The Early Year (Pine Box & Dance The Night Away)

Scud Mountain Boys ‘The Early Year’ Double CD package of their first two albums re-issued on One Little Indian, 8th July 2013. Originally released by Sub Pop in 1997 in the wake of the success of third album, Massachusetts, The Early Year comprises Scud Mountain Boys first two albums, Pine Box and Dance The Night Away and is re-issued by One Little Indian on 8th July.

The band reformed in late 2011 and a brand new album, ‘Do You Love The Sun’ is set for release on 26th August. Beginning their existence simply as the Scuds in western Massachusetts’ Pioneer Valley in 1991, the group played loud rock ‘n’ roll in local clubs and had an appreciable number of fans who would frequent their live shows. But after those shows ended, three members - Joe Pernice (vocals, acoustic and electric guitars), Stephen Desaulniers (vocals, acoustic guitar, piano, and bass), and Bruce Tull (electric guitar, lap steel, pedal steel) - would retreat to Bruce’s kitchen to unwind. There, late at night, the trio would break out their old country favorites, playing the songs they thought too quiet and too slow for live performances.

The band found that these were the songs they really lived to play, so they decided to make a change. Adding “mountain boys” to their name, the re-christened Scud Mountain Boys played their first show in 1993. Following unsatisfactory experiments in recording studios the band opted for a stripped-down approach to recording. In keeping to their origins, 1995’s Pine Box was recorded in Bruce Tull’s kitchen on a four track machine, capturing 12 original songs and three covers originally performed by such diverse sources as Jimmy Webb (”Wichita Lineman”), Olivia Newton-John (”Please, Mister Please”), and Cher (”Gypsies, Tramps and Thieves”). A cassette-only release first, the tracks were later released on vinyl by the indie-rock label Chunk Records in 1995. As an album, Pine Box carries the mordant tone set by its title’s reference to a plain coffin, and features songs like “There Is No Hell (Like the Hell on This Earth)” and “Freight of Fire.” Pernice’s lyrics tend to the subjects of loss and longing, with a tone of resignation.

Later in 1995 the Scud Mountain Boys released a second album Dance the Night Away (also on Chunk). Including more four-track kitchen recordings, as well as others made in a 24-track studio. The release featured drums on a few songs, another Jimmy Webb cover (”Where’s the Playground Susie”) and similar lyrical themes. As with the first record, soft sounds mask dark thoughts, and simple words are deceptively suggestive. Though the band was initially lumped in with the alt-country scene helmed by Son Volt, Wilco, and the hordes of other disciples of Hank Williams, the Scud Mountain Boys have always taken their inspiration as such from hooky ’70s AM pop as from the dirty country road of Johnny Cash.

As word of these two powerful records spread beyond Massachusetts, a number of record labels became interested in the band who signed with the Seattle-based Sub Pop who released Massachusetts, a 14-song album with a number of more upbeat songs with drums and electric guitar in April of 1996. Massachusetts unleashed the floodgates of critical acclaim that had eluded its less well-known predecessors. The New Musical Express rated the record a nine (out of ten) and opined, “Joe Pernice has the golden voice of the damaged, regret oozing from every word like wounded honey… rendering glorious the utter inevitability of failure….The best broken love and bad drug cocktail songs written in many a year.” Post-Massachusetts the band found itself adjusting to a full-time musical career. Pernice, for one, had to reconcile the new career path with the master’s degree in creative writing he had completed in 1996. Finding himself with a lot more time to write songs, he stacked up a few albums’ worth in a short period of time. He also devoted some creative energy to the Pernice Brothers - a side project with his brother, Bob.

In July of 1997 the band split up. Fast forward 14 years and, after being out-of-contact for many years, Pernice, Desaulniers and Shea had an almost-impromptu reunion in Cambridge, Mass., after which they announced the full Scud Mountain Boys line-up would do some shows in 2012. Indeed, a new album Do You Love The Sun is waiting in the wings for release in August.

http://www.scudmountainboys.com/