A tribute to the songwriters and artists who influenced his own music, nineteeneighties features Grant-Lee Phillips' stunning reworking of The Pixies' "Wave of Mutilation," The Psychedelic Furs' "Love My Way," REM's "So. Central Rain (Sorry)," and many more.
Since forging an independent-solo career at the outset of 2000, the former Grant Lee Buffalo front man, has gone on to release three critically acclaimed albums, toured the globe several times over, composed musical scores for various independent films, television and has even become a reoccurring character on the WB's Gilmore Girls. Appearing as The Town Troubadour, Grant-Lee Phillips, has stepped into a familiar roll. A lyrical chronicler, an astute observer whose songs are at once deeply personal, reflective while ever the barometer of the larger emotional times we share. Most striking is the manner in which Phillips continues to evolve, each album offering a new flower of growth and confidence. Phillips greets the spring of 2006 with a new collection of his favorite cover songs. "Nineteeneighties" is, as the title suggests, a reframing of some of the era's most intriguing and influential music. The result is a thoroughly smooth listen and an insight into Phillips' creative evolution, surely a fan's delight. The familiarity of the song selection, which includes REM, The Smiths, The Pixies among them, is sure to charm and to gain new converts to the cult of Grant-Lee. Says Phillips of "Nineteeeighties"; "It's my personal mix tape, just as it has reeled around in my head for decades. The more I got inside of these songs, with not much more than a guitar or a piano, their personality came through on new levels and my appreciation for them deepened…" Indeed the album is a reminder of the debt owed to a generation of bands and artists who labored well before such banners as "underground", "indie, "alternative" were commonplace. As Phillips himself puts it, "For every hokey hair band there was once an alternative - a parallel universe, existing just below the conservative, pastel surface." Kicking off with the single "Love My Way", originally recorded by post-punk trailblazers, The Psychedelic Furs, Phillips plans to take his songbook on the road this summer. Says Phillips, " There's a wide field of influences that were ingested long ago. Some of it sticks with you forever. " The "Nineteeneighties" collection has a personal root for Phillips as these were the songs that coincided with venturing out on his own, forming a band, trying on different ideas. " A lot of us, who were fans, found real purpose in the search of new music during the early eighties, the discovery of something that wasn't readily being delivered over the airwaves. Music that wasn't yanked off a rack and, for the most part, wasn't advertised, this was a treasure". MTV was still in its infancy and the information highway was yet to be paved. These were simpler times. Adds Phillips, "Word of mouth was how many of us found out about bands like The Clash and The Buzzcocks here in the US. This and flipping through a quarantined bin at the back of the record shop. If labeled, it would've read, "Underground". Sorta' like the record buyers version of that curtained off section of the video store. The fact that you were perusing this bin of perversion, said something about your philosophy at the time, your mistrust of the mainstream and your idealism that surely there was more than this." Phillips sums up the spirit of the era. " You went looking for "Your music". You went looking for yourself. The same quest for identity and individuality drove my own generation into the thrift stores, well before they became "vintage". Phillips' long adopted home of Los Angeles was at the epicenter of the '80's underground revolution. " I left my rural home of Stockton, CA. in '83, arriving in LA just as bands like the Dream Syndicate and X were stirring up serious dust. There was a tangible upsurge of artists who were releasing great albums on small labels and this captivated me. The economy of punk was in tune with the vitality of rock and roll's origins, something I was equally curious about. Gene Vincent, Eddie Cochran, and Elvis Costello's "My Aim Is True" played seamlessly along side one another to my ears." A good deal of this selection is drawn from English bands of the post-punk era, with the exception of homegrown REM, Pixies and AU exports The Church and Nick Cave." Phillips reminisces, "I was introduced to Joy Division and New Order by a now departed friend and former band mate, one who went too early. In some ways this music was a means of sustaining our connection. Songs can become markers in this way, time capsules of dormant memories." Nineteenighties is sure to stir memories for those who came of age with the many tracks Phillips has lovingly dusted off and given new life".
For The Record,Richard Ellison
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