Roadkill

Soul Coughing

Liberty Lunch

Saturday, November 2 "Somebody ought to do a compilation reel of Donna's Weird, Jerky Movements at the Ends Of Scenes. Really peculiar stuff -- sudden head twitches and thumbs-ups and Pee Wee Herman noises and whatnot. I suppose the accumulated sexual tension accounts for that, if not her general Tori-Spelling-Ness." -- M. Doughty, on America Online's "Peach Pit Babylon."

Soul Coughing frontgeek M. Doughty insists it's beginning to qualify as a clichéd interview question, but his morbid online fascination with television's Beverly Hills 90210 demands explanation. "I had a whole television season to make a record and hang out doing promotional bullshit, so I just got into writing about 90210," he says. "Now, its turned into this great marketing angle. I'm glad to be one of the world experts on Tiffani-Amber Theissen. It's flattering."

It's also got to be flattering for Doughty that 90210 star Jennie Garth is rumored to own both of the New York band's discs, 1994's Ruby Vroom and this year's Irresistible Bliss. So with a fan on the inside, could a call for a 90210 guest spot be far off? "I'm now at the point that I'd want to maintain my distance," Doughty says. "You want to keep it sacred and on its pedestal. But I don't assume anyway that they're going to start calling weird little alternative hip-hop bands to play the Peach Pit."

Indeed, Soul Coughing's hip-to-be-square mix of samples, beat poetry, and offbeat rhythms may be too challenging for the show's core following. But Doughty contends that after seeing the Goo Goo Dolls on the show, "90210 Rock" has become a genre he aspires to. "The 90210 aesthetic would be something where you are absolutely not required to suspend your disbelief at all," he says. "Where you can look at it and see an actor and not a character. I have ambitions to make something that has no bones about being completely false. I'll always be working, trying to push that envelope." -- Andy Langer