SOUL ASYLUM

Poor little Soul Asylum. 

Would you believe they were once hip?  Big time?
Back in `87, I picked up a Village Voice issue with a big story on the band, proclaiming them peers of Husker Du and The Replacements - the two bands I was most excited about at the time - comparing them to The Who at their peak, and naming them the best live band in America.  After reading the piece, I couldn't wait to hear them, and I snagged up a copy of While You Were Out on my next record binge.

I wasn't entirely sure what to make of it.  There were some pretty great songs - "No Man's Land", "Freaks", "Closer To The Stars" - a kind of fusion of Husker's cosmic hardcore rush and the Mats' barroom blitz.  But some tracks just kinda roared away without direction, or sounded too metallic.  "Passing Sad Daydream", the closer, was a kind of woozy meandering country-rock bar ballad with an explosive chorus that ended in a welter of guitar noise.  Robert Christgau described them: "Fast turmoil rools, with hints of metal anthem and country warmth sunk deep enough in the mix that nobody'll cry corny."  Close enough.  I was interested, but not knocked out the way I had been by their brother bands.

Back then I was working at a bookstore with several like-minded musos around, and one mate of mine was heavily into Soul Asylum.  That led to my picking up Made To Be Broken about a year later.  I found I liked Made a little bit more, despite flat production courtesy of Bob Mould (shame on you, Bob!). The first half was great - "Tied To The Tracks," "Can't Go Back," the title track and the glorious folk-country-punk of "Never Really Been," plus the noisefest "Whoa!".  Unfortunately after that it broke down into sort of aimless metallic riffing.  SA seemed to have trouble sustaining their good ideas across a whole album.  Too bad, cause their good ideas were pretty damn great.  That same mate laid a copy of their Time's Incinerator on me later that year - a collection of pisstakes.  Again, some were pretty inspired, some of it wasn't.

Still, interest remained, and when I saw Hang Time in the racks, I bought it.  I remember this well, cuz I was working that night and I showed up at the store with it.  My SA-fan friend couldn't wait to hear it, so as soon as the doors were locked, we slapped it on the store's stereo.

Oh hell yeah!  From the first crunching chords of "Down On Up To Me" it was one solid ride.  Lenny Kaye and Ed Stasium had cleaned up the sound, giving if definition and solid bottom without losing any of its grit.  More importantly, either producers had iposed or band had finally learned some discipline, because Hang Time was one killer after another.  Dave Pirner's wraparound lyrics never sounded better, and even the throwaways had something to recommend them.  It all ended with a complete frenzy called "Heavy Rotation."


That October, they played local hole The Oasis, and aforemention mate and I were in the front row.  They played one of the best sets I'd ever seen, better than any I ever saw from the Mats or HD (both of whom were estimable live bands).  They blasted through pretty much all of Hang Time and pretty much all the best stuff from their other albums, not to mention treating us to "Pumpin' For Jill", an absolutely ass-kicking "Two Tickets To Paradise" (kicking off the show) and "Amazing Grace", sung with their guitars held on their heads while the amps screamed feedback.  Awesome.

After that they seemed to vanish for awhile.  By 1990 the whole American scene was dying off (the Huskers were dead and buried and the Mats would soon follow them), and my whole life had turned upside down (job, girl, friends).  And The Horse They Rode In On appeared like magic in the racks one day and of course, I had to have it.  At least these guys were still around.

I've heard over the years that Horse is most people's least-favorite.  Odd cause I thought/think it was pretty damn great, a more-than-worthy followup to Hang Time.  Me and the old mate caught them twice that year, once at the I-Beam in San Francisco and once at the Cactus Club in San Jose.  Both shows were outstanding.

Then it was off to oblivion again.  Next thing I heard was they'd been dumped by A&M (no sales), signed to Columbia (huh?) and were recording with Booker T - yes, that Booker T.

I got to see them preview the new album that fall at Slim's.  The new songs sounded great and Grave Dancer's Union was a nice gift late that year - a very good, very rocking album that carried on the ideas they'd been exploring since getting on the stick four years back.  Then things got very strange...

Grave Dancer's hit the Top 40.  Suddenly, Soul Asylum, of all their peers, had turned into The Band That Made It.  Now tons of people who'd never heard of them before were hearing "Runaway Train" in heavy rotation.  The next time I saw SA, it was at The Warfield, a 2,300 seat San Francisco theater - that's ten times the size of the crowds I was used to seeing them with.  The show was a good one, but something had changed - the shaggy looseness of those early gigs was giving way to ... professionalism.

