Where Did Your Long Hair Go?

I spend an exorbitant (borderline unhealthy) amount of time at home on the internet reading about bands and labels. Most of these bands and labels fall into the category of bands and labels that inspire one to care deeply about them, if one inclined to care about them at all. These bands and labels are highly saturated with releases that inspire people to spend considerable amounts of time actively seeking them out. If one of these people is not actively seeking out a particular release from a particular band, it is still pretty likely that those bands, and those labels are on some sort of list (mental or physical) that is always with these people.

I also spend an exorbitant (borderline unhealthy) amount of time at record stores. I sort through seemingly endless boxes of 7 inches. Every so often a situation like the on that follows (and when it does it's fucking awesome) will occur. I think to myself, "Hey cool, there is a band called The Caroline Know." I turn the album over and notice that the 7" in question was released by The Bus Stop Label. I then think to myself, "Oh, I've actually been looking for this record." I'd read about the Caroline Know in the past, but they were filed away in a dark corner of my mind with other bands that I'd read about once and assumed that I'd never owned recorded music from.

There are two very important facets of this story. The Bus Stop Label is an "Iowa City bred, Milwaukee based," indiepop label that is often referred to as the "American Sarah." And "Caroline No," is my favorite Beach Boys song.

As it turns out, The Caroline Know are perhaps a bit of an American Orange Juice, if you're thinking about Orange Juice songs like "(To Put It In a) Nutshell," and "Consolation Prize." There is also, not surprisingly, a similarity to Sebadoh as Jason Lowenstein was a regular contributor, and Eric Gaffney was an occasional contributor. References to other bands aside though, The Caroline Know's "Nail," is the sort of 7 inch that can occupy one's record player for extraordinary lenghts of time despite the many other records resting along side, waiting for their turn. One will probably lift the needle ever so gently, again and again certain that after this one last listen, one will move on to the next record. Though once one has listened to the 7 inch an appropriate number of times, there will probably be a few days of listening to Pet Sounds involved...

Also while I'm kind of on the subject, can we put a mandatory hold on recording artists covering "God Only Knows?" This could comfortably last anywhere from 20 years to forever. There are plenty of other great Beach Boys songs that can be covered ("Caroline No" actually being one of them,) it's just that "God Only Knows," is actually a perfect pop song. Am I completely out of line to suggest that it could be left alone for awhile?