This Bakesale reissue is actually part of Lou Barlow's second unexpected reunion of the last decade. The first, of course, was his thought-it-would-never-happen rapprochement with longtime estranged partner J. Mascis in Dinosaur Jr. And then Sebadoh, the one-man-project turned full-blown band, found its second and best-loved line-up coming together again late last decade. The early Sebadoh records were purposefully fuzzy, mumbly things, full of raw pop yearning that was sometimes pretty hard to make out through all the hiss and crackle. Though they were key documents in the rise of lo-fi as a distinct movement in 1990s American indie, it's probably not coincidental that the word "weed" appeared prominently in several of the band's early releases, which often literally sound like the product of a baked mind and a four-track, flip-flopping between silliness and vein-opening.
As Sebadoh became more of a democracy, the clashing urges of the various songwriters (Barlow, bassist Jason Loewenstein, second guitarist Eric Gaffney, who left before Bakesale) turned the full-band's first few records into sometimes frustrating (the CD skip button was made for these sort of jumbles) and sometimes beguiling (they had a real way with an anthemic pop-punk hook when they wanted to) collisions of styles. Pure indie-pop instincts fought with an urge toward experimental cassette tape fucking around. Bouncy power-chord jams rubbed up against shameless acoustic mopery. By Bakesale in 1994, they'd already written a couple of undeniable anthems with "Gimme Indie Rock" and "Brand New Love", the latter an instant-classic covered by peers like Superchunk in what seemed like seconds after it's release. But Bakesale was the first Sebadoh album where the power-chords and anthems seemed to win out. It was, and remains, their most focused and purely pleasurable record.
The early- and mid-90s were great years for albums that brought punk's two-minute punchiness together with the earnest relationship laments that briefly defined that slippery terrain known as indie rock. And Bakesale is one of the era's best. If it's got fewer romance-gone-wrong epics than Superchunk's Foolish and lacks the emphatic guitar-snarl of Archers of Loaf's Icky Mettle, it combines bits of both tendencies into 15 songs that rarely outstay their welcome. Unlike Sebadoh's scattershot early albums, it works as a brief, memorable whole. The band probably wasn't trying to make a statement-- that sort of ran counter to the whole aesthetic back then-- but by tightening up and aiming for clarity, they managed one anyway. "Feels good just to bitch about it," from "Magnet's Coil", is one of those lines that defines a certain part of early indie's appeal, where kids-like-you kvetched about their foibles and fears in an unpretentious way. But the album's frantic pace, where even the slow songs feel like urgent expulsions of heartbreak, defines the other side of indie's appeal. At its best, all that emoting was delivered with a healthy shot of energy that felt necessary given the sluggish tempos of alt-rock radio at the time.
Bakesale sounds a little brighter on this remaster, though this isn't an album where you're really looking for crisp and distinct-in-the-mix instrumental interplay. Its opening three-song blast, all tumbling drums and jittery-but-beefy noise-pop guitar, is an obvious attempt to grab the attention of a new generation of kids who'd sprang up to embrace feelings-and-feedback. But even the somber stuff, like the "Not a Friend" to "Dreams" run early on, features strong, clear hooks instead of burying things in murk. This isn't to say the album is clean, at least not in the way indie records routinely are these days. But it's also not "lo-fi" in the indistinct or noise-obliterated way we've come to know. Without sacrificing the music's rough edges, the band was up enough on its hook-game that "Rebound" briefly hung around modern rock radio, Barlow's first unexpected minor-league hit until Folk Implosion's "Natural One" became the really unexpected hit a few years later.
So Bakesale itself remains a strong and lovable essay on 90s indie's charms. But what of the expected and extensive bonus material? Well, in bearing-down to make a no-filler album, it's pretty clear that Sebadoh's goof-off and boo-hoo sides went into the singles, EPs, and ancillary material from the same era. Tunes (using the word very loosely) like "MOR Backlash", "Foreground", and "Drumstick Jumble" sound like the "wacky" bedroom sound-collage filler they would have been if they'd been included on Bakesale, and acoustic demo takes of "Not a Friend" and "Mystery Man" prove how quickly charming sensitivity can give way to unfortunate sad-sack territory when you strip away the electric oomph of the album versions. (Though the acoustic "Magnet's Coil" and "Rebound" prove they could hit you without any amplification.) Despite a few strong songs like "Punching Myself in the Face Repeatedly, Publicly" and "Sing Something/Plate of Hatred" that can almost stand with the album's best, these Bakesale add-ons will mostly be of value to those who loved Sebadoh's first few years of all-over-the-place wildness, but it's not as if their second-disc inclusion can dull the parent album's punch.
