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What was it about alternative music that changed your world view?
The lyrics speak to you. You identify with it. Watch regular MTV, and the lyrics are nothing. Mariah Carey, Usher -- it's recycled clichés. It's absolutely untrue. You listen to Elvis Costello's "Shipbuilding", the Jam, Buffalo Tom, Juliana Hatfield, you go, "Yes. That moves me." I can't listen to an Usher song and say I'm going to cry. It's utter nonsense. I can't believe these artists -- and I use the term loosely -- sit in the studio and think, "Yes! We got it."
With which bands did you identify the most back then?
There were so many. The Replacements, the Smiths, Elvis Costello, Siouxsie and The Banshees, the Pixies, the Neighborhoods. I remember being greatly changed by Television's Marquee Moon. It was so different from anything I had ever heard before. That was the first time I remember thinking that I wished I lived in New York and went to clubs. I looked at the photo of Richard Hell and Tom Verlaine and knew that these guys were different. Something seemed to be happening that I was definitely not a part of. So by the time I graduated and moved to Boston in 1986, I was selling shoes, working as a bike messenger and doing stand-up, but it was all about seeing bands -- O Positive, Pixies, Throwing Muses, Lemonheads, Blake Babies.
How do you tend to discover new bands?
Sometimes you can tell if it's a cool band from the photo on the CD. If you see a band posing without much [clothing] on, it's probably uncool. Sometimes you can tell by song titles. "Girl I Want to Sex You Up" -- I'm not going to enjoy that CD. I also read record reviews. Anything that says "guitar pop" is good. "Wall of sound." "Lo-fi." "Obviously inspired by Velvet Underground or Yo La Tengo."
There's that great erotically charged scene in The Truth About Cats And Dogs with Suzanne Vega's "Caramel" playing. Anything particular you like for that type of moment in real life?
It's equally interesting to have sex to a really super-fast Led Zeppelin CD, or the more contemplative Elliott Smith, or Beck. Or the new Corner Shop. ALT
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Janeane Garofalo discovered alternative music in a way that would make Lou Reed proud -- she turned on a Providence, Rhode Island, radio station and couldn't believe what she heard at all. The song was by the Bongos, and she was forever changed. Now, in addition to her film and comedy careers, Garofalo hosts MTV's Indie Outing and fights to get Merge Records discs nominated for Grammys.
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So what's on your stereo right now?
Let me go look. Mary Lou Lord, Seam, Everclear, Supergrass and Cake Like.
What was your introduction to alternative music?
It was 1982. I was in college doing homework, and I stumbled across the Brown University radio station, WBRU. They were playing "Numbers With Wings" by the Bongos, and I just thought, "Yes! I knew there was something better out there." I started buying records and tapes like crazy and started going to see shows at the Living Room and Lupo's. You could see four bands for $4, and the Replacements or Wire Train would be playing. I started meeting more interesting people. My whole world changed.
What had you been listening to previously?
I liked Spyro Gyra, Rickie Lee Jones. I loved, loved, loved Todd Rundgren. All the Billy Joel, Styx, Cars, Pat Benatar. Even at that time I remember thinking that their lyrics were horribly cliché -- with the exception of early Bruce Springsteen. The Wild, The Innocent And The E Street Shuffle, Greetings From Asbury Park NJ -- I was from a New Jersey working-class background, and those albums spoke to me.
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