The Onion AV Club recently polled its writers about the bands they'd give their right nut to see reunite after an extended breakup or hiatus. Like just about everything the AV Club does, it's a entertaining and insightful read. You can check it out at www.avclub.com.
To be honest, I tend to look on at reunions with my bullshit detector on full blast. Something about them doesn't sit well with me, and for a few reasons. Growing up, it seemed like the only bands reuniting were the ones that I personally didn't give a damn about anyway. When Garth Brooks hung up his guitar and laughably oversized cowboy hat for the first time some 13 or 14 years ago, I can't say I really cared much. I did, however, when he came out of retirement what feels like a dozen times. Ditto for Kiss, who at last count has had something like five reunion tours. Where's the excitement or spectacle in a band that breaks up and gets back together every other week?
Another bone I frequently pick with reunions is how most of them are doomed to fail to begin with. Everytime Van Halen is said to reuinite it spins people into a frenzy, but it's always a matter of time before they implode again, serving only to remind us why the band broke up to begin with. Rather than bringing anything new or refreshing to the table, these reunions too often reopen and pour salt into old wounds. And don't get me started about reunion albums, which are almost guaranteed to tank and tarnish a once great band's legacy even further. Simply put, if a band breaks up it's likely for good reason, and reunions should be approached with the same caution a five year old would a fence with a "Beware of Dog" sign. Enter at your own risk.
Those are my blanket criticisms and gripes with reunions in general, but I have to say there have been a few bands over the past few years who have managed to at least halfway restore my faith in the sanctity of reunion tours. When the Pixies got back together some 11 years after their initial split in 2004, I immediately disregarded all my reservations to catch them in Milwaukee my senior year of college. I was only starting to get into music at about the time the band broke up in 1993, so I was forced to catch up with them in high school. When I finally caught them on stage, I'm pleased to say they exceeded my already high expectations in leaps and bounds. They played everything I wanted to hear, "Debaser," Levitate Me," "Dig For Fire," you name it was there. They aged noticeably, and Frank Black looked disturbingly like Uncle Fester, but apart from that the show served as a model example of how to successfully do a reunion tour.
Seeing Dinosaur Jr. onstage again was another pleasant surprise, not only because of how good they sounded, but also given the particularly volatile nature of their original split. The cliff notes go something like this: J. Mascis was a control freak and a dick, and bassist Lou Barlow was often times the target of Mascis' hostility. The power struggle continued until Mascis dropped Barlow by the wayside, telling him the band broke up before continuing on without him with drummer Murph and a rotation of stand in players.
So when the original lineup announced its reformation sometime in 2005, I met the idea with equal doses excitement and skepticism. But then the reviews came in. They were great at Lollapalooza in 2005, seemed to let bygones be bygones and put out a reunion album (gulp) that rivaled its best work on SST in both intensity and quality. I was sold. I first caught the newly reunited Dinosaur Jr. at the Paradise in November 2007. With PAs and speakers stacked what seemed like a mile high, the band tour through songs new and old, making for an hour or so of the most ear bleeding, mind numbing music I've ever heard. I was literally dizzy leaving the show.
The Pixies and Dino reunions were two huge steps toward softening my icy feelings toward reunions, enough so to make me ponder the AV Club's list a little further. What bands would I walk the Earth to see reform, even for a one off show?
Rocket From the Crypt
-It's only been e few years since San Diego's favorite son bid farewell on Halloween 2005, but a Rocket reunion couldn't come soon enough. Other Jon Reis projects such as the Sultans and Night Marchers have filled the void ok, and there's always Drive Like Jehu to crawl back to, but rewatching that youtube clip of Craig Kilborn proclaiming RFTC as the best live band in the solar system (moments before the band backed up the claim live on the Late Late Show in 2002) makes me hunger for teh real thing. For now, the closest I've come is seeing local boys the Appreciation Post do an all covers set of RFTC favs. It'll have to do.
The Clash
-They're the only band that matters, a bold claim but one the band lived up to ten fold. Still, there's no Clash without the late Joe Strummer, so this one seems dead in the water. We can dream, though, can't we?
Black Flag
-I probably wouldn't make it out alive, but I'd pull some serious strings to catch the Flag, "Damaged" era circa 1981-1982. That youtube clip of a crazed Henry Rollins beating the shit out of a fan in the front row with his microphone is still one of my favorite videos of all time.
Husker Du
-Kyle Ryan of the AV Club actually had the Huskers on his list, so I'll defer to him. But at this point it seems there's a better chance of smallpox resurfacing than these guys, as Bob Mould and Grant Hart continue to talk shit about each other in the press now 20 years after their breakup. Mould told me himself in an interview in 2004 that it would NEVER happen, but crazier things have happened.
Operation Ivy
-Most people would be lucky to land one great band, but Tim Armstrong has two to his credit in Rancid and Op Ivy. But as beloved as Op Ivy is there has scarecley been a mention or hint of a reunion since their breakup in 1987. There's no bad blood or ill will between the members (Armstrong and Matt Freeman still play together in Rancid), so it doesn't seem out of the question. And with Rancid having laid low for the past three or for years, it would have been nice to see an Ivy reunion of some sort to kill the down time.
The Kinks
-Enough said, but again, very unlikely. Hopefully Ray Davies comes around town soon because that's about as close as I'll get.
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