SEBADOH must be a contender for one of THE ultimate lo-fi bands, with their early cassette-only releases “The Freed Weed” and “Weed Forestin’” not only giving you heavy hints of Lou Barlow and Eric Gaffney’s recreational herb of choice, but also their predilection for going back to the bedroom to record songs with only a couple of battered acoustics and some cheap TDK C-90s for company.
Of course, Sebadoh actually started off as a result of Barlow’s less-than-amicable departure from indie/ hardcore darlings Dinosaur Jr, and I doubt very much that - at the time - the duo realised that they were actually paving the way for a whole new breed of ‘lo-fi’ pop compadres, with the likes of Guided By Voices and Pavement soon taking up the baton and recording albums that leant much more on feel and spontaneity than anything approaching regular (over)production values.
So whether Lou Barlow even wants to be saddled with his contribution as a ‘lo-fi’ hero these days I wouldn’t know, but inadvertently or otherwise, his early work with Eric Gaffney and - by the time of “III” - a third like-mind in Jason ‘Jake’ Loewenstein has come to be revered as something of a lo-fi touchstone, and while this reviewer would personally lean more towards later, more rounded albums (in relative terms) like “Bubble & Scrape” and “Bakesale”, it’s probably true that Sebadoh needed to make this quixotic, rites of passage album to get to where they ultimately ended up.
It’s tempting to view “III” as their “Zen Arcade”: a pivotal, sprawling third album which embraces pop sensibility and bleeding, naked emotion every bit as much as it does resolutely acoustic, down home snatches, but the overall reality is that the indulgence often outweighs the excellence, and – like your reviewer’s repeated attempts with The Pop Group’s “Y” or Sonic Youth’s “Bad Moon Rising” – you may well come away desperately WANTING to love it, but find its’ embrace simply too gnarly to take in one lengthy sitting.
Which isn’t to say “III” doesn’t have its’ moments, for it surely does. In truth, most of its’ highlights are from the band’s first proper foray into a studio (the legendary Fort Apache in Cambridge, Mass with producer Sean Slade) and the improved sound quality and growing confidence in these tracks brings us long-time ‘Doh classics such as the mercurial Gaffney’s undeniably cool “Violet Execution”, the flange-soaked “Scars, Four Eyes” and Barlow’s stone-cold classic “The Freed Pig”: the author’s open letter to his ex-Dinosaur Jr. colleague J.Mascis, which finds him admitting “You were right, I was battling you, trying to prove myself/ I wanted to bury you with guilt” over the most thrilling and immediate of indie guitar rushes.
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The fragile, lo-fi excursions harbour a few slivers of excellence too, not least thanks to Barlow’s vulnerable “Total Peace” and Loewenstein’s charming “Black Eyed Gurl”, which showed he was being effectively schooled in Sebadoh’s loveable idiosyncracy. This expanded re-issue also finds room for more off-kilter inspiration such as the band’s accidental ‘underground’ anthem “Gimme Indie Rock”, the clumsy, but catchy “Ride The Darker Wave” and the murkily cool “Calling Yog Sothoth”, which appears to be a tribute written by one of Massachusetts’ contemporary cult heroes (Gaffney) to one from another age (reclusive horror author HP Lovecraft).
Sadly, though, the sheer volume of tracks, relentless eclecticism and feeling the band are simply taking the piss conspires to scupper “III”s quest for its’ place in the pantheon as the ‘influential’ recording it seeks to be after the fact. The charm of many of the sleepy, semi-stoned acoustic songs wears thin after a while, while the quality control of even Barlow’s songs at this stage was often questionable at best: it sure as hell doesn’t excuse the throwaway likes of “Perverted World” and the downright annoying “Renaissance Man”. Mind you, these are probably preferable to long-winded tosh like Gaffney’s “As The World Dies, The Eyes Of God Grow Bigger” or “The Devil’s Reggae.” As for the closing “Showtape ‘91” – well, that’s enough to make you wish they’d never discovered the pleasures of industrial-strength skunk in the first place.
Ultimately, “III” is the epitome of a ‘transitory’ record made by a band who’d just gained a crucial third member (Loewenstein), but were about to jettison earlier one (Gaffney) as they proceeded irregularly towards “Bubble & Scrape” and a space in this writer and many more peoples’ hearts. It has enough flashes of brilliance to ensure you’ll remain fond in memory, but whether you’ll want to revisit it the detail offered by this extensive re-issue will depend on your tolerance level for stoned wittering. Mine’s still relatively low, I’m afraid.
(www.sebadoh.com)
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