Whatever happened to Fountains of Wayne? (c/d?)

List I have kept of who wrote what.

92 Subaru Adam Schlesinger
A Dip In The Ocean Chris Collingwood
A Fine Day for a Parade Chris Collingwood
A Road Song Adam Schlesinger
Acela Adam Schlesinger
Action Hero Adam Schlesinger
All Kinds of Time Adam Schlesinger
Amity Gardens Chris Collingwood
Baby One More Time Max Martin
Barbara H. Chris Collingwood
Better Things Ray Davies
Bought for a Song Chris Collingwood
Bright Future in Sales Adam Schlesinger
Bus Stop Graham Gouldman
Can't Get It Out of My Head Jeff Lynne
Cemetary Guns Chris Collingwood
Chanukah Under the Stars Adam Schelsinger
Cold Comfort Flowers Chris Collingwood
Cry One Tear Chris Collingwood
Denise Adam Schlesinger
Everything's Ruined Adam Schlesinger
Fire In The Canyon Chris Collingwood
Fire Island Adam Schlesinger
Firelight Waltz Chris Collingwood
Go, Hippie Chris Collingwood
Hackensack Adam Schlesinger
Halley's Waitress Adam Schlesinger
Hat and Feet Adam Schlesinger
Hate To See You Like This Adam Schlesinger
Help! John Lennon/Paul McCartney
Hey Julie Adam Schlesinger
Hotel Majestic Chris Collingwood
Hung Up on You Chris Collingwood
I-95 Adam Schlesinger
I Know You Well Chris Collingwood
I'll Do the Driving Chris Collingwood
I Want an Alien for Christmas Adam Schlesinger
I Want You Around Chris Collingwood
Imperia Chris Collingwood
It Must be Summer Adam Schlesinger
I've Got a Flair Adam Schlesinger
Janice's Party Chris Collingwood
Joe Rey Chris Collingwood
Kid Gloves Chris Collingwood
Killermont Street Roddy Frame
Laser Show Adam Schlesinger
Leave the Biker Chris Collingwood
Little Red Light Adam Schlesinger
Lost in Space Adam Schlesinger
Maureen Adam Schlesinger
Mexican Wine Adam Schlesinger
Michael and Heather At The Baggage Claim Adam Schlesinger
New Routine Adam Schlesinger
Nightlight Adam Schlesinger
Peace and Love Adam Schlesinger
Places Chris Collingwood
Planet Of Weed Adam Schlesinger
Please Don't Rock Me Tonight Chris Collingwood
Prom Theme Adam Schlesinger
Radiation Vibe Chris Collingwood
Radio Bar Adam Schlesinger
Red Dragon Tattoo Chris Collingwood
Revolving Dora Adam Schlesinger
Richie and Reuben Adam Schlesinger
Seatbacks and Traytables Chris Collingwood
Sense Into You Adam Schlesinger
She's Got a Problem Adam Schlesinger
Sick Day Adam Schlesinger/Chris Collingwood
Sink to the Bottom Adam Schlesinger
Small Favors Chris Collingwood
Someone To Love Adam Schlesinger
Someone's Gonna Break Your Heart Chris Collingwood
Song Of The Passaic W: John Alleyne Macnab M: Adam Schlesinger
Stacy's Mom Adam Schlesinger
Strapped For Cash Adam Schlesinger
Supercollider Chris Collingwood
Survival Car Chris Collingwood
The Girl I Can't Forget Adam Schlesinger
The Man in the Santa Suit Chris Collingwood
The Senator's Daughter Adam Schlesinger
The Story In Your Eyes Justin Hayward
The Summer Place Adam Schlesinger
The Valley of Malls Chris Collingwood
These Days Jackson Browne
This Better Be Good Adam Schlesinger
Today's Teardrops Gene Pitney/Aaron Schroeder
Traffic and Weather Adam Schlesinger
Trains and Boats and Planes Burt Bacharach/Hal David
Troubled Times Chris Collingwood
Utopia Parkway Adam Schlesinger
Valley Winter Song Chris Collingwood
Workingman's Hands Chris Collingwood
Yolanda Hayes Adam Schlesinger
You Curse at Girls Adam Schlesinger

(From a Facebook fan group)

What a body of work for both of them though. What a loss.

