Working its manner properly by means of Joe Pernice’s again catalog, New West now delivers the Twenty fifth-anniversary reissue of Chappaquiddick Skyline for the primary time on vinyl. Launched two years after Overcome By Happiness, the Pernice Brothers’ 1998 debut, Chappaquiddick Skyline has extra intimate, stripped-down nuance than its predecessor’s exactly rendered chamber pop. It’s nearly as if Pernice merely picked up the place he left off on “Ferris Wheel,” Happiness’ subdued final gasp.
Recording at residence on a Tascam TSR-8, Pernice introduced again Happiness producer Thom Monahan and guitarist Peyton “Pink” Pinkerton. Chappaquiddick Skyline additionally options contributions from drummer Mike Belitsky (Sadies, Neko Case), guitarist John Crooke, Laura Stein (Pernice’s spouse and previously of Jale) and Fort Apache Studios cofounder Joe Harvard. For the brand new vinyl version, the tracks had been remastered by post-punk producer/engineer extraordinaire Bob Weston.
Battling by means of a nasty chilly, Pernice took one for the workforce, providing a clear-headed song-by-song evaluation of Chappaquiddick Skyline for MAGNET’s Hobart Rowland.
1) “Everybody Else Is Evolving”
“It’s the tune that gave delivery to the ‘I Hate My Life’ T-shirt. The shirt grew to become extra standard than the tune itself after a Canadian Customs agent wouldn’t enable me to deliver them into Canada as a result of I used to be a single shirt over the restrict—25—and would wish an importer’s license. I believe he was fucking with me. Anyway, I had to return, the place a U.S. Customs agent supplied to donate the shirts to a homeless shelter. On the time, it appeared like a good suggestion … free shirts. However ‘I Hate My Life’ was most likely not acceptable. All the time felt somewhat unhealthy about that.”
2) “Solitary Swedish Homes”
“An homage to the late, nice Swedish poet Tomas Tranströmer. His poem of the identical identify is a killer. I can’t say how influential and galvanizing his writing has been to me.”
3) “Braveness Up”
“This was initially on the record of tunes that might develop into Overcome By Happiness. I scrapped it from the record whereas within the studio as a result of the tune itself was the least completed of the bunch. Cash was tight, and studio time was costly. There was no time to fuck round.”
4) “The Two Of You Sleep”
“I wrote this and ‘Kidney Formed Pool’ on the identical day: July 4, 1998. I keep in mind it vividly. My band had simply completed a tour. I used to be staying at Mike Belitsky’s condo on the Decrease East Facet. He was out for the day, and I used to be alone together with his acoustic guitar and four-track recorder. The recording on Chappaquiddick Skyline is from the demo I made in his condo. We added a number of issues later. I didn’t personal a cellphone but, and later that night, my mother and father lastly tracked me all the way down to let me know my grandmother had died that afternoon.”
5) “Breakneck Velocity”
“This one was written whereas I used to be nonetheless within the Scud Mountain Boys, so my guess is someday in 1997. It’s doable I’d forgotten I wrote it after we went to make Overcome By Happiness. Extra possible I didn’t assume it was ok. As Thom Monahan used to say, ‘Not each child makes the workforce.’”
6) “Theme To An Countless Bummer”
“I wrote this tune so I might shoehorn ‘salient’ right into a pop tune … However significantly, it’s a fast and contained little quantity. I at all times dug how John Crooke used our takeout lunch chopsticks to faucet out his guitar half. A theme of the report was small-dollar particular results.”
7) “Up In Michigan”
“I additionally wrote this one whereas within the Scud Mountain Boys. Bruce Tull and I performed it on the Center East as a duo in early 1997. I nicked the title from the Hemingway story.”
8) “Hundred Greenback Pocket”
“Throughout a self-prescribed prolonged interval of mattress relaxation, I watched quite a lot of TV. I obtained hooked on The Value Is Proper. Bob Barker stored a C-note in his go well with coat’s “hundred-dollar pocket.” I jotted that down for a later date. This recording is a favourite of mine. John’s vocals all through are fairly lovely. Pink’s outro guitar licks get me each time. Monahan pulled a clarinet pattern from someplace and fucked with it.”
9) “No one’s Watching”
“I wrote this tune after driving residence to Northampton from Boston. Someplace round Sturbridge, I might decide up an oldies station in Hartford. I heard Herman’s Hermits’ ‘Two Silhouettes (On The Shade)’ and it obtained me considering. As a enjoyable experiment, I attempted mapping the ideas from the Hermits’ tune to mine. What drives residence my recording is the vocals of Laura Stein and Jennifer Pierce. So freaking good.”
10) “Knights Of The Evening Vol. 1”
“Once I began penning this tune, it was about my father. After messing round with it, I discovered it labored higher as a romantic love tune.”
11) “Depart Me Alone”
“To an individual within the 1998 model of the Pernice Brothers, we had been all huge New Order followers. I believe us masking this tune was Pink’s thought. He actually made the guitar components his personal. I at all times beloved taking part in this one reside.”
12) “Kidney Formed Pool”
“See quantity 4 above and swap ‘Kidney Formed Pool’ for ‘The Two Of You Sleep.’”
