Replacements tribute is tightest yet

The Tribute to the Replacements returned to First Avenue for a third year Friday, a Minneapolis celebration of the most Minneapolis band. True to the Replacements' always-unexpected form, Friday's five-hour marathon centered on the group's raw, scrappy and downright snotty 1981 debut album, "Sorry Ma, Forgot to Take Out the Trash" — but the music actually sounded more rehearsed and sincere than in previous years. Few could've expected songs like "I Bought a Headache" and "Shiftless When Idle" to be taken so seriously. Religiously, even.

Guitarists Ryan Smith (of the Melismatics) and Terry Eason — who led the house band through the entire "Sorry Ma" album — played the spitfire guitar parts better than Paul Westerberg and Bob Stinson ever did post-recording. Highlights among the rotating vocalist stints included: the kickoff tear through "Takin' a Ride" by punk vet Dale T. Nelson; Pink Mink singers Arzu Gokcen and Christy Hunt's sassy spiking of "Rattlesnake" and "Don't Ask Why," respectively, and Japhies singer Reed Wilkerson's stage-diving delivery of "Otto."

Only two songs had a bratty flair: a glammed-out Curtiss A screamed his way through "Johnny's Gonna Die," while Jimmy "Dude Weather" Gaines delivered "I Hate Music" as an Elvis impersonator.

A dozen other acts also played 'Mats sets. Some were straight-up and well-rehearsed, especially High on Stress' nailed-it hammering of "Color Me Impressed" and "Left of the Dial." Some were more playful and clever, including Martin Devaney's montage of Slim Dunlap songs (the guitarist who replaced the late Bob Stinson) and BNLX's fuzzed-out approach to "Merry Go Round" and "You Lose."

The yin-yang approach was especially prevalent when stomp-rockers the 4onthefloor sloppily, drunkenly raised "Hootenanny" and "Treatment Bound" on the main stage while, minutes later, Poverty Hash played the same songs next door at 7th Street Entry with a bluesy bend. Both approaches worked beautifully.

>>Ever since the Replacements broke up in the summer of 1991, fans have been praying for some kind of reunion. In an exclusive interview with Rolling Stone, Replacements frontman Paul Westerberg admits that he has mixed feelings about the possibility of reforming the group. "I don't know, man," he says. "You catch me on one day and I think, 'Oh hell, why not?' Tommy has never stopped. He's a performer. I'm more of a writer-artist, though I perform as well - or at least I used to. But, God . . . I don't know."

Replacements guitarist Bob Stinson died in 1995 and drummer Chris Mars now devotes his life to art and hasn't played drums in years - which raises a logical question. "Who are the Replacements?" asks Westerberg. "Me, Chris and Tommy? Chris wouldn't do it. He might get together in a room and sit around and shoot the shit and if there were instruments, might play. I don't know more than that. I don't think Chris would ever go out and tour. I met with him last year a couple of times just for fun. Tommy is a little more aggressive towards it, because I think he needs a gig."

Unsurprisingly, Tommy Stinson - who currently plays bass in Guns N' Roses and Soul Asylum - doesn't agree with Westerberg's assessment of the situation. "He thinks I need a gig?" Stinson says. "That's funny. I got fucking three or four gigs going at any one time. Paul likes to sit home and record in his basement, and that works for him. I like to perform. But you never know. I'm more like, if a reunion happens, it happens. If the planets align and the oceans don't swallow up the earth first."

Stinson does share some of Weterberg's reservations about a possible reunion. "Why would we do it?" he asks. "The only reason we would ever do it would be to get paid. We're not going to recapture anything. I think I could probably have fun with it though. It'd probably be a short-lived moment of having fun with it, but I ultimately think it might not be very good to try and go back."

