Out of the Vaults #22 - The Lemonheads - Lick

My wife dives into our CD cabinets (The Vaults) and randomly pull out one of the thousands of CDs. The chosen album will then be given to me and I will talk about the CD for awhile no matter how good, bad, obscure or embarrassing the chosen disc is. Where did I buy it, when did I buy it, what was my first reaction to hearing it, do I still listen to it today etc, etc, etc

Out Of The Vaults # 22 - The Lemonheads - Lick (1989)

It's no secret that the Lemonheads are one of my favorite bands but it is the band's whole history that puts them there. If they had not released anything after the punk bursts of  1987's Hate Your Friends they wouldn't up there. Their Dinosaur Jr-esque major label debut Lovey alone would not put them there. If their "Breakthrough" album It's A Shame About Ray was where the band began they would not be there either. It's all these along with 1988's Creator and the 1993 Power Pop/Alt Rock album Come On Feel the Lemonheads that place them there. Even 1996's Car Button Cloth plays a part.

But out of all the albums the band released 1989's Lick gets a bit of an edge because for me it was the one that was the most important.

Many people may be surprised to know until 1989 the Lemonheads had two singers. There was of course Evan Dando, the smooth voice singer/guitarist who would go on to become a big star in the Alternative Rock world, but there was also the more raspy-voiced Ben Deily. One of them would play the drums on the songs the other one wrote and sang.

At the time Evan was great at writing loud blasts of punk rock like ("Glad I Don't Know". "Come Back D.A.", and "Sad Girl") or metal ("Cazzo De Ferro"). Ben's specialty was blaring jilted love songs ("Anyway", "Ever").

 The album did show a few signs of the alternative guitar rock that would later take the Lemonheads near the top. The driven by bassist and future Video/Movie director Jesse Peretz album opener "Mallo Cup" and "Circle of One" at Track 4 both may not seem too out of place on Lovey or even It's a Shame about Ray.

Lick also contains three great cover songs. The first is "Rabbit" by the obscure New Zealand punk band Proud Scum. The second, Patsy Clines's "Strange", I actually did not even know was a Patsy Cline song until several years later which led to a semi-embarrassing night at the old 9:30 Club where I was yelling out for Evan and company to play it. The third cover is the reason why Lick is to me the most important of their albums.

Luka 7" Single

As the very last video on MTV's 120 Minutes one Sunday night the Lemonheads' version of "Luka" came roaring through the television speakers. It was a simple folksy rock song written and recorded by Suzanne Vega just a few years earlier taken by the Lemonheads and transformed into a blaring, noisy punk rock song with wailing guitars all the way through until the end. It was the first time I had heard the band and even though I have used the expression many times in this blog before this is where it probably fits the best; I was blown away.

After Lick was released Ben left the band taking his songs with him to his bands The Pods and later Varsity Drag. Of course, the Lemonheads, now with Evan as the sole vocalist continued on to become one of the biggest names in Alternative Rock.

However, the days of the one-two punch of Evan Dando/Ben Deily may not be totally behind us. I heard it through the lemon tree that Ben has actually joined Evan in an all-new Lemonheads lineup. Definitely a project I will be keeping an eye out for.

Meanwhile here is a video of The Lemonheads doing "Anyway" live in 1989 with Evan on Drums which I actually just found last night. Definitely check out this song and the other 14 songs on YouTube from the show.