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papas fritas, "pop has freed us"
Minty Fresh
I am somewhat ashamed to admit I have been struck with a feeling ofnostalgia for something that I never quite experienced before with therelease of this collection. What's even worse is the sticker on thefront cover advertises as song as featured in a Dentyne Ice commercial.Regardgless, I'm pretty certain that there was a time in the 1990s thatcommercial alternative radio was occasionally adventurous and sometimessupported a local group who had a great song. The two most notablestations here in the USA were probably NY's WDRE and LA's KROQ.Boston's WFNX wasn't far behind, and here in Boston, we had our shareof local hits that never quite made much of a difference outside of theBay State, no matter how hard Kay Hanley tried. Papas Fritas wasn't aband who I felt much affinity for, but whenever "Lame to Be" or "HeyHey You Say" came on the radio I soaked it in. I wasn't terriblyimpressed with pop songs back in the mid-1990s, and Papas Fritas wereclearly obsessed with Beach Boys, Fleetwood Mac and the Replacements.To their credit, they made the most impressive dense pop records theycould with the budget they had. Often recording on their own 8-trackrecorder, the core trio of Tim Goddess (guitar), Keith Gendel (bass),and Shivika Asthana (drums) each shared vocal duties, often singingtogether like a 1970s Hanna-Barbara cartoon band. Despite theirconfined conditions, the group were joined by string players, horns,and percussionists and achieved some sparkling clear results. Yetthere's a reason why these songs rarely stretch much longer than threeminutes: they've given away all the songs' secrets within the firstminute. It's the beauty of simple pop and what attracts so many peopleto the bloody Beach Boys. They didn't cloud their music with effectsand distortion, nor did they ever wander from the verse-chorus-versestructure, but listening now, there isn't a dull moment and everythingseems honestly direct. Named after their self-publishing company (and aplay on their name) this collects 17 musical tracks on one disc andthree music videos on a DVD. Most of the tracks are from bonus cuts offinternational releases, compilation tracks, and singles, but eight oftheir biggest radio album cuts from their three records also appear tomake it more of a hits package as well. It's nice for people like mewho would have honestly probably let their full-length records collectdust as well as fans who wanted fully digital versions of songs thatwere only available on cheaply made flimsy 7" records or expensiveimports. The video DVD is entertaining to watch, and the band's justtoo cute in "Hey Hey You Say" not to fall in love with them. It's aperfect visual accompaniment and I strongly encourage all labels tostart doing this. If there's anything the rest of the industry canlearn from this is that including multimedia extras as a bonus (ie: notmaking so many separate DVD releases, but tossing in a second disc likethey should) can only be a good thing.
I am somewhat ashamed to admit I have been struck with a feeling ofnostalgia for something that I never quite experienced before with therelease of this collection. What's even worse is the sticker on thefront cover advertises as song as featured in a Dentyne Ice commercial.Regardgless, I'm pretty certain that there was a time in the 1990s thatcommercial alternative radio was occasionally adventurous and sometimessupported a local group who had a great song. The two most notablestations here in the USA were probably NY's WDRE and LA's KROQ.Boston's WFNX wasn't far behind, and here in Boston, we had our shareof local hits that never quite made much of a difference outside of theBay State, no matter how hard Kay Hanley tried. Papas Fritas wasn't aband who I felt much affinity for, but whenever "Lame to Be" or "HeyHey You Say" came on the radio I soaked it in. I wasn't terriblyimpressed with pop songs back in the mid-1990s, and Papas Fritas wereclearly obsessed with Beach Boys, Fleetwood Mac and the Replacements.To their credit, they made the most impressive dense pop records theycould with the budget they had. Often recording on their own 8-trackrecorder, the core trio of Tim Goddess (guitar), Keith Gendel (bass),and Shivika Asthana (drums) each shared vocal duties, often singingtogether like a 1970s Hanna-Barbara cartoon band. Despite theirconfined conditions, the group were joined by string players, horns,and percussionists and achieved some sparkling clear results. Yetthere's a reason why these songs rarely stretch much longer than threeminutes: they've given away all the songs' secrets within the firstminute. It's the beauty of simple pop and what attracts so many peopleto the bloody Beach Boys. They didn't cloud their music with effectsand distortion, nor did they ever wander from the verse-chorus-versestructure, but listening now, there isn't a dull moment and everythingseems honestly direct. Named after their self-publishing company (and aplay on their name) this collects 17 musical tracks on one disc andthree music videos on a DVD. Most of the tracks are from bonus cuts offinternational releases, compilation tracks, and singles, but eight oftheir biggest radio album cuts from their three records also appear tomake it more of a hits package as well. It's nice for people like mewho would have honestly probably let their full-length records collectdust as well as fans who wanted fully digital versions of songs thatwere only available on cheaply made flimsy 7" records or expensiveimports. The video DVD is entertaining to watch, and the band's justtoo cute in "Hey Hey You Say" not to fall in love with them. It's aperfect visual accompaniment and I strongly encourage all labels tostart doing this. If there's anything the rest of the industry canlearn from this is that including multimedia extras as a bonus (ie: notmaking so many separate DVD releases, but tossing in a second disc likethey should) can only be a good thing.
