1993-10 Offbeat Magazine
They Might Not Be Prince
By Matt Pollard and Nevin Thompson, Offbeat Magazine, October 1993
Archived from: https://archive.org/details/offbeat-1993-10-oct-01/page/n3/mode/2up
Ed note: While there is a town in New Hampshire named Lincoln (in fact, 16 U.S. states have a city or town named Lincoln)[1], Linnell and Flansburgh are from Lincoln, Massachusetts.
They Might Be Giants stopped by at Harpo's on Wednesday, August 7, to play a sold-out show.
"I was in Spokane yesterday," says John Flansburgh, guitarist for They Might Be Giants. "I found the place really exciting." Spokane? "The great thing about Spokane," Flansburgh continues, "is that there are pawn shops all over the place and cappuccino stands on every corner. There was a place just down the street from our hotel that sold out-of-town newspapers and sheet music. It was heaven."
Flansburgh’s opinion of the Washington town was probably affected by the fact that he and the entire TMBG crowd had just spent an arduous fourteen hours on the road from Spokane. They arrived in Victoria at nine at night, without the benefit of a sound check, a cup of chowder, corn, cake or creamed cauliflower to perform a near sold-out show Harpo’s.
But despite their long wait for the dinner bell to do the “dinner bell thing,” They Might Be Giants played an outstanding, elating, rowdy gig. With a backup band packing accordions, glockenspiels, clarinets, a bassist and a drummer, TMBG treated the packed house to most of Apollo 18.
Still, TMBG managed to play audience favourites from Flood and Lincoln, though never got around to "Put Your Hand Inside the Puppet Head," despite chanting hooligans and other TMBG maniacs who had gathered to hear the band.
Mania is probably the best way to describe the show: the crowd moshed to "Bird Cage in Your Soul," prompting complaints from front-man John Linnell. Whenever Flansburgh ascended the stage-right speaker to perform blistering guitar antics, enthusiastic females attempted to pull his pants down. And, during a few of their slower songs, people in the audience actually chatted amongst themselves.
But, then, as Flansburgh admitted to Offbeat, They Might Be Giants hardly have the raw, sexual attraction on-stage as fellow performer Prince. Flansburgh elaborated: “TMBG’s biggest problem is that we're not explained very easily,” says Flansburgh. “Some people say we're a complicated frat band, but those guys probably haven’t been to any of our gigs. Monday Magazine called us 'too intelligent,'" he continues, “but I don’t see that as being a problem. Still sometimes I wish I was in a rockabilly band - rockabilly is the greatest music in the world. But we’re not in a rockabilly band, so we’re stuck mumbling They Might Be Giants songs."
Flansburgh says he finds it surprising that TMBG are in the same business that other performers like Prince are in. "Most rock music works on a consistent sexual plain," he says. "Since we're not very good-looking guys we tend to skirt those issues. It’s sort of strange that we're in the same business as Prince - he’s just so into his sexuality, and he can do those James Brown splits. In our case we work with what we've got, which I guess is intelligence."
They Might Be Giants' upcoming release may just underline Flansburgh's point with a capital prosthetic forehead.
"Our new EP is called The Sun Is A Mass of Incandescent Gas," Flansburgh says. "We got the title from the 1950s educational film, Why Does the Sun Shine?" The EP is an off the cuff project "aimed at TMBG fans." "For instance, we're covering a Meat Puppets tune as well as "Jessica", by the Allman Brothers," says Flansburgh. "There's going to be some hilarious liner notes as well."
For some TMBG fans, the album liners are as good as the music. "We put a lot of work into the liner notes," says Flansburgh. "For Flood, I wanted a photograph of the inside of somebody's house with the water-level half-way up the living room walls." Finding a suitable photo was hard work. "I couldn't find one photograph like that, so I snuck into the Time-Life photo archives in New York, where a friend of mine works. The cover from Flood was taken by Mary-Borque White, who did some amazing photographs of the Depression. To my knowledge, that photograph had never been published before. It was kind of exciting to have that on the cover of our album."
Unlike the Flood photo, the Lincoln cover was constructed for the album. "The Lincoln cover tells a lot about our childhood," says Flansburgh. "The cover of Lincoln was taken in Lincoln, New Hampshire, where John and I both grew up. So, obviously, the Danish table legs, dead presidents and the cute, little church are a reflection of what the early years did to us."
Both Giants now live in New York, a decidedly different atmosphere than New Hampshire. "The last time I was walking around in New York I say a guy wearing a tee-shirt that said: Brooklyn - Where the Weak are Killed and Eaten. At that point I knew that I had to get out of that town. I've lived in Brooklyn all of my adult life now, and I've gotten used to it, and I don't think that's a good thing. I think it's time for me to get rid of this caffeinated, fast-paced life. I think I'll look into Spokane."