Soundtrack of Your Life: Deep Cover

An occasional feature in which we mark the songs of our relative youth as played over public muzak systems. 

Date: 26 March 2015, 2 to 3 p.m.
Place: 2013 Honda Civic driving from Santa Fe to Albuquerque, N.M.
Song:  Entire album: "Key Lime Pie"
Artist: Camper Van Beethoven
Irony Matrix: 0.6 out of 10
Comment: We admit that there's virtually nothing ironic about the hero of this story buffing up the 1989 CD release from alt-freaksters Camper Van Beethoven at the height of their accessibility. I had a random hankering for "Pictures of Matchstick Men," prompted, I think, by a channel flip past a PBS pledge-driving airing of yet another '60s nostalgia-fest. As soon as the laser dropped on the first track, the Middle Eastern-tinged "Opening Theme," the music sounded both familiar and fresh. Even on factory speakers the audio was unbelievably crisp and clear. Then came the litany of songs that had started to leak from my memory, reinstated just in time. This is the second full LP by David Lowery (Cracker) and his ragtag pals. It is produced by Dennis Herring and engineered by Csaba Petocz (they would team up again two years later for another near-masterpiece from the Heyday of the Planet of Sound, Throwing Muses' "The Real Ramona"). "Sweethearts" steals a riff and mood from Bob Dylan's "Slow Train" album. Morgan Fichter's violin recalls Dylan's "Desire"/Rolling Thunder era, and it is that violin that memorably kicks off the penultimate track, "Matchstick Men," indelibly recorded pristinely with the hollow sound of the violin's body high in the mix, as if the instrument were turned inside-out, before the guitars come crashing in. (Video # 1, below.) This is what digital was invented for. Trippy psychedelia crashes to Earth with a muscular thud. On the other end of the spectrum, the shambling lyrics of "When I Win the Lottery" (#2), seguing into the hypnotic drone of "(I Was Born in a) Laundromat," celebrating the Queen of the Trailer Park. Where was I in 1989? Staying up a little late on Sundays, before the big workday watching "120 Minutes" on MTV and swooning over that "Matchstick Men" video. Midpoint: "June," hinting at an echo of the drone of "I Want You (She's So Heavy)." Then "All Her Favorite Fruit" planting the seeds for Cracker's alt-epic "Euro Trash Girl."  The suspense kept building. Is "Matchstick Men" next? No? How about next? And soon the slow-building Final Four: "Flowers" ("by the drunken river, flowers growing ... out of my bones," intoned through Lowry's sinuses). And the best Guided by Voices song that Bob Pollard didn't write, with "Revolver" guitar slashes: a compact 2:46, "The Human Press of Days." (#3) The stop and start. Fichter's weepy violin. The martial drumbeat. All "to resist the dull existence of [pause] gravity!" Fiddle, crash, bang, thump, "all I ever see is them and you." Coda. "Come On Darkness." It all returns. It clicks and snaps back into place.

BONUS TRACKS#1: The great cover song:



#2: Whatcha gonna do?



#3: What did it mean to fly?