Things got stranger.  Drummer Grant Young retired from the band and music.  They played the White House.  Dave Pirner started dating Winona Ryder.  And the critics who'd once championed them turned on Soul Asylum en masse.  Now the word was that they were an embarrassing pop/heartland group and that Pirner's songs were stupid.  Wow.  So far had the band's star fallen that people were incredulous when I would mention being a fan of Soul Asylum.  I mean, I was getting sneered at by folks who like Hootie and the Blowfish, fer crying out loud!!

It was three years before they were heard from again.  Let Your Dim Light Shine was a disappointment, a mix of by-rote Soul Asylum and offbeat attempts to branch out, none of which really came off.  But I did like the much maligned single, "Misery", which had a vaguely Kinks-ian feel to it.  Gen X'ers loathed the song with a passion - maybe because it struck too close to home.  I saw them again, this time at the Santa Cruz Civic.  Radiohead opened - they were terrible.  SA wasn't much better.  They'd dropped all but a couple of pre-Grave Dancer's songs from the set, and they seemed bored and tired.  Dave strapped on an acoustic and began a ballad that went "I wrote a song for you .... BLAH BLAH BLAH!! (explosive chorus as the band slammed into it behind him)(I'm not making this up, seriously).  Their one encore was a cover of "Sweet Jane." It was looking like the party was ending.  A few years later, Candy From A Stranger appeared in the racks, again without fanfare.  There wasn't a single memorable song on it.  Columbia soon divested themselves of the band.  

End of story.  Well not quite.  Dave cut a solo album (I came across it once at Borders, gave it a listen on their sample player.  Eh).  Dan Murphy played with Golden Smog a lot (interestingly, Golden Smog got better critical notices than Soul Asylum anymore).  Little more was heard.  Until Karl Mueller was diagnosed with throat cancer.  A benefit gig in Minneapolis drew Paul Westerberg out of retirement, and even got Bob Mould and Grant Hart to share a stage for one last time.

In `06, SA reappeared with a new album - The Silver Lining.  Karl played on the album but was gone by the time it was released.  SA did a free gig in Cesar Chavez Park.  For free?  Why not.  By now Michael Bland was on drums (are there any Minneapolis musicians he hasn't played with?), and Tommy Stinson hisself was playing bass.  The rhythm section definitely were goosing things along but Dave and Dan played with plenty of fire that night, and Tommy still exudes the rock`n'roll animal magnetism - if anything, even more than when he was younger.  It was a good show and I had a great time, even though only one pre-Grave Dancer's song appeared in the set, and the new songs off The Silver Lining didn't do it for me.  After the gig I made my way across the street to the Fairmont Hotel to take a leak, and who should be on his way out but Tommy.  I doffed my hat and bowed to him, and he responded with an "Aaaah, thank you!" in a tone that suggested it was, after all, only his due (not that he wasn't correct).

And after that it was back to oblivion.  Earlier this year, or late last year, SA released a new album, Delayed Reaction.  Based on the samples, it sounds okay, but not interesting enough to fork over for.  Tommy and Michael Bland are no longer playing with them, and recently Dan Murphy called it a day as well.  That leaves Dave Pirner the only original member left.  Apparently he plans to carry on.  So be it.  I don't see much sign that I'll be paying attention.

Soul Asylum is the rather sad example of a band that burned brightly for a while, then burned out.  But for those of us who saw them in their peak years, we know they were once something special.

Essential Listening

Almost all of their catalog is still in print and readily available.  Hang Time and And The Horse are the two albums I most strongly recommend, and both can be bought separately or as part of the three-disk Welcome To The Minority set, which also includes a host of worthwhile b-sides and outtakes.  Grave Dancer's Union is of course their big hit and also  readily available.  More highly recommended (by me) are the Twin/Tone albums - Say What You Will, Made To Be Broken and While You Were Out.  These albums are less consistent, but the highlights still represent the band at their best.  The albums are preferable to the Closer To The Stars collection, which simply misses too many highlights.  The cassette-only Time's Incinerator has some amusing rarities but is not essential.  It has never been on CD and is now pretty rare - will probably set you back $25 or so.   Anything after that may be worth it if you're into the band.  There's a live album (After The Flood) but frankly bootlegs of 80's shows are better.

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