Bastards of Young
The Replacements
Six minutes long, which is almost an act of provocation from a band associated with short, chaotic rock songs. The arrangement is sparse and melancholy — guitars that jangle rather than crunch, a rhythm section that doesn't push but settles into something heavy and resigned. Paul Westerberg's voice sounds like it has been used hard, cigarettes and late nights and genuine feeling compacted into a delivery that is almost careless but never is. The emotional register is collective rather than personal: this is a song about a generation, about the children of the working class and the nowhere-specific Midwest, about what it means to be promised something by a culture that never intended to deliver. The production on Tim, from 1985, is cleaner than the Replacements' earlier work but not cleaned up — there's still grit in it, a refusal to be polished into palatability. Lyrically it's one of Westerberg's most sustained pieces of writing, full of compressed images that accrue weight over the song's long running time. The guitar solo, credited to another player, is perfectly wrong — searching, unresolved, human. You play this on a Sunday afternoon when nothing has worked out the way it was supposed to and you need someone to confirm that without turning it into a self-help statement.
slow
1980s
gritty, heavy, sparse
Minneapolis Midwest American rock, 1985
Indie Rock, Alternative Rock. Heartland Rock. melancholic, resigned. Opens in collective weariness and deepens steadily over six minutes into generational grief, ending without consolation.. energy 5. slow. danceability 3. valence 3. vocals: rough worn male, emotionally heavy, careless surface with precise feeling underneath. production: jangling guitars, restrained rhythm section, gritty mix, long slow burn. texture: gritty, heavy, sparse. acousticness 3. era: 1980s. Minneapolis Midwest American rock, 1985. Sunday afternoon when nothing has worked out and you need someone to confirm that without turning it into a lesson.