems like the perfect song to kick off Superchunk's career, particularly that early line "Why build a cradle, if you don't plan to rock it?", which I always assumed was a reference to the Cat's Cradle in Chapel Hill. They're coming right out of the gate just this side of thrash punk, really. The tempo is jacked way up. I'm not sure I ever heard them play anything this fast during the gazillion live shows we went to.

My Noise was an early single, and is also on the Tossing Seeds compilation. It moves a little slower and seems designed to be an anthem, a song that has the chorus "it is stupid, but it is my noise", as Superchunk sing about the little musical loyalties that seem so important when we are younger. They sing about these loyalties over a grinding bass riff and squealing guitars. I think i am supposed to like this song a lot more than i do, like it is built is such a way to appeal to everyone, to their sense of loyalty to their locality. Loyalty was never my strong point, and i find this song kind of dull, especially on the choruses where McCaughan whines and the guitars fail to do a magnificent riff like the song requires.

Yeah, they're clearly going for the a bit of the snot-punk scene that was so big back then.  I remember a time when I would play this song as loud as the stereo could handle and wail along with the chorus, but honestly, I can't imagine doing it again now.  It feels forced, lyrically as well as musically.  A little to self-satisfied.  "It's never silent, and that's dangerous I'm told."  Yeah.  I remember that feeling.  Then I could legally buy alcohol and things got better.  Or at least fuzzier around the edges.

On Let It Go Superchunk try to sound like Sex Pistols, something every punk band is required to do at some point. The song starts with a short flurry of whirring guitars and a stead bass thumping before McCaughan comes in, ending each line with a hint of Johnny Rotten scorn. They actually do this fairly well.

"I know the pleasure that revulsion brings." Again, not a bad tune, but this still feels like an exercise in nostalgia, which wouldn't seem so odd if the immediacy of screaming out Fabricoh and Audiowhore with absolutely no nostalgia at all wasn't so near at hand.

Moving on to another early Brit punk act, Swinging has a rhythm and guitar riff that reminds me of Garageland by The Clash. I keep expecting McCaughan to chime in with "Back in the garage with my bullshit detector"... Anyway, Clash references always work for me.

Superchunk mix it up a bit on Slow which is positively epic in length for this record, clocking in at just over five minutes! Plus the song is, in fact, slow. The guitar grind seems lethargic and the drumming is scattered and lazy. Maybe it is because i am listening to this in the summer, but it sounds to me like this fellow Southern band wrote this song because of how the heat makes you feel this time of year, where everything just needs to move more slowly. It's not very punk rock (there were ten song EPs from 7 Seconds that were shorter than this one tune!), but the band works well in this longer format, which they were to explore in more depth later in their career.

This is probably my favorite tune on this album. The fact that they slow down and stop doing the pseudo-thrash thing helps a lot. As they grow as a band, into the middle period of near perfect punk-pop, their songs are much more mid-tempo, like this one.

And then we hit Superchunk's first masterpiece, Slack Motherfucker a rallying cry for every American youth who has ever worked a pointless job. One guitar jangles, one grinds, and the bass thumps lazily in a song designed to get the kids pogoing. It does so wonderfully. This song is an anthem, but it does not have the forced anthemic feel of My Noise, and instead comes across as natural. This is a direct result of passion overcoming ideas. My Noise is the idea of an anthem, while Slack Motherfucker is a song that McCaughan wrote about a co-worker at a Kinko's, if you believe the mythology. I could go on about this point, but i'll cut it short: having ideas can lead to competent music, while to make truly great music you have to feel something as well.

Moving on, Binding is another slightly slower song, this time with slightly different guitars. One guitar grinds, while the other trills in an almost flippant manner. I have no real recollection of this song before going back and listening for the purposes of this exercise, but i actually kind of enjoy this tune. Huh.

It's back to The Clash for Down The Hall, the sister song of Swinging. This tune could have been on Give 'Em Enough Rope, except that the voices are higher pitched and not that growling that Joe Strummer had going on.

Half A Life is another longer, slower song. It starts with the line "Visiting hours are over", which seems really familiar to me. Either those words are in some other song, Superchunk recycled them later in their career, or i am a lot more familiar with this song than i thought. Anyway, This one clocks in at around four and a half minutes, and McCaughan tries to really sing here instead of the yelling that has dominated the record. The song seems kind of sad, but it builds nicely to a sort of head-banging conclusion.

And finally we wrap things up with Not Tomorrow. This starts with a hopping guitar line, before all the instruments join in and just thrust the thing along at a furious bouncing pace. The vocals are shouted, and the song never slows down. A good punk dance tune to wrap things up.

This is not the best record, and Superchunk were to do great things in just a few years. But this is where it starts, here, with this short, fast, vaguely angry record.

However, this is probably the third or fourth Superchunk record i had heard. I started, of course, with Foolish, and after seeing them live eventually tracked down the record that Slack Motherfucker was on. To me, the purpose of this record is to showcase that early anthem. The band hadn't really figured out what they were doing, which is pretty common for debut records. Still, i have heard many worse records over the years, even if this is not an album i come back to.

Label: http://www.matadorrecords.com/
Artist:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Superchunk
  http://superchunk.com/
  http://www.twitter.com/superchunk
  http://www.last.fm/music/Superchunk
  http://www.myspace.com/superchunkmusic
  http://www.mergerecords.com/
  http://www.facebook.com/pages/Merge-Records/88476979019
Wiki: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Superchunk_(album)
Also on EvilSponge:
   Introduction to Superchunk
   Album: No Pocky For Kitty
   Compilation: Tossing Seeds (Singles 89-91)
   Album: On the Mouth
   Album: Foolish
   Compilation: Incidental Music 1991-95
   Album: Here's Where the Strings Come In
   EP: Laughter Guns
   Album: Indoor Living
   Album: Come Pick Me Up
   Album: Here's To Shutting Up
   Concert: Thu.8.Sep.11