With a full head of spiky hair, rail-thin frame and unflagging enthusiasm for playing music, John Freeman looks as if he has not aged 15 days in the 15 years since his band the Magnolias last put out a record. Fortunately for him, though, the indie music world underwent a major facelift.
Local music: Little-brother pop/punks the Magnolias are now elder statesmen
August 17, 2012 at 9:04PM
"In 1997, bands were still beholden to record labels," the 47-year-old said. "Now look at us."
Always billed as the "junior" band to the Replacements and Soul Asylum -- a tag Freeman said he wore proudly -- the Magnolias are now one of the more senior bands still kicking around the Twin Cities. Last month, they finally issued a new record. Loud, dirty, spazzy, squawky and loaded with sharp pop hooks, "Pop the Lock" sounds remarkably like the Magnolias of 1997 or 1987.
Only the Magnolias of 2012, however, could have made the disc the way Freeman wanted to, using classic (and pricier) analog equipment, a reputable local producer (Mike Wisti) and no record label. They did it thanks to Kickstarter.com, the online donation site. "It's really the first Magnolias record to be made all on our own, which felt pretty liberating and exciting," Freeman said.
Guitarist Mike Leonard remembered the "final" Magnolias show at the Turf Club in 1997 as "pretty much a joke," since it somehow took place without the band's frontman. The writer of all but one of the Magnolias' songs before "Pop the Lock," Freeman had cut out for a getaway to Italy.
"We hit a real rough patch where we lost our record label, booking agent and manager all close together, and I was just so frustrated with the whole thing," the singer said. "I wanted nothing to do with the Magnolias."
That's a sharp contrast to Freeman's fond memory of opening a sold-out Fleshtones gig in Boston in 1986 "and the place just going ballistic for us." The band earned radio play and even MTV attention for its singles "Pardon Me" and "When I'm Not." Their base grew strong in Europe after Virgin France released their 1992 record "Off the Hook."
It was an invitation to tour Europe in 2008 that started the Magnolias down the path to a more permanent revival. The tour wasn't exactly a high-roller affair, but it convinced Freeman to do more than the couple of local gigs a year that the band played for much of the '00s.
"It was just a lot of fun," he said. "That was the problem in 1997: It had stopped becoming fun."
Some of the songs on "Pop the Lock" started with Freeman's post-Magnolias bands the Pushbacks and Action Alert, including the disenchanted "American Dream" and the brick-chopping rocker "Neighborhood Patrol." But about half the record was written with the new album in mind. "At a Disadvantage" is a more somber gem with a Byrdsian jangle, and "Kissing the Ground You're On" bursts with the thrill of traveling abroad.
Despite the 15-year holdout, Freeman admits that the new Magnolias might be as unchanged sonically as he is ageless in appearance.
"It's pretty much my thing all over again," he said. "What am I going to do? Add cello or synthesizers?"
