Superchunk

Their first releases came from all over the place.

The Fluid, Pavement and Superchunk were American bands that Pav toured.

Magic Dirt and Bud were bands that Pav gave supports to.

A couple of bands carried over from Waterfront.

It continued the work of Felleheen in a way.

Notably, Gerling carried over to the new label.

International bands like Superchunk and pavement side project Preston School of Industry also carried over.

They would release acclaimed albums by Jersey, Art of Fighting, and even The Go-Betweens.

And I don't know what it is about that, but that's just the way life works.

I did think that opening up for Archer's Love, Superchunk, given Pylon, Reenactment Society, having those opportunities definitely helped us get a little bit of a name more than just a band that...

Has like 500 followers or something on

Spotify

Today, it's gonna be a special rewind episode.

I'm looking back on my interviews with Superchunk's Mac McCaughan and the Dead Milkmen's Joe Jack Talcum.

Uh, they stretch back to just, uh, 2017, 2018, and, uh, and it's all about, uh, you know, why music, why new music still matters decades into their career, especially at that point.

Uh, Mac will be looking back at the urgency and anxiety that fueled What a Time to Be Alive, uh, during Trump's first run.

And, uh, and Joe Jack Talcum's gonna explain why the Dead Milkmen only agreed to reunite if they kept writing.

But we're gonna start with my 2017 interview, uh, with, uh, with Mac from Superchunk.

They hadn't planned on recording a new record at that time, but with the '26 election, uh, hitting a nerve with the Chapel Hill band, the songs flowed fast and ferocious, as he'll say, uh, leading to that record, What a Time to Be Alive.

We talked about the politics behind the songs, as well as the, uh, the LP's special guests.

I met him, he was my tour manager, front of house for my tour in 2009, my solo tour.

And I, I remember seeing him when he came to Woodstock with Superchunk, and I just said like, "So what are you listening to?"

Mm-hmm.

And he said, "Uh, I don't know," said like, "I really like this Michael Beach." And I didn't know anything about...

So we're gonna do a little summer block here.

So, uh, we're gonna ta- we're gonna play some Superchunk, some Tigertail, and some Summer Vacation.

So everything's got a summer theme on this one.

So I'll, I'll talk about the songs on the other side of this in a little bit.

But yeah, we're gon- we're gonna check things out.

But up first it is This Summer by Superchunk.

[rock music] Oh, this summer.

We won't regret what we cannot know.

Jason, you've definitely toured here before, haven't you? Probably you were involved in so many music projects and bands.

Yeah, I've been here with Bob Mould and Superchunk.

I actually played Cork twice.

Did you? With Bob Mould, yeah.

Yeah.

Super Chunk.

Really? This is where I hate chat GPT or AI, Google, whatever it is.

I hate that sometimes.

Yeah.

So it's, but it's like, you know what I mean? It's like those bands like, you know, Superchunk or Yo La Tengo and these bands that are able to kinda, like, sustain themselves-

Yeah

... by being on this sort of circuit-