Robbie Thomas
Jar of Flies – 30th Anniversary
It was late 1993 when I watched MTV one weekend, I was in the 5th grade at 11. I think it was The Headbangers Ball I was watching when the VJ did a music break to tell the viewers the news of what the bands were doing. And the VJ said that Alice In Chains is making an acoustic album. Again, this was late 1993, and I was guessing they wouldn’t have it out until the summer of 1994. Way back before the internet was available to almost everybody and social media, you had to get your music news from MTV, VH1, and music magazines, such has Rolling Stone. The latter, I haven’t read that magazine since 1997.
While we were freezing our asses off in the ruthless weather in January 1994, Jar of Flies came out. Since I didn’t have a CD player at the time, I got it on cassette. And the album was a great sound to my ears. I enjoyed Rotten Apple, Nutshell, and I Stay Away. Although I looked down on violins and violas, I think those instruments did justice for the song. One thing I wouldn’t say I liked about I Stay Away is the chorus lyrics. It reminds me of a song made six years later that I hate called Teenage Dirtbag by Wheatus. The music video for I Stay Away is the shit. I also saw the puppets they used in that video at the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame. But sadly, my dumbass didn’t take a photo of it. Here’s someone else’s photo.
I was neutral with No Excuses, yet it made number one in the rock charts and was a top 40 hit. I enjoyed Whale & Wasp and the final track, Swing On This. At the end of that song, you can hear the band members and perhaps the recording staff talking a little when the song fades out. I always wanted to hear more of that; it would’ve been interesting to me. I wonder if the new 30th-anniversary release has more of that.
Don’t Follow didn’t do anything for me at that time; I didn’t dig the country vibe of that song. But I would later discover Paw, and I did enjoy the pedal steel they used on the song Jessie. I would take my Walkman cassette player to the bus stop and wait for the bus in the cold ass winter, listening to this on cassette, among a few other cassettes I had.
If the 30th-anniversary edition is in MP3 format, I’ll likely buy it. I try to be a minimalist and will likely not buy the box set. The physical version is sold out at the time of this blog post. That’s not a problem for me; I wasn’t interested in that version. I may buy a Jar Of Flies shirt or hoodie down the road, though. If you want to get the physical version, if they make more of those, take a look here.