If 1996 Truly was the official year of the pop record, as some critics are
claiming, it certainly rubbed the Super Friendz the wrong way. Coming hot on the
heels of a pop-marked debut album, Mock Up, Scale Down, and ten-inch EP, Play the
Game, not Games, the band's new record, Slide Show, heads off in some different
directions, with some unexpected, albeit enchanting results. Ask the band about
this, and they'll tell you it was purely intentional.
"We are in the climate now that if we ever wanted to make a really good
straight forward pop record, this would have been the time to do it," admits
guitarist Matt Murphy. "But we reacted against that and decided to stake our own
territory and be ourselves. Writing hits, or pop songs for that matter, wasn't our
biggest concern. Obviously, 'Up and Running' is a pop song, and there are other pop
songs on the album, but that wasn't our goal."
Considering the events in the band's life since that first album, a lot of this
soul searching makes sense. The biggest change in the band came over a year ago when
Toronto drummer Lonnie James filled the breach behind the drumkit (a space that was
previously occupied by a calvacade of temporary drummers, including Dave Marsh, and
Sloan's Chris Murphy). With this new addition to the established front line of Murphy,
bassist Charles Austin, and guitarist Drew Yamada, the Super Friendz spent the last year
touring Canada steadily along with musical friends like Al Tuck, Sloan, the Inbreds, and
Zumpano. The band also spent time recording at Toronto's Chemical Sound last May and June
with another friend, Eric Masunaga of the Dambuilders, who helped the quartet to record
Slide Show shortly after he finished helping out on Sebadoh's Harmacy record.
"The thing that I find strange about records now is that they are totally a reflection
of what you were into at that time, especially when you're only releasing one record a year,"
says Austin. "I think we were into longer, more complicated arragements. We were consciously
trying to write songs that were different from the first record."
In truth, much of Slide Show is a far cry from the band's earlier work, especially songs
like long-time fan favorite, "Karate Man." The band considers the change in approach an evo-
lution in sound. Members are also quick to admit that much of Slide Show is more self-indulgent
than previous recordings, but hopefully not to a point that it will lose any of its audience
" 'Karate Man' was a cool riff and some chords based around a Clash song structure," explains
songwriter Murphy. "I was just testing the water to see what you are allowed to write about. It
was something stupid. Kinda Kinks in a way, writing about something foolish. But now we've gone
through this period where we were trying to figure out if we had what it takes to be good songwriters,
which leads to a bit more introspection.
"For people who like the looks of us better than the sound of us, our singles give us the freedom
to follow our ideas through, "he continues. "I think rock 'n' roll is all about self-indulgent tunes.
[Recording this album] was a challenge to see if we could create the sounds that we imagined as song-
writers and as a band. We tried our hardest, but we didn't produce an album of pop gems."
"Finding out that people like the last record allowed us to follow our intuition a lot more, without
constantly worring about stiffing," laughs Austin. "If there had been a negative reaction, this
whole process might have been a little tough."
"I think that there's a natural evolution", says James, of Slide Show's place in the Super
Friendz' discography. "There's the first record, Mock Up, Scale Down, then there's the EP that
starts to go in these directions. Then this album has the ideas that the EP opened the door for,
coming out fully realized. Part of the amazement of the music for me as a fan has always been
the ability to watch an artist grow up in public. Now it's happening for us."
Says Murphy, "The first album was a collection of songs by a group of guys who were just
getting their feet wet in songwriting. So it is little experiments with different themes and
styles of pop music. Since then we've come to more of a consensus of how to keep your person-
ality alive in the music without reacting against each other. This new one has everyone in
tune with each other- it's a lot more cohesive- while still adamantly tring to stake out their
own domain. To claim their own identity within the band."
Having three songwriters who each sings his own songs, it falls it the arrangement of Super
Friendz songs to give the whole band a cohesive sound. Slide Show's music tracks were largely
recorded live, with only a few overdubs. Workhorse producer Masunga painstakingly pierced each
song's vocal track together line by line, taking the best performance from a collection of four
takes
"When we made Mock Up, Scale Down, we hadn't practiced," offers Yamada, comparing the re-
cording approaches. "We had just played the songs live. We were still learning a lot about
playing in a band and still didn't have a full-time drummer. Lonnie's made a big difference.
Plus, this time we sat down a couple of weeks before hand and started to hammer out songs for
hours a day."
"We were lucky that we were able to take a bit of time, more time than any of us had put
into an album before," adds James. "We didn't go too nuts with overdubs or anything- we are
learning to work with less and make it more."
Slide Show's 14 songs are a long journey in Murphy's estimation, which is the reason that
he pulled two of his songs from the record during the recording process. Still, the over-
cautious guitarist need not be too worried. The adept album grows on the listener- there's the
immediacy of pop tracks, like the first single, Murphy's "Up and Running" and his "Stop-Start,"
but then there are also jams like the album's closing tracks, Austin's "Evening Sun" and Murphy's
"The Epic." For his part, Yamada strikes a strong chord with his "Waltz/Two songs," a two-parter
that weaves the listener into the album's more outre moments. Humorously, the band has taken to
calling their album psychedelic. "Psychedelic is the cool way to say arty," jokes Murphy. The
band is armed with quick quips to explain Slide Show's more lyrical tangents, yet seems tentative
when talking about the album in total. Talking on the phone from his apartment, Murphy is unsure
about album-related matters during this first album-related interview. It's an awkwardness that
permeated conversation with Yamada, Austin, and James back in November, the day after the Super
Friendz' show with Zumpano.
"I really wish I could say how excited I am about this album," admits Murphy. "I fear that we
are too hesitant about talking about this record, like 'gee, I don't know.. are people going to like
this?' When it comes down to it, I think this recording is totally cool. It sounds pretty '70s.
It doesn't sound washy '90s in the least. The singing on it sounds great. The reverb is a natural
spring reverb. I think we played well. It makes me happy to hear it.
"At the same time," he continues, "I don't want to sound like I am working up how excited i am
about the new album because I know from last time. We were really excited about releasing our first
album and then the day came and it passed and things were exactly the same for the next four months.
We're just sitting around on our asses as usual. You can get yourself so built up about the release,
then you put it out and you wait for something to happen and nothing happens. The day goes on. So it's
hard to get all that excited. Then again, maybe it's just winter talking."
Exclaim Magazine, February 1997