Their Baby One More Time is something else

what a terrible loss. writing a song that makes "that thing you do" work as a movie is a significant achievement on top of everything else he did as a working musician.

May his memory be a blessing.

his marriage to his ex-wife was covered in Vows, what a time capsule https://www.nytimes.com/1999/02/14/style/vows-katherine-michel-adam-schlesinger.html

Nice that maybe my absolute fave ("sick day") is one of the few co-writes.

Most of those not too surprising except Collingwood doing Hung Up on You and A Fine Day for a Parade.

Anyone else like Ivy? I love the first two records and EP.

Over here IVY

RIP. The sound of my tweens.

― coco vide (pomenitul), Thursday, April 2, 2020 12:39 AM (ten hours ago) bookmarkflaglink

Fuck, this very much. RIP.

Haven't posted in a minute but ilx was the first place I wanted to come when I heard. This is heartbreaking. RIP

Good reminder of how crazy prolific here was here:

https://music.avclub.com/adam-schlesinger-and-fountains-of-wayne-were-so-much-mo-1842627923

And how he basically had multiple shots at going for the EGOT.

it is so so dumb that "TTYD" lost Best Original Song

Funny bit in what I just posted:

“I was up against Andrew Lloyd Webber and Diane Warren. You know, all my peers, basically,” Schlesinger said in that 2001 interview of losing the 1997 Oscar to Lloyd Webber for Evita’s “You Must Love Me.” “It was funny, because Diane Warren was sitting right in front of me, and she writes these really sappy love ballads, but her personality does not fit her music. When he won, she was like, ‘That piece of shit won?’”

Nice post by Sarah Silverman, apparently they were very close and working on a musical together

https://www.instagram.com/p/B-ewvzUAfyf/?igshid=1ntfv4wnvihdj

This morning I was watching this video of Adam and Mike Viola performing "That Thing You Do" and felt myself close to tears. I just can't believe this.

Considering he's one degree away from Superdrag and Nicki Minaj, I suspect "six degrees of Adam Schlesinger" would shame Kevin Bacon.

If you are interested, Maron moved his 2012 talk with Adam out from behind the paywall. It's actually a pretty good talk.

i'm listening to it, it's very nice. what a balanced sounding, kind fellow he seems. his persona is slightly less gruff than i'd guessed at. i had no basis for my guess, just like...pictures i guess? i just learned brian young was in the posies for a while. i was surprised, and i also learned now he's drumming for jesus and mary chain.

the quick ween commentary was a minor but wild side note to me.

Sad he lost the Oscar and Golden Globe to that incredibly dull song from Evita. That Thing You Do was a great song that needed to sound credible for the whole movie to even exist.

otmfm, and which is sort of easy to never even consider (since the song is exactly what it is). what would that movie even be if the song sucked? i mean, the alt take would be for it to be obviously horrible, i guess?

i still love the "oneders" joke.

Me too. I love the movie.

Every so often if I'm in a brainstorming session I'll randomly say "I keep backing back to the Heardsman"

If you are interested, Maron moved his 2012 talk with Adam out from behind the paywall. It's actually a pretty good talk.

http://www.wtfpod.com/podcast/repost-adam-schlesinger-from-2012

Driving to the valley of POLLS: Fountains of Wayne's UTOPIA PARKWAY (An Adam Schlesinger memorial poll)

Is it Adam singing on Everything's Ruined? I always pictured that but never had that confirmed. It could have been the friend who taped me their debut told me so, but that was about 23 years ago so can't remember at this stage.

"From the night I can't remember / with the girl I can't forget" seems like such an obvious couplet and yet they wrote a perfect song around it and no one else did.

Many xp, Brian Young was the drummer on "Amazing Disgrace," my absolute favorite Posies album. Joe Skyward was the other half of the rhythm section for that one, and when I saw them live the power knocked my socks off.

Carl Wilson on Adam

"From the night I can't remember / with the girl I can't forget" seems like such an obvious couplet and yet they wrote a perfect song around it and no one else did.

Did this predate the Magnetic Fields song with a similar conceit?

always got them confused with ben folds five...

