Spin
October 1995

Let Love Rule
Introducing the new romantic punks: Smoking Popes
SMACK IN THE middle of Huntington Beach is a quaint little faux 19th-century Bavarian village complete with charming Hansel and Gretel cottages and strudel shops. The scene in the village dance hall. though, is straight out of the Brothers Grimm. Squads of skinheads are galloping round in circles. sieg heil-ing in time to the band onstage. “I thought this shit was over.” sighs Josh Caterer. frontman of Chicago pop-punk prodigies Smoking Popes. who are unfortunate enough to be next on the hilt The group—Josh. his two siblings. Man and Eli. and drummer Mike Felumlee—unanimously decide against honoring its engagement.

The Huntington Beach billing mix-up is especially ludicrous because Smoking Popes traffic exclusively in love sings. Their Capitol debut album Born to Quit (the follow-up to 1993’s Ge: Fired’) is awash with amped-up tearjerkers hardly want in comparison with the Buzzcocks and the Undertones. The current single. “Need You Around.” manages to be both suave and exhilarating. Over a thumping is-everybody-ready backbeat and a pummeling fuzztone assault glides a voice that’s part Morrissey and part Mel Tormé.

“Do I look like a lounge singer?” inquires Josh Caterer, the owner of said voice, when complimented on his velvety timbre. With his thinning pate. scruffed-up sneakers, and troubling nicotine addiction, he seems more Like a loitering machine operator. which, as it transpires. he once was. But when he opens his mouth to sing, he sounds world-weary and resigned. In fact, he sounds downright suave. “1 realized early on that I didn’t feel comfortable screaming without a melody. I just wasn’t that type of guy.”

In an age when melody has attained the status of endangered species and naïveté is hardly a desirable character trait, here’s a group happy to be perceived as purveyors of plaintive hand-on-heart. boy-girl Jove songs. “We’re trying to not be afraid of sensitivity,” attests Josh. “You’ve got to embrace it these days.’ Admirable sentiments. Remember them, next time you’re in Huntington Beach.

JONATHAN BERNSTEIN