Where do you start with a band that had one foot in the '80s, and the other in the succeeding decade that gracefully managed to deflect the superficial trappings of either period? Well, as bassist
Alec Palao eloquently describes in
From of Play's liner notes, you start by
not selling truckloads of records, and ditto for packing droves into nightclubs to see your act. Meet
The Sneetches, a bygone San Francisco treat that never indulged in the flavor-of-the-moment whims of their mid-80s to nineties tenure, be it new wave, neo-psychodelic, grunge or otherwise. In fact, no amount of peer pressure (if any existed at all) swayed the Sneetches to be anything other than ...themselves.
Settling on a four-person roster by 1988 (one that was coincidentally half Yank/half Brit) the band's modus operandi was never quite spelled out, rather revealed slowly and intermitently over the course of four full lengths and easily thrice as many short form singles and EPs. Highly prolific, the Sneetches discography is somewhat intimidating, and although an attempt at distilling the highlights of their career was attempted via 1991's
1985-1991 compilation on Alias Records, Omnivore's summation of their trajectory encompasses the tail end of their run as well on
Form of Play, albeit not chronologically. Still, a "trail mix" cross-section of their work isn't a bad way to present the Sneetches, as they fell shy of releasing a universally hailed album, or for that matter much in the way of signature songs. And what
of those songs you might ask?
Over the course of their decade lifespan, the Sneetches frequently inhabited a power pop place, with their intuition being equally persuaded by both sides of the pond. Frontman
Mike Levy and six string-wielder
Matt Carges piloted their airship through primo, hooky terrain on "...And I'm Thinking," the Merseybeat inflected "Julianna Why," and a devastatingly bittersweet single from 1987, "Only For a Moment." A more streamlined muse is at play on "Empty Sea" and "What's In Your Mind," loosely slotting into a mode at home with latter era Let's Active, and even Game Theory. Some appealing anomalies materialize as well, namely the punky Buzzcocks-cum-Replacements thrust of "Looking for Something," and the strummy, pastoral folk of "Let Us Go."
Form of Play may not be my dream roster of Sneetches songs, but first-person perspective aside it's a representative assemblage of what made these Bay-era popmeisters tick. The few previously unreleased sections are predominantly culled from live performances, but a concluding acoustic demo of "How Does It Feel" channeling Big Star says volumes about where the Sneetches were emanating from.
Form of Play can be derived on CD or digitally direct from
Omnivore, and the usual digital peddlers
iTunes and
Amazon. Feel free to check out some
archived Sneetches entries on these very pages.
Noooo! Skinny ties and facial hair should never mix! Granted, you'll have to download the record to see what I'm referring to on the back cover of Nephews... I'm not sure what their point of origination is/was (Boston?) but the four-man Aunt Helen were about as scattershot as they come. Something of a one-song-wonder, this record starts out with a genuine bang in the guise of "Psychology Today" and deescalates rapidly from there. The keeper in question, "Psychology," boasts the sass and savvy of AH's Midwest contemporaries Fools Face and Secrets, not to mention a dash of The A's. As you might have gleaned from the cover art, this was not a band that took themselves particularly seriously. A sardonic, calypso reading of "Wild Thing" doesn't impress, nor does much of Helen's willfully cheeky approach on the remainder of Nephews. Such goofball tactics are either charming and endearing or a fatal flaw. I'll let you be the judge.
