SUPERCHUNK (MOO, June 1994)
by Matt Hickey

    Superchunk has sold out.
    The Chapel Hill, North Carolina, thrash popsters have just released their
fifth great album, the fairly calm (by comparison) Foolish, and instead of
putting it out on Matador, an independent label the band had previously used,
or going the dreaded-but-economics-driven major-label route, the Chunkies
decided to distribute the record via the band's own independent Merge
Records. Foolish  could be the outfit's best effort yet, although it's
difficult to cop to that completely; it combines the usual speedy guitar
action with a slower, mellower sound and seemingly more mature, direct
lyrics. This a band that, while not quite a junior-league Fugazi, doing
everything only their way, damn it,  remains true to the D.I.Y. indie ethic
while continually evolving into an even better band.
    So where's the sellout, you ask?
    They have a video on -- get ready -- Beavis and Butt-head.
    Actually, all that sellout crap is just that. It's just a cheap ploy to
get you into the story. The band didn't even know about the video for the
song "Package Thief," off their last record, On The Mouth, appearing on the
show, let alone give the green light to it. But at least one band member
doesn't think the idea of those animated dillweeds debating what the song is
about -- or, of course, whether there's a chick in the band, which there is
-- sucks.
    "You're the second person that's told me that," said guitarist/lyricist
Mac McCaughan by phone from Merge's Chapel Hill headquarters while on a
break, sort of, from painting the inside of his house a shade of "peach
mimosa." (He was kidding. I hope. Yeah, he was.) "That's awesome. I used to
really hate (the show) and thought it was really dumb, but now when I watch
it, I find myself laughing. It's kind of funny."
    While being interviewed, McCaughan was pretty distracted because he was
helping put the new EP by Polvo, a Merge band, into boxes -- and because he
said he would rather paint his house than do another interview -- but he was
patient in answering yet another round of inquiries about the new album and
the lyrics contained therein. Much has been made in other publications about
the nature of said lyrics -- about just how personal they are, who and what
they're about, etc. I didn't get into the specifics in the conversation and
won't here; let's face it, the band, which includes bassist Laura Ballance,
drummer Jon Wurster and guitarist Jim Wilbur, is pretty aggravated about the
whole thing, and despite the Rona Barrett in me screaming to get out, it's
just not important. What is important is that for whatever reason, McCaughan
has graduated from dealing in subjects like package thievery, slack
motherfuckers and mowing the lawn to more, oh, adult themes. Whether
intentional or not, the lyrics are likely the best McCaughan has ever
written.
    Not that he necessarily agrees.
    "I don't think there's one record that I would say, 'Well, this is all
the best,'" he said. "In a way (the new lyrics) are more direct, though
they're still pretty abstract or something like that. They haven't changed
really that much since probably the second record.
    "(They) just sort of came out that way, really. Like most of the stuff we
do, we don't really know what we're doing as much beforehand as when it
actually happens."
    To a certain degree, much has also been made about the band changing its
sound. It's not a drastic change, mind you -- they didn't all of a sudden
become Air Supply -- but there's a been a subtle slowing down of the pace
that actually began in earnest in the middle of On The Mouth. Some listeners
didn't get it, while some that did didn't seem to like the new direction too
much.
    "Most people didn't seem to notice, really," McCaughan said. "(People who
don't like it) don't have to listen to it if they don't want to...But I like
this record and I like the way that the sound seems to be changing. That
doesn't necessarily mean that the next one will be more like this one. We
don't really know until we actually write the songs."
    Superchunk is touring at this very moment -- Columbus is a scheduled stop
in mid-to-late June -- and when the band returns home, McCaughan the record
mogul will turn his attention to the Merge Records' fifth anniversary weekend
that will coincide with a compilation album to be released on July 25. The
skinny: 
    "There's 20 songs on it, and it's as many Merge bands as we could fit on
there, sort of -- some previously unreleased stuff, like Magnetic Fields,
Superchunk, Polvo, some other things, and then some stuff from out-of-print
7-inches that have been out before that you can't get now. Just a whole sort
of mixed bag of stuff."
    Before I let McCaughan go about his merry way, I asked him the cheesy,
yeah-sure-I'm-a-rock-writer question about what kind of music influences his
work. After his "everything from punk rock to New Zealand pop music to Neil
Young or whatever" answer, I told him I've recently heard more than a couple
of bands that had a tad of Superchunk in them.  
    "Oh, really? That's interesting," he said, sounding genuinely surprised.
"Even though we've been around for five years, it doesn't seem that long to
me, so it seems weird that there would be someone who would be influenced by
us. It makes you feel like the bands that you were like, 'I always admired
this band,'  and to think there's someone else who thinks about us in the
same way is cool
-- though being in the band doesn't really feel like you deserve it."
    There are those that would beg to differ.
    Cue Butt-head: "These guys rule."
    That they do, my moronic cartoon pal. That they do.