In The Different Quantity Ones, I’m reviewing each #1 single within the historical past of the Billboard Fashionable Rock Tracks/Different Songs, beginning with the second that the chart launched in 1988. This column is a companion piece to The Quantity Ones. The column is now biweekly, alternating with The Quantity Ones on Mondays.
Within the grand historical past of other rock, Tracy Bonham’s “Mom Mom” will not be an particularly essential tune. It is a pretty illustrative signal of what was occurring on alt-rock radio in 1996. The tune would not come from any explicit underground scene. It is a debut single from an artist who by no means hung out within the indie trenches, and it exists within the cultural slipstream of each grunge and the mega-success of Alanis Morissette’s Jagged Little Tablet.
“Mom Mom” is sharp and hooky and well-crafted, but it surely’s additionally received a sure whirling, chaotic power. It is a good tune, actually — higher than I remembered. We’ll get into all that additional down within the column. However nonetheless a lot it rocks, “Mom Mom” did not set up some new lane or herald the arrival of a brand new famous person. Tracy Bonham is a real-deal one-hit surprise, a definitive instance of the time period, and that is her one hit.
Nonetheless! Within the historical past of the Billboard Fashionable Rock chart, “Mom Mom” is an essential tune, and for a really miserable cause. With “Mom Mom,” Tracy Bonham grew to become the final lady to attain a #1 hit for a whole technology. After Bonham, a number of bands with girls of their lineups made #1 hits. There have been even a number of that had been led by girls, although that quantity is very small. After “Mom Mom,” the following #1 alt-rock hit from a feminine solo artist was Lorde’s “Royals” in 2013. (That is a spoiler for a column that I would write sooner or later within the far-off, unsure future.) Lorde was born 5 months after “Mom Mom” reached #1.
When Billboard first established the Fashionable Rock chart in 1988, the primary #1 hit was Siouxsie And The Banshees’ “Peek-A-Boo.” I am not going to take a seat right here and let you know that various rock radio had a utopian period of gender fairness that stretched from the late ’80s to the early ’90s. It completely didn’t. That shit was primarily a boys’ membership from soar. However it was a boys’ membership the place a towering, plain determine like Siouxsie Sioux nonetheless commanded consideration, or the place Alanis Morissette might launch herself towards blockbuster standing. That ended after “Mom Mom.”
I am not saying that proper. The Siouxsie-to-Alanis period of alt-rock radio did not all of the sudden come to a pure cease in 1996. It was ended. This was a deliberate effort. In 1996, Invoice Clinton signed the Telecommunications Act, which swiftly and inexorably deregulated the radio panorama. Shortly after its passage, the conglomerate then often known as Clear Channel began shopping for up radio stations all around the nation and shifting them to centralized, optimized playlists. Somebody at Clear Channel evidently determined that alt-rock radio ought to be directed squarely at younger males, so feminine artists disappeared from the airwaves. This was not an particularly gradual course of. In the event you ever sit and surprise how these stations went from the Treatment to Creed within the area of 1 decade, there’s your reply.
The Telecommunications Act and Clear Channel turned radio-style various rock into one thing a lot bleaker and extra company than the format’s college-radio origins, and the near-complete absence of girls, for 17 years, is probably the most obvious instance of that course of at work. With all that in thoughts, it is laborious to not look again with affection at Tracy Bonham’s “Mom Mom,” the final hit of its variety. Happily, I needn’t depend on the mix of nostalgia and enshittification dread to say good issues about “Mom Mom.” “Mom Mom” rocks loads laborious by itself deserves.
Tracy Bonham will not be associated to the man who performed drums for Led Zeppelin after which died. Earlier than she had her one hit, nonetheless, Bonham had a stint taking part in violin for Robert Plant and Jimmy Web page after they did their 1994 reunion tour. I am positive there have been plenty of jokes about having a Bonham within the band. However no: This explicit Bonham is from Eugene, Oregon. Her father, a journalist, died when she was very younger. Her mom, a music instructor, remarried, and Tracy change into the oldest daughter in a big combined household. She began out singing and taking part in violin as a child. In a while, she informed the LA Instances, “There was one time that I used to be kicked out of music college for smoking a cigarette, and I used to be so [angry] that I practiced 4 hours a day.”