In 2006, Westerberg and Stinson reunited the Replacements to record two new songs for a compilation LP. Session drummer Josh Freese played drums, though Mars did contribute background vocals. "From time to time we'll get together and jam just for fun," says Stinson. "We do it without any sort of expectations or anything. We didn't break up in any sort of a nasty fashion. There was no dispute or anything. We just kind of walked way from it. I'm not so sure if there's any point in really revisiting it necessarily."

While a reunion may be unlikely in the near future, Westerberg has spent a lot of time recently combing through his past for a planned box set. "On a whim I got to dig through some old tapes," he says. "I found one song I never put on anything for people to hear. Then I dug deeper and found the original 'Good Day' Eventually>. That pretty much stunned me. I have to close this box set pretty soon because this could take the rest of my life just going through all these things and going, 'God, why was that there.'" 

Westerberg hasn't released any new material since his 2009 EP PW & The Ghost Gloves Cat Wing Joy Boys, and that's unlikely to change anytime soon. "I write stuff, but I haven't written much lately," he says. "I played a little saxophone last year, more or less just for something else to do. I wouldn't say I'm working on a record. I have enough stuff to release one tomorrow, but why bother? In this day and age, my thought is to make a song everyday and erase it as a sort of Dadaist protest.<<

JESUS!! Buy some smokes once in awhile, MMMM-KAY!!

>>Twin/Tone rush-released the cassette-only live album The Shit Hits the Fans before the Replacements left the label for Sire later in 1985. The album is an audience tape of an Oklahoma City concert from 1984 that a Replacements roadie confiscated from a patron that was bootlegging the show and it is presented unvarnished. Consequently, it is, as they like to say, a "warts-and-all" document of a standard Replacements show, capturing the group as they slaughter several of their best-known songs and run-through drunken covers of R.E.M., Thin Lizzy and the Rolling Stones. The tape sounds poor and the performances are, to be charitable, sloppy, but it's great fun for hardcore fans, especially those longing for the 'Mats alcohol-fueled live shows.<<

1. "Lawdy Miss Clawdy" (LLoyd Price)
2. "Ye Sleeping Knights of Jesus" (Robyn Hitchcock)
3. "Lovelines" (Westerberg/Stinson/Stinson/Mars)
4. "I'll Be There" (Berry Gordy, Jr./Bob West/Hal Davis/Willie Hutch)
5. "Sixteen Blue" (Westerberg)
6. "Can't Hardly Wait" (Westerberg)
7. "I Will Dare" (Westerberg)
8. "Hear You Been to College" (Westerberg/Stinson/Stinson/Mars)
9. "Saturday Night Special" (Ed King/Ronnie Van Zant)
10. "Iron Man" (Butler/Iommi/Osbourne/Ward)
11. "Misty Mountain Hop" (Page/Plant/Jones)
12. "Heartbreaker" (Bonham/Jones/Page/Plant)
13. "Can't Get Enough" (Mick Ralphs)
14. "Jailbreak" (Phil Lynott)
15. "Breakdown" (Tom Petty)
16. "No More the Moon Shines on Lorena" (Alvin Pleasant Carter)
17. "Merry Go Round" (Nikki Sixx)
18. "Left in the Dark" (Ken Draznik)
19. "Takin' Care of Business" (Randy Bachman)
20. "I Will Follow" (Hewson/Evans/Clayton/Mullen)
21. "Jumpin' Jack Flash" (Jagger/Richards)
22. "Radio Free Europe" (Berry/Buck/Mills/Stipe)
23. "The New World" (Cervenka/Nommensen Duchac)
24. "Let It Be" (Lennon/McCartney).
    

They usually didn't play the whole song of say "I Will Follow" or "Heartbreaker", and it was as sloppy as you'd imagine, but I dare you to find any other band that covered the likes of The Carter Family, Black Sabbath, BTO, The Crue, and/or The Jackson 5 in the same show.  GOOD TIMES!

I'm surprised they didn't include another of their guilty pleasures they liked to butcher around this era, "Hitchin' a Ride" by Vanity Fair...