Sweet endings

The Flying Nuns break up; Trona lose a member

Cellars by Starlight by Brett Milano

This weekend, the Flying Nuns become one of the first bands ever to record their first album and break up at the same time. Still in progress at this writing, the album is long overdue after the band's eight-year run. They expect to wrap it up in time for their Middle East show this Friday, after which bassist/singer Kevin Sweeney is outta here. He'll be bound for his girlfriend's home of Tucson the following morning, and another popular Boston band will bite the dust.

Or will they? Gathered around a table at the Middle East during a recording break, the three Nuns aren't quite sure. "Maybe we'll get together and play at each other's weddings and funerals," suggests guitarist Pat Lynch. "I can't see us ever playing together again," opines drummer Tony Velez. "That's because he's the pessimist of the band," counters Sweeney. "There are plenty of bands that take four years off, then get back and do it. This isn't an official split-up, we're just taking a break for a while. We'll all be in town next October, so we could play then -- except that it would be too soon after this show that we're saying is the last ever." Since Velez also is also leaving town -- he's moving to Hoboken -- reunions don't seem likely right away. Only Lynch will be staying in the Boston area, where he's currently a publicist for Rounder and a member of the Peer Group.

The Flying Nuns' approach to pop was so quirky that they could only have been from Boston -- but they weren't. Actually they moved here from New Haven, after Miracle Legion and Dumptruck and before the Gravel Pit. So why is New Haven such a fertile source of slightly eccentric pop outfits? Sweeney explains by citing the famous story that ska was born when Jamaican bands heard radio broadcasts from New Orleans, only the signal was so weak, they learned to play it lopsided. "Everybody in Connecticut loved Boston bands and wanted to sound like one, but our reception was so bad that we all developed this quirky approach."

The Nuns' local popularity arguably peaked around four years ago, when they had only one single ("Disco Dancing Queen," on manager Brian Dunton's Warped label) to their name. The members are the first to admit that they weren't the most career-driven band in the world. To date they've released just 14 songs, on the single, two EPs, and the WMBR Pipeline compilation.

"We weren't prolific, that's for damn sure," admits Sweeney. "We always played the same songs, but nobody noticed because we kept playing them in a different order." Bigger things seemed likely when they signed to Matador three years ago, but that alliance fell apart after one Flying Nuns EP. "They expected us to go on the road," says Sweeney. "We didn't even have a van or a booking agent until it had been out for a while, and by then it was too late. Matador saw that as our being lazy. But it was more just ignorance on our part."

The Matador fallout effectively benched the Nuns as a live band. They took a year-long break from shows ("We were about to start up again, then football season came along," Velez explains), and that prompted their best work in the studio. Last year's SPR 005 EP (released on the Spinning label and named for its catalogue number) sported a harder, more focused sound -- a good example of what can happen when an outfit splits from its label and writes songs to please itself. Toning down some of the band's odder quirks (notably the falsetto vocals) and dealing with down-to-earth song topics ("Separation Anxiety," "Disorder"), SPR 005 is often seen as their "dark" record -- not least because of its dark-colored EP jacket and the choice of a cover tune by Joy Division.

"I didn't realize it was dark until people started pointing it out," notes Lynch.

"We do a lot of things randomly," Sweeney adds. "The songs just wind up reflecting the mood of the time they were written in."

The same applies to the album-in-progress, which will combine a few leftover songs with new ones written for the project. Whether or not the band are around to promote it, Spinning has agreed to release it next summer. And now that nothing is at stake, the Nuns are experiencing another creative burst.

"It's fun, because the songs are taking us in a different direction than we've been before," notes Sweeney. "The sense of humor is back, and there's a more soulful feel to the material."

"I don't think anybody's going to mistake it for a soul record," Lynch interjects. "That pop element will always be there."

The Flying Nuns come out of rock and roll with good attitudes intact and the requisite stories to tell, including the night they opened for Blind Melon two days before singer Shannon Hoon's fatal overdose -- "What I remember most is how much his audience hated us," Velez recalls -- and the time in New York when they found Joey Ramone lurking in their van outside CBGB. "I don't think he knew where he was," Lynch explains, "but somebody led him into the club." And you won't find any grudges as the band prepare to call it a day. "We're basically a lazy band at heart," Sweeney notes. "This started out being really fun, and we managed to drag it out for years."

