Freak Scene #71: Pajama Slave Dancers Say Farewell With 'SoSo'
Plus, Winterpills unearths a track from 20 years ago for an expanded edition of their 2005 debut
A Guide to Music in Western Mass. (and sometimes Connecticut)
This week in Freak Scene, the latest album from the Western Mass. indie-rock institution Pajama Slave Dancers is likely their last, and Winterpills is somehow turning 20, though I demand a recount.
It’s been so long since Pajama Slave Dancers have released a new album that the Northampton rockers had started to seem like a myth, an indie-rock Beowulf that conquered Western Mass. and then disappeared. Like any epic hero, they weren’t really gone: PSD recently released SoSo, their first new album since 1997 — and possibly their last ever.
Singers and guitarists Steve Westfield and Dave Montovani started the band in 1982, and released their first album, All You Can Eat!, on cassette the same year. They kept busy through the ’80s and ’90s, then took a long break when the musicians focused on work and family (and other musical projects) before they came roaring back about a decade ago, culminating in SoSo.
It’s a 21-track behemoth that still clocks in at less than an hour, thanks to Pajama Slave Dancers’ penchant for compact bursts of thrashing punk, garage-rock, off-kilter pop and, believe it or not, a track or two that could pass for a sea shanty. They deliver all of it with the same gleeful, anarchic sensibility that has fueled the band for decades — long enough for Robert Christgau, the self-appointed “dean of American rock critics,” to have written (about their 1985 album Cheap Is Real), “Like most collegiate humor, this isn’t as funny as it thinks it is, and like most collegiate humor it holds up against competing professional product.” He gave the album a B.
Christgau’s opinion likely didn’t amount to a pisshole in the snow for PSD, whose target audience all these years has always been themselves. It’s the best way to explain how the churning guitars and galloping drums of album opener “Alien Janitor” can exist so comfortably alongside the ’60s-style psychedelia of “Deece Cutback Broziah,” an instrumental track with twangy guitars from Westfield and J Mascis of Dinosaur Jr. that build in volume and intensity as they wrap themselves around each other over a muddy bassline and a garage-rock beat. For all your skanking needs, “Five Day Weekend” is a third-wave ska jam complete with horns, while Mascis is there again to sprays superheated lead guitar all over “Polly Anne Marie.”
Lou Barlow, also of Dinosaur Jr. (and Sebadoh), adds backing vocals and “weirdo synths” on “Daxe Rexford,” where theatrical piano flourishes sound like they could have come from a late-Victorian British music hall variety show, or a Kinks outtake circa 1965. A few tracks later, the longest song on the album is also the most seaworthy: featuring vocals, penny whistle and squeezebox from John Allen, “40 Days at Sea” is PSD’s take on a maritime work song, with a shout-along chorus and vaguely smutty lyrics.
After such a long-awaited and triumphant return, it’s fair to wonder why Pajama Slave Dancers are ready to call it quits. This is a guess, but it’s likely related to the death of drummer Dirk Futon (a.k.a. Jeffrey Roncalli), who passed away in May 2023. Losing a friend and musical collaborator may well have seemed like a natural punctuation mark on the career of a band that has been funny, abrasive, juvenile, eclectic and creative, usually all at once. If SoSo is indeed the last album from Pajama Slave Dancers, it’s a fitting send-off.
Winterpills Mark 20th Anniversary of Their Debut
Supposedly it’s been 20 years since Winterpills released their self-titled first album, but that’s obviously a mistake, because I reviewed it for No Depression when it came out, and there’s just no way so much time has passed. Anyway, let’s say it has been 20 years: the Northampton band is celebrating the anniversary with a remastered reissue of Winterpills, out July 11 with a pair of bonus tracks, “Looking Down (Flora’s Version)” and “Everybody Gets High.”
The group recorded the latter song, a minor-key meditation on the unhealthy ways people bury emotional pain, during the sessions that yielded Winterpills, but left the tune off the LP. “To be honest, at the time, it seemed a bit too upbeat in sound compared to the other songs on the album,” singer and songwriter Philip B. Price says in a press release. “I felt like we had something really cohesive in the overall vibe, and adding this shiny little bauble threw it off, drew too much attention.”
If “Everybody Gets High” is upbeat, that makes the somber “Cranky,” which did make the album, akin to a shovelful of dirt landing on a coffin, but Price is right about the cohesive vibe of Winterpills. It’s hard to see where “Everybody Gets High” would have fit in, and hearing it for the first time all these years later is like opening a time capsule, or peeking through a window into the past. Back to the present: Winterpills have a new album due this fall, and a gig Nov. 8 at the Iron Horse to mark the occasion (tickets).
Upcoming Concerts
The Bands on Brewster concert series returns this summer, and I’m a few weeks late on it (sorry to the Classicals, Norma Jean and Wallace Field and Brittany Brideau). Going forward, though, you can catch the following acts for free on Thursdays on the Brewster Court Walkway outside Northampton Brewery: Avery Joi June 26, the Greys July 3, Simple Friend, Ribboncandy and King Radio July 10, Hannah Mohan and Stefan Weiner July 17, Lucia Dostal July 24 and the Hendersons July 31. Temporary Friends and Jeff Coyne play Aug. 7, Gold Dust on Aug, 14 (read more about their stunning new album in Freak Scene #66), Ruby Lou on Aug. 21 and Prewn perform Aug. 28. Weather permitting (a big if this year), the shows happen from 6-8 p.m.
The Iron Horse hosts Cut Worms Sept. 11 (tickets), Jeffrey Foucault with the Old Hat Stringband Oct. 4 (tickets), the singer and songwriter Katie Pruitt with Jess Nolan Oct. 24 (tickets) and the Barr Brothers Nov. 16 (tickets).
The Parlor Room brings in Pete Droge, perhaps best known for his 1994 song “If You Don't Love Me (I'll Kill Myself),” Sept. 14 (tickets). Also, Jonathan Scales Fourchestra Sept. 19 (tickets) and Jenna Nicholls Sept. 26 (tickets).
The Drake in Amherst hosts Éilís Kennedy & Peter Blanchette July 17 (tickets), the Georgia psych band Improvement Movement Sept. 14 (tickets) and ’90s-influenced indie band Dogpark Sept. 19 (tickets).
The Space Ballroom in Hamden, Conn., also has a Dogpark show, Aug. 29 (tickets). Also coming: San Diego synth-pop band Glass Spells Sept. 5 (tickets), Pinkshift Nov. 14 (tickets) and the influential ’80s indie-rockers the Dream Syndicate Dec. 9 (tickets).
Austin alt-country band Reckless Kelly, featuring Simsbury’s Jay Nazz on drums, play Infinity Hall in Norfolk Sept. 28 (tickets).
That’s a wrap on this week, but Freak Scene is always seeking submissions. You can send music for coverage consideration to erdanton at gmail or reply to this email. Check out these guidelines first.
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