FFWD Weekly
Copyright © 1998 All Rights Reserved.
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| MUSIC Soul Asylum's last album, Let Your Dim Light Shine, sold nearly as many copies in Canada as its predecessor, Grave Dancer's Union, but - and maybe it's because it sounded like a tepid bit of rehashed and half-hearted rock radio pabulum - there's a lingering impression that it was a failure. After Grave Dancer's and its shopping-list-of-milk-cartons'-most-wanted video "Runaway Train," which both went to the top of the charts, the fact that it's tough to name one track from Dim Light is extremely telling. But how do you say that to someone who was involved in the project? How do you ask what happened to someone who is probably still attached to the recording? Well, side-stepping the issue as delicately as you'd cut one in front of the pope, you say something like, "Hey, so, was it disappointing that the last album was a failure?" Or something like that. "Not for me, but I think it probably was for the record label in certain parts of the world," an unfazed Dave Pirner yawns from a hotel bed in Toronto. "But it was kind of a good thing for the band to not be in the position where we have to sell 20 billion records every time we make one. We had to get some perspective on things, and that's what we got. "There's no such thing as a level in rock 'n' roll," the frontman says. "There's no right or wrong way of doing things and if you have sales expectations, you shouldn't be in a rock band.... It's always been the same job to me." Yeah, but the difference in living with the two albums seems like the equivalent of a resumé choice between a computer degree from MIT and six hours of surfing the net for haiku about Spam. But that's just perception, and it's one that Pirner doesn't seem fazed by. Why should he be? He's been at this gig for 15 years, and before 1992's Grave Dancer's Union, the Minneapolis quartet were the epitome of an unglamorous, working-class rock band - toiling in the trenches and in the shadows of fellow (and some would say better) indie rock bands from their hometown, Hüsker Dü and The Replacements. With their new album, Candy From A Stranger, Soul Asylum have removed themselves even further from the success of their breakthrough recording. It's an extremely subdued affair with little to offer in the way of hit singles and even less to offer in the way of old-school Minneapolis beer 'n' sweat rock songs. And with all but one of the tracks bearing Pirner's name, that leads to speculation Candy is an extremely personal and introspective record for the musician. In fact, the similarities to The Replacements' All Shook Down, which was virtually a Paul Westerberg project and the gateway to an official solo career for the band's leader, are more than noticeable and worth bringing up. But Pirner quickly closes the door on the suggestion he's had enough and might like to go it alone "I have no desire to be a solo artist at all," he insists. "I've never had any temptation to have my name on the record instead of the band's name - I mean it's a band. "If it is a more personal record, that's all the more reason to not put my name on it. I don't want it to be something that is being analyzed as far as how much it has to do with me." Pirner explains the other projects Soul Asylum band members have been involved in - he did the score for the film Chasing Amy, and worked with fellow bandmate Dan Murphy on the first record for Midwest supergroup Golden Smog - are as much a break from being the band as they desire. Soul Asylum is a job he says he'll keep coming back to as long as it's fun. Which brings up an interesting observation - all throughout the conversation Pirner refers to Soul Asylum as a job, which is an odd word choice especially when it's juxtaposed with the adjective fun. "Yeah, I guess it doesn't sound quite right to call it a job, but I don't know what else to call it," he says. "I think after you've been doing it for as long as I have it's a trade, it's a vocation and it's an occupation and it's a passion and it's a religion - it's a lot of things. But I don't like to overstate it as anything other than rock 'n' roll." |
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