"It's a shame about Ray," sings Evan Dando on the title track of The Lemonheads' 1992 breakthrough album -- but the real shame would be if the band's legacy turned out to be marked by their instantly catchy but eventually irritating cover "Mrs. Robinson."
It's a Shame About Ray didn't gain much chart traction until it was reissued with their pop-punk version of the Simon & Garfunkel song tacked on to it. The mostly mellow jangle-pop of the original release, however, solidified the album's place in 1990s alt-rock canon. Rhino's new Collector's Edition reissue -- a two-disk set loaded with demo tracks, outtakes and music videos to supplement the 33 minutes of Ray proper -- is a new, definitive version of the album, and one that, with any luck, will introduce the sounds of these iconic Gen-Xers to an entirely new generation of slackers.
A few of Ray's songs are mopey, but luckily Dando was blessed with as much songwriting talent as he was quarter-life angst. The title track is melancholy and lyrically impenetrable -- yet almost anthemic. Its jangly guitars suggest the usual influences -- think Big Star and The Byrds. The disc's extensive liner notes reveal that the song was inspired by an Australian acquaintance who called everyone he met "Ray." The English major in me wants to posit that "It's a Shame About a Ray" is, then, a fatalistic lament about inevitable human failings and disappointment, but this is the kind of music that benefits from passionately singing along rather than close reading.
"My Drug Buddy" is another of the album's highlights, featuring extensive backing vocals from Dando's bandmate and nebulous significant other Juliana Hatfield. The song shows a strong country influence, and the vocal pairing is more Gram and Emmylou than Lee and Nancy. The repeated line "I love my drug buddy" would take on new significance a few years later when Dando publicly admitted to smoking crack, but the lilting melody and sultry organ accompaniment are enough to make the song an engaging listen. The band reveals even greater roots-music influence on "Hannah & Gabi," a pedal steel-driven country rocker that again shows off Dando's songwriting and vocal prowess.
The album, pretty consistently rocking and rewarding through its first 12 tracks, ends problematically with the aforementioned cover of "Mrs. Robinson." The band was more or less commissioned to record a new version of the song to help advertise the recent re-release of The Graduate to a younger, grungier demographic, so they decided on a Ramones-aping punk-rock treatment. The song was a modest hit on modern rock stations and is still their most well-known recording -- a fact that seems quite perverse considering the strong musicianship and original songwriting that fills up the rest of Ray.
Of course, with this release of the album, the listening doesn't end where the original track listing does. There are 10 bonus tracks -- mostly demo versions, save for one scuttled cover of the Australian band Sneeze's "Shakey Ground." The second disc of the set is a DVD with music videos and live and candid footage from an Australian tour. These bonus features may be mere curios to new or casual fans, but longtime followers of The Lemonheads will surely appreciate them.
I often fear that The Lemonheads, 10 or more years from now, will be remembered more for their banal cover of an iconic 1960s song than the power-pop classic that is It's a Shame About Ray. Though the bonus tracks and videos on this reissue are a major selling point, the real significance of Rhino's generous repackaging is an acknowledgment of It's a Shame About Ray's status as a classic. 3
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