DISQUS

Popdose: Steve Foley, Elvis Presley, and America

  • Zack · 1 year ago
    I'll reiterate an earlier pronouncement - if you didn't die this year, you sucked.
  • Darren · 1 year ago
    There's still time.
  • DwDunphy · 1 year ago
    Thanks, but if those are the rules, I'd rather suck.
  • Darren · 1 year ago
    Dude, you lack commitment.
  • DwDunphy · 1 year ago
    I was going to respond with a Rush lyric quote, but I forgot it. Probably just as well.
  • Darren · 1 year ago
    Not lyrics from the tune with all the rapping in it, I hope. ;P
  • rwcass · 1 year ago
    Nicely done, Darren, and thanks for the news -- I didn't know Foley had died. His quotes in the Replacements oral history that came out last year were interesting since he was on top of the world when he got hired for the "All Shook Down" tour, whereas the other three Replacements were just running out the clock.

    Foley was also in Bash & Pop, though from what I've read, Tommy Stinson played almost everything on their one album. It's a great album, though, superior to anything his more democratic band, Perfect, put out later in the '90s, and better than some of Westerberg's solo albums. Then again, it sounds like the answer to the question "What if Westerberg had left the Replacements after 'All Shook Down' but Stinson decided to carry on the Replacements' name and sound with a new set of musicians as revenge for being mostly left off of that session-musician-dominated final album?"
  • Darren · 1 year ago
    Yeah, the Bash & Pop record hinted at potential greatness and I was glad to see Foley still on-board by the time they made their record. I had caught them a year prior in a dive bar playing to less than 20 people and thought it would be something Stinson would get tired of doing in another couple months. Of course, I would later see Stinson playing to fewer people than that with Perfect. Foley was a kick-ass drummer, a great guy, by all accounts, and will be missed.
  • rwcass · 1 year ago
    So Bash & Pop were playing gigs before they recorded "Friday Night Is Killing Me"? There's not much written about the history of the band, so I didn't know. Did they sound good live? Was their sound enhanced on the album by Stinson doing everything himself (or with session musicians, which is one rumor)?
  • Darren · 1 year ago
    Don't know the band's exact line-up when I saw them (other than Foley and Stinson), but they rocked really well. I remember a barnburning cover of "Speak Now Or Forever Hold Your Peace" (a Terry Reid tune that Cheap Trick absolutely made their own on their first album) and chatting with Tommy afterwards about his love for Cheap Trick, life after the Mats, and whatnot.
  • Matt · 1 year ago
    Second things first: Kind of ties in with a theory I've been trying to formulate over the past few years... That Elvis' life is the perfect analogy for Rock and Roll: Started out with vim and vigor and ended up slumped over in the crapper.

    First things second: R.I.P. Steve Foley. Your contribution to Rock and Roll history will not be forgotten. I probably saw you 50 times, and always dug it.