Bonham went to USC for violin, after which she modified her focus and moved all the way in which throughout the nation to check voice at Berklee Faculty Of Music as an alternative. Bonham dropped out of Berklee, however she stayed in Boston. She earned her residing by working odd jobs and writing advert jingles for native automobile dealerships. She additionally taught herself guitar and located plenty of inspiration within the native membership scene. She had an actual eureka second going to see the Dambuilders, native indie stars whose frontwoman Joan Wasser sang and performed violin on the similar time. Bonham realized that she might try this, too. (The Dambuilders’ solely Fashionable Rock hit, 1994’s “Shrine,” peaked at #13.)
Bonham began placing her personal music on the market in 1994. She had a tune on a neighborhood indie compilation, and he or she recorded a demo tape, which received some consideration from a Boston Phoenix critic. Think about a world the place an alt-weekly music critic might have that form of affect! I began out as an alt-weekly music critic not that lengthy after that second, however I do not assume I ever satisfied anybody at a label to take heed to a demo tape. I do not assume I even tried. Due to that demo, nonetheless, a bunch of main labels needed to signal Bonham. She went with Island.
In 1995, Tracy Bonham launched her debut EP The Liverpool Classes, which she didn’t really document in Liverpool, on the native indie label CherryDisc. She was already signed to Island on the time, however this was a type of conditions the place the label tries to drum up credibility by ensuring that an artist has at the least one indie launch earlier than getting a an actual push. Island funded the EP. Future American Hello-Fi bassist Drew Parsons performed on it. (American Hello-Fi’s highest-charting single, 2001’s “Taste Of The Week,” peaked at #5. It is a 5.) Bonham’s EP observe “Sunshine” received a video, and the tune has a cool tangled-ominous factor occurring.
Bonham’s full-length debut The Burdens Of Being Upright got here out in March 1996. Drew Parsons performed on that document, too. So did Polara frontman Ed Ackerson. Josh Freese, who I simply noticed fucking killing shit with 9 Inch Nails, is the drummer on Burdens. He was actually simply beginning a prolific session profession on the time. Wikipedia tells me that he performed drums on a few data from Ok-pop pioneers Search engine optimization Taiji & Boys shortly earlier than he labored with Bonham. That man has had fairly a life.
The producers of Burdens had been Sean Slade and Paul Q. Kolderie, the 2 guys who ran Boston’s Fort Apache studios. By 1996, they’d already amassed a hell of a discography. They produced a bunch of early Lemonheads and Mighty Mighty Bosstones data, Uncle Tupelo’s No Despair, Morphine’s Treatment For Ache, Radiohead’s Pablo Honey, Gap’s Reside By way of This. Do you know that the identical two guys produced all these data? I did not know that till this very second. (Slade and Kolderie’s work will seem on this column once more.)
When Tracy Bonham wrote “Mom Mom,” every part was not wonderful. Bonham was going by means of a nasty breakup, and he or she was depressed. The tune is not some indirect allegory. Its that means is fairly apparent. Her narrator is having a tough time, however she would not need her mom to fret about her. She will get on the cellphone together with her mother and makes idle small speak, by no means letting on that she’s screaming inside. The tune does the basic Pixies soft-to-loud factor, with that musical change additionally written into the lyrics in probably the most direct methods. The tune’s quiet components are the issues that Bonham’s narrator really says to her mom, and the loud screamy bits are her personal nerve-jangled inner monologue. You get it. It is not laborious to get. No one wants an explainer for “Mom Mom,” and that is in all probability one of many causes it did so properly at radio.
I am over-generalizing right here, however probably the most canonized various rock figures usually are usually those with probably the most elliptical lyrics. Kurt Cobain wrote phrases that resisted straightforward interpretation, so persons are nonetheless providing up their very own takes all these a long time later. The radio hits that you can instantly grasp are those that are usually remembered as relative novelties. Even one thing like Radiohead’s “Creep” appears to be a permanent supply of embarrassment for the band, just because it matches so neatly into the established freakout vocabulary, though it fucking guidelines. (“Creep,” which stays Radiohead’s highest-charting Fashionable Rock hit, peaked at #2 in 1993. It is a 10.)
