Keeping tabs on Joe Pernice’s career has occasionally proven something of a challenge. His first band, an Americana outfit dubbed the Scud Mountain Boys, eventually morphed into the more pop-pronounced Pernice Brothers. Still, Pernice’s ambitions didn’t stop there, and a solo outing released under the moniker of Big Tobacco found him spinning off his surplus material and garnering good reviews in the process. While the Pernice Brothers have remained an ongoing entity, Joe’s recently expanded into the literary world, penning an autobiographical novel titled “It Feels So Good When I Stop” and recording an accompanying “novel soundtrack” that takes the same backward glance.
Although it’s not formally billed as such, the new effort is strictly a covers album featuring songs that helped shape Pernice’s musical palette. “I always thought Del Shannon was right down there with Pat Boone,” he remarks during a spoken word segment that precedes a harmonious “I Fall to Pieces.” “Why? Because I didn’t know what the fuck I was talking about.” He’s less critical in his approach to the material itself, rendering Steve Wynn’s “Tell Me When It’s Over” with a chiming Byrds-like shimmer, “I’m Your Puppet” as a lush serenade, and a surprise pick, the Mary Poppins lynchpin “Chim Cheree,” with delicate but purposeful grace. The only time the mood turns melancholy is when he prefaces a darkly confessional take on “Hello It’s Me” with a tirade against Todd for stirring up his teenage emotions. It’s then, and only then, that the album title offers truth in advertising. (Ashmont Records 2009)
