If you were paying any attention to college radio in the early '90s, it's likely you are familiar with the Trashcan Sinatras.
The five-piece band from Scotland earned raves for its literate brand of pop-rock. The Sinatras' 1990 debut, "Cake," and its follow-up, 1993's "I've Seen Everything," earned a cult following of people who loved the band's upbeat charms.
As the CMJ.com review of "Cake" puts it, this band is "the Smiths only with less whine, more pep and a touch of Old Blue Eyes' sentimentality," and with "pop hooks you could catch Moby Dick with."
By the time "I've Seen Everything" came out, though, the musical landscape had changed. Out of the Northwest rose a horde of angry, flannel-wearing punk rockers who made screaming guitars and melancholy lyrics "in" - and witty, bittersweet, finely crafted pop rock "out." According to All Music Guide (allmusic.com): "The ascendance of grunge essentially derailed whatever commercial momentum the group still had left."
The Sinatras' record label went belly up. The band was forced to sell its Shabby Road recording studio and actually declared bankruptcy.
But they never gave up. It took eight years, but the Trashcan Sinatras are back with a new album, "Weightlifting," released last August. And for the third time since, they're on the road in the United States, a road that leads to John Henry's in Eugene on Tuesday night.
Sinatras' frontman Frank Reader said the band plans to be back in the fall as well, on an acoustic tour. The goal is to try to play as many different places as possible.
"Our most potent selling tool is us playing live because it's kind of what we're most comfortable doing," he said in a recent phone interview from Toronto.
"One of the things we missed out on was some consistent live playing, the chance to build up a head of steam and become a well-oiled machine. We're grabbing this chance this time with both hands."
One stripped gear in that well-oiled machine is the brick wall called radio. The band's inability to get on the radio is a major headache.
"It really frustrates us and annoys us because in places where we've been turning up, people are seeing us in stores and at gigs and they're knocked out by us. They don't know why they haven't heard of us before," Reader said. "We can make an impact that way if people hear us. I've always believed that."
Those who have heard of the Trashcan Sinatras and "Weightlifting" come away impressed, if the reviews are any indication.
"The reviews have been approaching the universal acclaim bracket. That's quite nice for us. That's unusual for us, too. We're used to the mixed reviews bag," he said. "So it's been good. The hard work was done when we wrote and recorded it to our satisfaction and we're just glad to get a little bit of recognition for it and not be universally ignored."
"Weightlifting" opens with "Welcome Back," the aptly named song that also is the album's most rockin' tune. The Sinatras wanted to send a message with the opening track.
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"The overall feel of the album is one of release, release from burden. The overall sense of the album is quite melancholic. But we had this song that was a little bit incongruous and the only place it would really fit was the beginning," he said, adding with a chuckle, "We figured if people were in the mood for the album and they wanted to have something laid back, they could go on from track two.
"Secondly, we wanted to have a more defiant slant on the whole release sort of vibe."
During that eight-year drought, there were some dark times, and the Sinatras came close to chucking it all in. But - "to be cheesy about it," Reader said - they had too many good songs to waste.
"We didn't want to go out at least without clearing up everything, gathering it all together, and pinning it all together and releasing our last hurrah," he said. "We went into it with that kind of attitude and it was quite liberating. Songs tend to create a momentum, they feed your confidence. We started to feel like there were people out there who wanted to hear us."
Those people were visitors to the band's Web site - www.trashcansinatras.com. The band plugged into the Internet early on - back in 1996 or so - and has come to value it.
"Without any overstatement, it's probably the thing that saved us," he said. "It allowed us to raise money directly to record the album when nobody was interested. And also just knowing that there were people out there who thought you were worth listening to."
Reader hopes "Weightlifting" isn't the Sinatras' last hurrah. The deal with the record label, SpinArt, doesn't extend beyond this album. Any follow-up will be made the same way "Weightlifting" was - on the band's own dime.
"To be tied to a deal that could be obsolete by the time we get around to writing another album was silly," Reader said. "It means we have to struggle on for a bit under our own steam financially. But it's much more rewarding.
"It really brought us together as people as well. The fact that we're all aware of how hard we've worked to get this together, it pervades the whole tour and the band."
CONCERT PREVIEW
Trashcan Sinatras
With: Nicole Sangsuree
When: 8:30 p.m. Tuesday
Where: John Henry's, 77 W. Broadway
Tickets: $15, $12 advance through Ticketmaster
Originally appeared in the eugene register-guard |
