Say something longing about Miracle Legion/Polaris/Pete&Pete

Listening now and realizing Mark Mulcahy can sound amazing like Bob Dorough. Perhaps they should have done a kid's show collabo

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZedPsqOgpbE

Mark played a great but too-brief set in support of j. Mascis last night in Rhode Island. They'll be in Northampton, Mass. tonight.
https://www.instagram.com/p/Bt6OdBRhD9V/?utm_source=ig_web_button_share_sheet

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K0sWAOHgsyQ

He’s playing in Rhode Island April 3rd

Back to school - Autumn is the perfect time/weather for listening to Mark Mulcahy.
Why is that?

There's something very meta about latter day Polaris/P&P fandom: Nostalgia for a show about nostalgia. Wistful memories of childhood are both the subject of the Polaris album and its associaiton to most listeners. For a certian age group, it was probably also your very first introduction to indiepop.

When I was about 17, I became briefly obsessed with this show and its soundtrack and endeavored to collect all the music from it, which I wasn't able to do. The best story I have about this was that when I went into the Virgin Megastore to look for Starfish by the Fat Tulips and they didn't have it, for whatever reason I was so intent on buying an album called Starfish that day that I got the one by the Church instead.

But I found the Polaris album held up a lot better alongside the rest of the music from the show: various Stephin Merritt songs, the Shackwacky cassette, a couple of tracks off the first Drop Nineteens album, Luscious Jackson, etc. Taken on its own, it tended to hammer you over the head with a particular sound and mood and became cloying long before its runtime finished.

Mark Mulcahy's voice is a thing of wonder at times and suits the more intimate material a lot better IMO than something like 'Snacks and Candy' above.

There were also a few songs like 'Everywhere' (or whatever it was called) that worked a lot better as 30-60 second instrumental cues on the show than as standalone songs.

I went to the Pete & Pete reunion tour 8ish years ago at Bowery Ballroom. It was nice. I think think there are videos online.