Have you heard Welcome Interstate Managers their new CD? I cannot recommend it strongly enough. Here’s a link to the Amazon listing: link
If you like music - it has great pop music - melt-in-your-mouth pop music that is instantly accessible and familiar, yet bears up to repeated listenings as you hear the complexity. Some are hard-rockers - like Day Tripper or Paperback Writer by the Beatles - others are more strummy.
If you like lyrics - the lyrics are complex, funny and thoughtful. Each can be listened to in the background or its own short story. Fountains of Wayne tend to live by the Police Songwriting Law - write upbeat-sounding tunes that have heavy lyrics.
Great, great stuff. Easily the best pop album I have heard in years. Check it out.
P.S.: Oh, and in case you haven’t heard of them, Fountains of Wayne were the ones that wrote the title song to the Tom Hanks-directed movie “That Thing You Do!”
I don’t think I’ll buy this one. I pulled out their self-titled after hearing “Stacy’s mom” on the radio and gave it as listen. Then I remembered why it’d been years since I’d listened to the cd. They tend to have a few songs I like, and more that I don’t care for. Oh well.
** Mockingbird**, have you ever heard Travis’s version of that song? It’s the best I like it much better than Britney’s or FOW’s versions.
fingers crossed that my friend comes through with the extra ticket so I can see them on Thursday, since my stupid ass waited too long to buy a ticket and it got sold out
I hope you get your ticket. I saw them last week in Milwaukee and it was a really good show. Not that I judge a live performance by this, but I’ve never heard a band that sounded so much like their recordings.
I’m with WordMan, get the damn album. It’s really outstanding.
I’ve been listening to it nonstop for weeks; easily the best album I’ve heard in years.
I saw them at a very small venue several months ago, and found the show to be very lackluster–no energy or enthusiasm, poor audio quality. I thought maybe they just weren’t much of a live band. Was that a bad night perhaps?
A slight hijack here, a question about fountains of wayne. My high school (in fresh meadows, ny) was on utopia pkwy. On the album cover there is a picture of an actual utopia pkwy street sign from queens. The art in the album liner notes, cover, etc is all pictures of queens and other parts of nyc. Several of the songs pertain to nyc. Are they from queens? And if now, why would they pick such an obscure region (utopia pkwy is mostly residental, or lined with little neighborhood stores) to sing about?
Yep - these guys are local New Yorkers. I am sure the specifics are find-able, but the write about all the boroughs, Long Island, etc. A lot of Welcome Interstate Managers is about New Jersey.
I seem to remember one of them stating that they used to drive by the Utopia Parkway ramp off the L.I.E. or something, on the way to gigs - he always thought it would be a cool album name…
I stopped and bought the album today after reading this thread.
It’s pretty good. There are a couple of absolute gems on the album. But I can’t call it “The best in years”. One thing I don’t like is that some of the songs seem to have fairly pedestrian subjects. Great melodies, good hooks, but not very deep.
A better new album in the same genre would be The Jayhawks’ “Rainy Day Music”. Or Wilco’s “Yankee Hotel Foxtrot”
Keep listening; it’ll grow on you. Once you realize that many of those “fairly pedestrian” subjects are actually extremely pedestrian subjects, then you’ll fully appreciate the genius that is FOW.
Your other suggestions are also great albums, particularly YHF. Anyone who can listen to “Jesus, etc.” and not be impressed has ice water in their veins.
I don’t know Fountains of Wayne at all, apart from hearing the song Hackensack on the radio the other day and being totally captivated. Is that track on the new album?
initech - I couldn’t agree more. On the surface, Fountains of Wayne write incredibly catchy pop tunes, the kind that sound deceptively easy, but are more complex when you peel the layers. As for the lyrics, they tend to go after “slice of life” portrayals of ourselves and people we know. Listeners don’t have to focus on them at all - do we really want to focus on “Every Breath you Take” as a stalker’s anthem every time we listen to it? - but if you choose to focus on the lyrics, you get stories of big dreams, false hopes, dealing with the day to day and the harsh reality of life. All in a neat, well-produced, incredibly accessible pop package. The music adds a layer of complexity because of its pop sensibilities - it makes the lyrics that much more…poignant, I guess.
On Route 46 in Wayne, NJ there’s place that sells fountains. The name of this place is “Fountains of Wayne”. Is that where the band got their name? I was aware of the fountain store before I was aware of the band, and I always wondered if they took their name from the store.
I like it much better than Britney’s or FOW’s versions.