My music tastes as I exited high school and entered college in the late 1980s were fairly myopic. Sure, I was listening to the same mainstream radio stations as my friends at the same time I was venturing beyond that safe cocoon to explore what at the time was known as "college rock," but in those forays into the unknown I was limited by what I could learn from friends, the few magazines on the subject and MTV's "120 Minutes." I was passionate about a few artists, however, and that devotion helped to exponentially enhance my education.

R.E.M. was among the first bands that hooked me, and I bought up (or taped from friends) everything I could find. I made wise choices, for the most part, taping the tepid Full Time Men album from a friend (that being Peter Buck's collaboration with the Fleshtones) and purchasing the Byrds tribute album Time Between. In that case, a purchase was a no-brainer, for it featured Buck backing Robyn Hitchcock, an artist whose Globe of Frogs album (or rather, store-bought cassette) had been played so much that the lettering had been rubbed off the tape. Dinosaur Jr. also had become an important band in my life, and its inclusion on the disc certainly didn't hurt. That I didn't know much about the other groups on the disc didn't matter; this was enough to justify the purchase of what, in 1990, was one of my first CDs.

So, 17 years later, what do I have? A disc with some great Byrds covers, some dross and the first appearance in my collection of what went on to be some favorite bands. Of particular note are the Chills ("Draft Morning"), Thin White Rope ("Everybody Has Been Burned" and "I Knew I'd Want You") and Richard Thompson (joined here by Clive Gregson and Christine Collister on "Here Without You" and "Hickory Wind"). All contribute great versions of songs, though only Thin White Rope's performance was enough at the time to make me explore further, leading to purchase of a cassette of The Ruby Sea. The disc also feautures several bands I've not heard from again, like the Moffs, the Mock Turtles, the Primevals and Static. Apparently, UK label Imaginary Records used the disc to promote some of its own, lesser-known artists. The disc was issued in the U.S. by Communion.

The bands I did know turned in some nice versions of Byrds tunes as well. Hitchcock and Buck, performing as Nigel and the Crosses, do a gorgeous version of "Wild Mountain Thyme," while Miracle Legion (whose Me and Mr. Ray was just beginning to hook me) offered suitably wacky versions of "Mr. Spaceman and "All the Things." Only Dinosaur Jr. left me somewhat cold. The band played a great, fuzzed-out version of "I'll Feel a Whole Lot Better," with Lou Barlow on lead vocals, but the whole thing is marred by the presence of "Artie Sinatra," who speak-sings over Barlow in a voice that makes Neil Hamburger sound like, well, the real Sinatra. They do the same thing with "Lotta Love" on the contemporaneous Neil Young tribute, The Bridge (next week's Out of the Shadows pick). I remember laughing about it at the time, but now I wish I could strip that goofy vocal away from what is a pretty rocking cover. (Trivia: apparently Sinatra is the face in the sun on the cover of the band's first album).

Both the Byrds and Young tributes were among the first wave of such releases (along with similar, indie-centric tributes to the Kinks, Syd Barrett and Captain Beefheart). The idea, of course, was to interest younger fans in the work of bands that influenced current favorites. As the late critic Robert Palmer wrote in a New York Times review of several of them, "At their best, the tribute albums offer a satisfying sense of emotional connection as well, linking younger bands and audiences with the works of their predecessors at a level that runs deeper than mere competence." I first heard most of the songs on Time Between in these versions, long before I'd heard the Byrds originals. I've since become a huge fan of that band's first five or six albums (a read through Ric Menck's 33 1/3 book about The Notorious Byrd Brothers is what led me to dig this out in the first place) and while it's clear the trajectory of the evolution of my music taste would have led me there sooner rather than later, I know this disc certainly nudged me in that direction.

MP3: Dinosaur Jr. - I'll Feel a Whole Lot Better
MP3: Thin White Rope - Everybody Has Been Burned
MP3: Miracle Legion - Mr. Spaceman

Next week: The Bridge - a Tribute to Neil Young

Labels: music, OOTS