Poi Dog Pondering
Fruitless (Texas Hotel/Columbia 73553)

Poi Dog Pondering will surely be a "blank stare" artist for the next generation of music listeners (if they are not already). For some reason, though, lots of people my age still hold on to this band with a kind of fiercely protective attitude, as though it represents all the unfulfilled hopes of alternative rock.

The way I see it, all Poi Dog Pondering represents is their own unfulfilled hopes. They had their time on Columbia Records back in the late 80s/early 90s, when bands like REM and Indigo Girls were garnering huge audiences, and people seemed to appreciate the optimism afforded by the coming decade.

Flash-forward to the early 00s and Poi Dog Pondering is still plugging away despite diminishing returns, still huge in Chicago (Chicago street festivals, at least) but not having delivered on the "promise." Sad.

I always sort of saw Poi Dog as mildly interesting, though mostly in theory, as their rootsy, earnest music wandered far too close to the "jam band" arena for my comfort.

I bought the Fruitless EP on the strength of a pretty cool, dare I day Mellencampy, acoustic treatment of New Order's Love Vigilantes," then promptly ceased to care about PDP one way or the other.

This track still ranks as one of the more inventive covers I've heard, and the EP offers another nice cover, "Going Up the Country," the Canned Heat version of which I must admit is still a guilty pleasure.

As for the rest, take it or leave it. "Fruitless" is a not-that-catchy single that probably still gets airplay every once in awhile on Chicago's WXRT (perhaps the most loyal radio station in the country, to the point of being just an alternative classic rock station. They hold on to pet songs longer than I hold on to pets … but that's more about my fear of germs).

"Fruitless" is a slice of 1990 alterna-pop not dissimilar to, say, "Turn You Inside Out" by REM. Two live tracks (including an 8-minute version of Roky Erikson's "I Had to Tell You") are strictly for the fans, man.

It's never a good sign for you when your band inevitably sounds better doing covers … in general, that means you don't write very good songs. The band could probably have catapulted themselves to stardom by releasing "Love Vigilantes" as the single, but there's no sense crying over spilled Poi.

Ah well, I'm not going to dwell on this EP; I just wanted to weigh in before trucking this down to Jimmy's Used CD Shack Mart to get a shiny nickel for it.

Loud Bassoon rating scale

Review by Wimpemy Tarl