When Lou Barlow misses "Ren and Stimpy," he gets cranky.
Barlow just got home from remixing B-Sides for his band Sebadoh's soon-to-be released album Bubble and Scrape, but he's more concerned about missing the first half of the lost "Ren and Stimpy" episode last night.
Barlow and his girlfriend have been keeping up with MTV's marathon of the show all week, with the coveted unseen episode to be the crowning jewel of their loyal viewing. Although Barlow admits the last half made for brutal television, he's pretty miffed.
"I just got a VCR so I'd been following it and I don't know, last night my guard was down and we didn't watch TV," Barlow said. "I said, 'what time is it' -- 11:15 -- I turned on the TV and it was half over."
Barlow soon forecasts that Nickelodeon, in probable disgust, will never air the episode, and he'll forever miss those elusive 15 minutes. You probably won't find Barlow writing a tune about "Ren and Stimpy," but he feeds on that type of frustration.
It is the frustration of the everyday -- finding a place to live, food to eat -- that drives Sebadoh.
Even the sound seems to hinge on the F-word, teetering between amplified psychotherapy and lowfi confessions.
Sebadoh always seems on the brink of indie rock perfection or ruin, as if the band were pondering breaking up by the last chord change. You could call it "dysfunctionalcore."
"We hate each other," Barlow said jokingly. "No, we're pretty good friends. We sort of respect/disrespect each other. No one really gets out of control."
This sometimes-tense relationship has produced a large catalogue in the band's 6-year history.
Members of the group -- the multi-talented Barlow, Eric Gaffney, Jason Lowenstein and sometimes Bob Fay -- may look like they just walked off the movie Slacker, but their output over the past seven years has far surpassed the entire Osmond clan. After three albums, various EPs, 7-inches and Barlow's solo project Sentridoh, the band seems on the verge of getting over some fustrations with Bubble and Scrape, its first full-length release on Sub-Pop Records.
1992 was a good year for the band, Gaffney said, adding that he was able to move from eating tuna fish and drinking free punch everyday to more substantial meals.
Aside from eating better, its last record, Sebadoh III started selling, and the band signed to Sub-Pop and released the Smash Your Head on the Punk Rock EP. Sebadoh received some news media attention, even from the likes of New Yorker magazine.
Gaffney has even encountered autograph seekers.
"I actually had the privilege of autographing two college DJs, autographing their breasts in front of a bar here," Gaffney said
Of course, Barlow, perhaps best known as the ex-bassist from Dinosaur Jr., has his share of frustrations despite the increase in autographs.
Living 90 miles apart from Gaffney and Lowenstein, and the split and reunion between he and his girlfriend provides Barlow with a litany of frustrations, he said.
In fact, all of the seven songs he penned on Bubble and Scrape deal with his feelings over the break-up with his girlfriend. The first single, "Soul and Fire" is certainly not what you'd call a cheeky romantic sing-along.
"It's totally about me and my girlfriend splitting up," Barlow said. "The title came from a dream my girlfriend had after we broke up. The dream was about her moving in with my lawyer."
Just like the unpolished music, the band's lyrics pour out just as directly, which is exactly how Barlow wants it.
"When I explain something, I explain it exactly and I have to explain it as painfully as possible," Barlow said. "People go 'ugh, God.' "
Barlow learned his writing craft at an early age, influenced by the confessional syrup of 70s hit radio.
By sixth grade, Barlow picked up a guitar and managed a crude version of Kansas' "Dust in the Wind." But, his musical tastes and his life changed when he first heard the Ramones.
He then spent most of puberty hiding fanzines such as Sick Teen, Touch and Go and Flipside inside textbooks and blasting Minor Threat, he said.
On high school: "I hated learning things," Barlow said. "I hated being taught, it made me feel stupid right away."
His late-teen years were spent playing in the hardcore band Deep Wound (which later became Dinosaur Jr.) with J Mascis. When Barlow was fired from Dinosaur Jr., he met up with Eric Gaffney.
"I did percussion and he played ukulele. We started playing as a duo at New Hampshire College," Gaffney said.
With Bubble and Scrape, the band has come full circle, from selling cassette tapes of its sparse four-track recordings.
After all, tonight Barlow is going to get a pizza and join his girlfriend (the one he broke with last year) and watch Comedy Central. Who needs "Ren and Stimpy" anyway?