Can't get my head around this

Robbie Fulks on Adam:

https://www.talkhouse.com/heres-how-adam-schlesinger-did-that-thing-he-did/?fbclid=IwAR1WJ6tDHwrfP-nelFDaxeQldWP7LPdAqU3SxStMWmrb-lM1v8A21W31pfI

Xpost that Magnetic Fields tune was released first. The Girl I Can’t Forget came out a few years later on Out of State Plates.

CC on Adam:
https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-features/adam-schlesinger-fountains-of-wayne-chris-collingwood-980798/

He viewed himself as a craftsman and not an artist, a word he considered pretentious. He worked diligently every day, even when he didn’t feel like it, which is true of a lot of successful people, and probably the greatest single difference between us.

lol that RS photo makes each member of the band look stoned on a different drug.

What a great interview. Reminds me a lot of Forster's account of Grant McLennan, except that Adam was really technically proficient.

Yeah

Very nice tribute. Does anyone know what their falling out was all about?

Artistic differences?

i read something in the last few days where Collingwood basically said he checked out during the making of Sky Full of Holes (drugs/alcohol-related, maybe? or maybe he just wasn't into it) and that forced Schlesinger to take over to keep the ship moving. and then once Collingwood was in a better place and tried to return - I'm paraphrasing here - "it was hard to go from him leading back to a 50/50 situation". i think that was the main reason for their separation ... if they truly fought, i'd guess it grew out of that as opposed to artistic differences or whatever.

i wish i could remember where i saw that, maybe someone else will know.

COLLINGWOOD: Well, the - you know, the struggles with alcohol were over in 2006 or so. And Fountains of Wayne was recording long after that. So it hasn't been an issue for several years. It was related to, I think, what eventually caused the demise of Fountains of Wayne in that when we were recording the record before the last Fountains of Wayne record, which was called "Traffic And Weather," I didn't really have a whole lot to contribute to that album. I was out to lunch a little bit, mentally, and just drinking too much.

And I think that the fact that I sort of removed myself from the process at that point made it really easier for Adam to take over. And when I was ready to actually make another album, you know, several years later after I'd sort of cleaned up my act, it was very difficult. It was very, very hard to get back into the position where we were equals.

https://www.npr.org/2016/07/24/487237229/fountains-of-wayne-s-chris-collingwood-returns-with-new-project-look-park

re: Sky full of holes

“Adam and I just fought constantly making that record,” he says. “We stopped making that record in the middle of making that record to try to work out a whole bunch of things that were going on between us. We saw a psychiatrist and tried to work things out. ”

In the end, they reached an agreement to finish the album, tour a bit behind it, and then go their ways.

https://veermag.com/2016/10/life-after-fountains-of-wayne/

and…

AS: I don’t know if Chris wants to do it anymore. Getting the last FoW record finished and out in the world was sort of a nightmare, frankly. If we can find a way to work together and have fun and be creative again and not have it be miserable, I’m totally into it. But I’m too old to have band fights.

CC: I like Sky Full of Holes quite a lot, but it was no fun to make. There were two different writers with two increasingly different visions, and we spent more time fighting than recording. I try never to say never, but it’s staggering to think of everything that would have to happen for me to want to repeat that experience.

https://louderthanwar.com/interview-fountains-wayne/

xpost i had the timeline wrong, but that's it - thank you vm

Listened to UP and Traffic and Weather this am as I was making Easter brunch. The latter was a mainstay in my car CD player after it came out. It’s obviously not on the level of its two predecessors and has fewer classics. But it holds up better than I remember and that the circumstances surrounding its recording would suggest.

Yolanda Hayes for the sneaky win here.

https://youtu.be/R3CfvtjZgog

^ Squeeze's Glenn Tilbrook's new cover of Hackensack

Hackensack is the best FoW song.
(also, Glenn Tilbrook is one of my all-time favorite songwriters, but this cover is a bit limp -- dude *is* in his 60's after all)

https://youtu.be/m9p8t4Q_MX4?t=185 him doing Red Dragon Tattoo in 2003

That's more like it -- back in 2003, Glenn still had the juice (I think i saw that solo tour)