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THE
Get
LEMON HEADS
Another Shot
E van dando and Georgia havent
had the best relationship in the past—
at least not when it comes to the per
former/audience dynamic. At a 2007
show at the 40 Watt Club here in Athens,
Dando played a few songs best described
as halfhearted and distant. He was listless,
stopped and started songs erratically, and
about half the crowd—a crowd that had -
started out excited and hopeful to see one of
the seminal '90s college-rock songwriters per
form after years of not touring through Athens
and after a decade-long album gap—ended
up leaving the club before the show was even
over.
And then last fall at Atlanta's EARL, with
a packed house ready and waiting, and wait
ing, and waiting, after the show's start time
was postponed several times, Dando came out,
announced he was feeling sick, tried perform
ing one song, then backed out by claiming he
had to save his voice for a big show in D.C.
the next day, then got into a brief verbal tiff
with a crowd member. He was sick, so OK, but
he handled his relationship with and obliga
tion to his audience clumsily; nobody there
was happy to hear that D.C. mattered more
than Atlanta.
So, what's up, Evan? Instead of talking
about Dando, let's talk with Dando. Currently
on tour playing his landmark 1992 album,
It's a Shame About Ray, in its entirety, Dando
acknowledges that, these days, he has to
focus more on maintaining his vocal health.
'Yeah, I remember those shows. I was sick.
The Atlanta show, the D.C. show, but that's it
last year; those were the only two we didn't
play," he says, calling from the back of his
tour van, on the way to Indianapolis. “Playing
is pretty much the same [as it was years ago].
The only difference now is I gotta be careful
with my voice.*
Dando and a rotating cast of backing
musicians have performed under the name
The Lemonheads for a quarter century. Tons
of press came his way in the '90s as part of
the “alternative* boom, and he's certainly
not the only rocker to struggle with drug-use *
fiascos amid rapid swings—both ways—in
fame, acclaim and recognizability. The current
tour coincides with a U.K. release of a career-
spanning 47-track double-CD compilation,
Laughing AU the Way to the Qeaners: The Best
of The Lemonheads. It's available digitally
for those of us on this side of the Atlantic.
The comp covers 25 years and a number of
Lemonheads lineups.
“One of the songs, 'Had,' is from the day
after we graduated high school It was fun
to pick the songs. And 'Mrs. Robinson' is on
there, too. I'd rather it not be, but they said,
Yeah, it's gotta be on there,'* says Dando,
who famously bristled at all the attention his
band received due to its cover of the Simon
& Garfunkel classic. “At this point this is the
kind of thing that only fans would buy; so if
its just a fan thing, you'd think fans would
understand if I didn't want the song on there.
And they'd probably already have that song
anyway. But it's on there.*
The guy can play a good show, and reports
from this current Lemonheads lineup—
Dando's backed by tour pro Chuck Treece
(Urge Overkill Bad Brains) on drums and Fred
Mascherino (Taking Back Sunday, The Color
Fred) on bass—have been positive. They're
performing Its a Shame About Ray from start
to finish on this tour, though Dando's spend
ing the downtime working on new tunes and a
new album.
"Any show I'd play, I'd play a bunch of
these songs anyway,* he says. "It's more of an
academic thing to play an album all in a row.
Basically, I'm doing this because I'm not ready
with my new album yet. But you can't tour it
forever. I mean, I guess I have."
Chris Hassiotis
fife
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12 FLAGPOLE.COM • FEBRUARY 22,2012