Hole in the Wall, Saturday, February 15
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South by Southwest season, you’re bound to hear a few good ones, and seeing as
Minneapolis’ Rex Daisy were the buzz band at SXSW ’94 (along with Veruca
Salt), and eventually signed with Geffen, it’s curious to note that their
long-awaited debut, Guys and Dolls, is actually on Chicago indie
Pravda.
More curious still, Guys and Dolls appears to be the same album Geffen
sent out as an advance in ’95, just prior to the pop trio’s return to SXSW.
What’s
the deal? According to their bio, it was the ol’ major-label
flim-flam: “Rex Daisy left L.A. with the rock record of their dreams, content
in knowing that in just a few months [Geffen] would press copies of their opus
and sell same to kids all across this great nation of ours. Little did the band
know of the implicit danger in trusting shifty L.A. types.”
“In retrospect, we weren’t surprised we got dropped,” says Mike Ruekberg, the
band’s singer and main songwriter. “Even when we were in L.A. we smelled
trouble — Geffen didn’t seem to know they had us. I liken it to the Three
Stooges sneaking into the high society party as plumbers. As soon as the pie
fight ensued, and the high society lady was fired, that was it for us.”
The “high society lady” was, of course, the band’s A&R rep. Actually, she
wasn’t even an A&R rep, but rather legendary producer/svengali John
Kalodner’s assistant. “He said she should find someone and he would help,” says
Ruekberg. “She actually got him to fly to Minneapolis in the middle of winter
to see us, and we rewarded his efforts by putting on one of the worst shows
ever — drinking too much and generally sucking. Remember this was the guy who
discovered Foreigner! His quote on me — and this was the nicest thing
he said: `He reminds me of John Sebastian. And I like
John
Sebastian.'”
Okay, so they do a mean cover of “Welcome Back.” As in Welcome Back,
Kotter. (They contributed said TV theme to one of Pravda’s K-Tel-like
compilations of contemporary bands doing Seventies schlock.) Nevertheless, they
were signed to Geffen, and when Kalodner defected to Columbia, they were
dropped. “The Geffen thing was already in the works before SXSW, which is why
not that many other people came knocking,” says Ruekberg, who’s actually
thrilled to be on the tiny Pravda since he and bassist Steve Price have known
the folks there for years. “There we were walking around feeling like the
Beatles, and, meanwhile, Veruca Salt was quietly getting a million dollars and
a real record deal.”
— Raoul Hernandez
This article appears in February 14 • 1997 and February 14 • 1997 (Cover).