TRONA CHANGE

Now that Trona are established as one of the city's leading pop outfits, they're about to turn into a much different band: singer/guitarist Mary Ellen Leahy is leaving, playing her last gigs with Trona on the Esplanade August 8 and at the Middle East on the 14th. Originally joining as a back-up singer and guitarist, Leahy came into her own on the much-liked Red River album, sharing the spotlight with singer/guitarist Chris Dyas. That's Leahy's vocal on the current radio hit "Johnny Quick." "That's what made it so hard," she says. "I'd come to this sad and scary decision. Then I came back to work and it's, 'Mary Ellen, you're on the radio!' "

Still, tensions within the band were mounting. "There's no real dirt," Leahy says, "just the classic musical differences that started turning into personal differences -- that was fairly prevalent on Red River. I was still excited about the pop thing, and I think Chris wanted to dig a little deeper."

As for her future plans, "I'll still be doing music, but there's nothing lined up yet. It's not like I'm leaving to join Prince's band or anything."

According to bassist Pete Sutton, Trona now plan to bring in a new guitarist rather than another frontwoman, and Dyas is likely to take on all of the singing.

SEEN THIS WEEK

Back when I was a teenager and first heard the J. Geils Band's version of "First I Look at the Purse," I was especially impressed because I thought it was saying "First I Look at the Pussy." So give a big cheer to Nashville Pussy, who actually sang it that way at Axis a week ago Wednesday. Word on this band has definitely gotten out: long before they started playing at Axis, a crowd had already gathered around six-foot-three bassist Corey Parks's end of the stage for gawking purposes. Like Kiss and the Stooges before them, Nashville Pussy know that a great metal band have to be larger, louder, and trashier than life. They carry both the Ramones guitar overload and the sleaze/fun factor of '70s metal to their logical extremes. The point isn't so much that the two female members of the band make out on stage, but that they do it while playing a furious version of Ted Nugent's "Wang Dang Sweet Poontang." Would anybody else kill to see these people booked on the Lilith Fair?

I'm always a sucker for songs with local references, and Skeggie Kendall unveiled a good one during a Middle East set last Wednesday with his new band, the Toughskins. "Central Square" is a three-chord rocker with an early Modern Lovers groove and lyrics that capture a slice of life -- not to mention a slice of pizza -- with their talk of hitting the area's clubs and then heading to Hi-Fi for a slice. Local scenesters will also recognize the references in "Should I Tell Her Who I Used To Be," a dark-humored true story about a fellow who went for a new life in Boston after producing albums for the Rolling Stones -- that would be the late Jimmy Miller. With local roots guy Jake Guralnick on lead guitar, the new line-up has a more countryish sound than Kendall's last outfit, Tackle Box, but his melodic aim remains true.

Finally, the club-chatter quote of the week. Following a terrific Middle East set two Saturdays ago by long-running indie-poppers Scrawl -- during which the band announced that they've been dropped by Elektra Records, a mere five weeks after the release of their Nature Film -- a fan offered these encouraging words to singer/guitarist Marcy Mays: "Don't worry, half the people in this room have been dropped by major labels."

COMING UP

Tonight (Thursday), Servotron play robot rock at the Middle East, Andrew Bird and Tom Leach are at Johnny D's, Big Ray & the Futuras are at Mama Kin, and John Medeski (without Martin and Wood) is the special guest at the Lizard Lounge's Club d'Elf . . . Tomorrow (Friday) brings Combustible Edison to the Middle East, the Allstonians to T.T. the Bear's Place, Quintaine Americana to the Linwood, Senor Happy to Bill's Bar, Jeffrey Gaines to the Paradise, and Barrence Whitfield & the Movers to Johnny D's . . . On Saturday Jason Hatfield's Starhustler play downstairs at the Middle East with his former bandmate Mary Lou Lord, the Prissteens, Red Aunts, and Caged Heat are all upstairs, Popgun hit T.T.'s, Mighty Sam McClain plays the House of Blues, and Dennis Brennan is at the Lizard Lounge . . . John Cale & the Creatures play the Roxy on Sunday; alterna-country heroes Freakwater and Giant Sand leader Howe Gelb are at T.T.'s . . . Outer-space strippers Astroslut are at Charlie's Tap Monday . . . And on Wednesday it's Leon Russell at the House of Blues and the Push Kings at T.T.'s.