Properly, fuck all that. I like a great easy-to-grasp alt-rock tune, and “Mom Mom” is an efficient easy-to-grasp alt-rock tune. The intro has a fantastic flitty nervousness to it. Bonham strums an acoustic guitar and tells her mother that she’s simply calling to say hiya and that heavens no, she’s not lonely. A chattering tambourine and Bonham’s personal violin percolate across the edges, foreshadowing the notion that issues are about to collapse, as if we could not inform that already as a result of we had been listening to this on an alternate rock radio station in 1996. Then Josh Freese’s drums crack out like a machine gun, and we leap headlong into rockin’ territory.
The “Mom Mom” pre-chorus is my favourite a part of the tune. An enormous crunch-riff is available in, and Bonham’s voice takes on a brand new confidence as she ponders questions of what her mom thought when she left dwelling: “Would I strive a bit of tobacco? Would I carry on mountaineering up my skirt?” Then every part drops out, and we get the big-money refrain: “I am hungry! I am soiled! I am shedding my minnnnd, every part’s wonderful!” Bonham screams these final two phrases like she’s in Integrity, and that second is the rationale that radio fell in love with the tune. It is abrasive sufficient to be seen however temporary sufficient that no person modifications the station. You keep in mind it. Bonham wasn’t used to screaming, and he or she ended up canceling some exhibits as a result of she stored blowing out her voice. She needed to discover ways to scream after she’d already made her screamy hit.
There’s probably not any subtext to “Mom Mom.” It is a temporary and economical character sketch. This narrator insists that she’s residing a fantastic life beacause she loves her mother and would not need this good girl to emphasize out too laborious. However a part of her is spiraling, and that half is determined to inform her mom that every part is not wonderful. She retains it in verify, and he or she ends the tune the identical approach that she ends the cellphone name: “I miss you, I like you.” With these two traces, her two selves converge. These two issues may be the one truths that she tells her mom on that decision, the one time that she really expresses what she feels. Take a look at that, I wrote an explainer anyway. I promise I am not making an attempt to insult your intelligence. That is simply how I work by means of writing about these songs that I heard a zillion instances after I was a child.
The feelings come throughout so cleanly partly as a result of the tune presents them so properly. The strummy components aren’t that quiet, however Bonham sings them with a form of determined conversational detachment that communicates so much. The riff-stomp is fairly apparent, however I like its explosive power. These drums go laborious. Bonham’s violin lends the tune a mystical Zeppelin grandeur that units it aside a bit of additional. I want there was a bridge, however that is only a well-done ’90s rock tune.
“Mom Mom” was all around the radio in the summertime of 1996, after I was between tenth and eleventh grades. Tracy Bonham made two movies for the tune — one for MTV and one for VH1. I am fairly positive the one which’s in heaviest circulation now’s the VH1 one. It is simply Bonham and her backing-band guys in a fancy dress closet, making an attempt stuff on. It is cute, however “Mom Mom” would not actually strike me because the form of tune you are purported to sing whereas smiling.
The opposite video has a cleaner idea. It is a single unbroken shot. Tracy Bonham is on a TV set yelling, and her precise mom ignores every part that she says whereas she tidies up a front room. Bonham’s actual stepfather makes an look, too, and her backing-band guys rock out within the eating room. Mama Bonham would not discover them, both. She simply retains on doing chores and by no means catches on to her daughter clearly freaking out. That is sensible, proper? Sadly, that is the form of tune the place you really want a tough digicam lower when the drums kick in. With out that, it feels inert and incomplete.
I assume the two-videos ploy labored properly sufficient as a result of “Mom Mom” blew up and received some crossover play on pop and mainstream rock radio. It did not contact the Sizzling 100 as a result of the one by no means got here out commercially within the US. Elsewhere, although, the B-side was a reside cowl of PJ Harvey’s “50 Ft. Queenie,” with Bonham taking part in the guitar riff on violin, and I believe that is fairly sick. (The OG “50 Ft. Queenie” by no means made the Fashionable Rock chart, which is fucking silly when you ask me. Harvey’s highest-charting single, 1995’s “Down By The Water,” peaked at #2. It is a 10.)
