Alternative Wednesday!
Between getting up ass early, riding to the hinterlands, and getting ready for Christmas, I'm running behind on this week's nugget of alternative rock goodness. And it definitely didn't help that this week's hunt was a bit harder than usual. The 1980s featured a LOT of bands who did Christmas songs or covers. The Pretenders, Cocteau Twins, and the Pogues all had tracks that are now considered modern Christmas classics. For whatever reason, there aren't that many 90's bands that did the same thing. The one exception to that rule is Harvey Danger.
Harvey Danger started life as a Nirvana tribute band, but quickly became more than that. 1997 saw the release of "Where Have All the Merrymakers Gone" and their big hit, "Flagpole Sitta". "Flagpole Sitta" was a great single, "Where Have All the Merrymakers Gone" was a good, solid album. However, "Merrymakers" had bloody little in common with the single that was released to promote it. Which isn't to say it was a bad album or a bad song, it just took a couple of listens to hit your ears just right and that may have been part of the problem for the band. They had a couple of other albums, but "Flagpole Sitta" was their only big hit before they finally broke up in 2007.
Before they left us, Harvey Danger did make one other, not inconsiderable contribution to alternative rock culture. They released a really good alt rock Christmas song, "Sometimes You Have to Work On Christmas" which, while if not the best song they ever released (that would be "Terminal Annex" in my opinion), but the song is solid and it's heartfelt and that's more than a lot of music can say.
Edit: Corrected some links that didn't show up, some that posted incorrectly, and corrected some grammar issues. Dude, even the interwebs in Alabama sucks.
Harvey Danger started life as a Nirvana tribute band, but quickly became more than that. 1997 saw the release of "Where Have All the Merrymakers Gone" and their big hit, "Flagpole Sitta". "Flagpole Sitta" was a great single, "Where Have All the Merrymakers Gone" was a good, solid album. However, "Merrymakers" had bloody little in common with the single that was released to promote it. Which isn't to say it was a bad album or a bad song, it just took a couple of listens to hit your ears just right and that may have been part of the problem for the band. They had a couple of other albums, but "Flagpole Sitta" was their only big hit before they finally broke up in 2007.
Before they left us, Harvey Danger did make one other, not inconsiderable contribution to alternative rock culture. They released a really good alt rock Christmas song, "Sometimes You Have to Work On Christmas" which, while if not the best song they ever released (that would be "Terminal Annex" in my opinion), but the song is solid and it's heartfelt and that's more than a lot of music can say.
Edit: Corrected some links that didn't show up, some that posted incorrectly, and corrected some grammar issues. Dude, even the interwebs in Alabama sucks.
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