I might by no means heard Tracy Bonham’s album The Burdens Of Being Upright earlier than researching this column, and I’ve to say: Fairly good! I would not name it a misplaced ’90s basic or something, however I’ve performed it a few instances and had enjoyable whereas it has been on. That is not one thing that occurs with plenty of the one-hit surprise varieties who find yourself in these columns. Nonetheless, that is completely a one-hit surprise state of affairs, so it is form of humorous that the album actually has a tune known as “One Hit Marvel.”
The Burdens Of Being Upright finally went gold completely on the power of “Mom Mom.” Bonham adopted that single with “The One,” which occurred to be the primary tune she ever launched, on that native Boston indie compilation a few years earlier. “The One” has plenty of the immediacy of “Mom Mom,” but it surely peaked at #23. I assume it wasn’t actually the one. After that, Bonham by no means made it onto the Fashionable Rock chart once more.
Bonham recorded a follow-up album with producers like Tchad Blake and Mitchell Froom. It was supposed to return out in 1998, however record-industry chaos stored it on the shelf for 2 years. When Down Right here lastly arrived in 2000, the alt-rock panorama was a really completely different place. Radio paid no consideration, and the album disappeared with out a hint.
Quickly, Tracy Bonham was out of her Island deal and on the lookout for work. For a few years, she toured with the Blue Man Group. I’ve by no means seen a Blue Man Group present, so I can not actually let you know what that position would entail. YouTube tells me that Bonham didn’t have to color herself blue or shave her head to do that, however I assume I simply do not get what this is. Bonham additionally sang backup on a few tracks from Aerosmith’s 2004 album, which I am each sorry and delighted to let you know known as Honkin’ On Bobo. I do know that folks have been making jokes about that title for many years, but it surely’s really wonderful that somebody managed to conjure such an disagreeable three-word mixture after which used it because the title for what was purported to be a industrial product.
Bonham stored making her personal music, too. Her 2005 album One thing Stunning got here out on the Rounder sub-label Zoe. It received sufficient of a push that she performed The Tonight Present, but it surely did not chart wherever. Prior to now twenty years, she’s stored placing out music — generally on her personal, generally on smaller labels. She’s been on this web site a number of instances. In 2016, Fred Armisen helped hype her crowdfunding marketing campaign to make a brand new album. That document, Fashionable Burden, had collaborations with Stomach’s Tanya Donelly, Letters To Cleo’s Kay Hanley, the New Pornographers’ Kathryn Calder, and Speedy Ortiz’s Sadie Dupuis, in order that’s fairly good.
A number of weeks in the past, I received a PR electronic mail a couple of new Tracy Bonham vacation single known as “Un-F*ok This F*kt Up Christmas,” asterisks hers. Additionally, Wikipedia tells me that Bonham was once married to Steve Slingeneyer, a previous member of the Belgian band Soulwax, and to present Rolling Stone editor Jason Positive. How about that! That is some trivia for you! It is much less essential than the trivia about Bonham being the final lady to seem on this column for 17 digital years, however I am making an attempt to not finish on a bummer-ass word.
You recognize what? I considered an ending that is much less of a bummer-ass word. Proper now, there is a fairly profitable Canadian alt-rock band known as Mom Mom. They have no US chart hits, however they do fairly properly on-line. Their tune “Hayloft” is a few good shit. It seems like Franz Ferdinand making an attempt to sound just like the B-52’s, besides spookier and with precise girls within the band. I really do not know whether or not Mom Mom, the band, are named after “Mom Mom,” the Tracy Bonham tune, however let’s simply say that they’re. That is a nicer legacy.
GRADE: 8/10
BONUS BEATS: You’ll in all probability not be shocked to be taught that “Mom Mom” has soundtracked a scene on Yellowjackets, the Showtime present about women going cannibalistic cult-crazy after being marooned within the freezing wilderness for I overlook how lengthy. That present’s soundtrack is just about all ’90s radio nuggets. However I used to be a bit of shocked to be taught that the present’s producers used “Mom Mom” because the temp observe for its opening theme and that the precise opening theme, from Craig Wedren and Anna Waronker, was going for that “Mom Mom” vibe. Right here, simply watch the present’s opening titles and picture “Mom Mom” over it:
(The best-charting single from Anna Waronker’s previous band that canine is “By no means Say By no means,” which peaked at #27 in 1997. Craig Wedren’s previous band Shudder To Suppose by no means made the Fashionable Rock chart, not even with “X-French Tee Shirt” in 1994.)
