undertherock

APPETITE FOR DISTRACTION: Tommy Stinson used his time between Guns N' Roses gigs to cut a solo record.

by Michael Pelusi

The Lone Gunman

If you or I were a current member of Guns N' Roses — rolling with the delays and cancellations, not to mention the riots and lawsuits — we might take advantage of all that time to laboriously craft a musical statement of our own. But Tommy Stinson, who does, in fact, play bass for GN'R now, let things happen much more naturally.

Village Gorilla Head (Sanctuary), Stinson's first solo album, "wasn't any sort of concerted thought that I had at any point," he says on the phone at a tour stop in San Francisco. "It was just more like, well I've got this opportunity to record a bunch of songs, and get real drums on 'em, so maybe I'll make a record. And I got a bunch of songs down, [and realized] OK, well that's a record then."

Stinson has been a Gunner since 1997. When it was announced, it came as a real shock to rock fans who knew about Stinson's old job: bassist for The Replacements, those Minneapolis post-punk ne'er-do-wells, who shared a few of the original Guns N' Roses' substance-abuse vices, and none of their commercial good fortune. But what The 'Mats did have going for them was a font of songs from frontman Paul Westerberg, filled equally with hellion abandon and vulnerable introspection.

This is the legacy that stares at Stinson — who was 12 when The 'Mats got together in '81, and whose brother Bob served as lead guitarist till '85, and died 10 years later. The relentlessly tuneful Village Gorilla Head is up to the challenge, filled equally with gritty swagger and pop polish on winning tracks like "Not a Moment Too Soon" and "O.K." It at times sounds like the kind of album bands like Cracker were putting out in the mid-'90s, when indie-rock vets were able to make nice with the mainstream, maybe even without losing their oddball appeal. (The album is certainly better than The Replacements' most naked bid for chart success, 1988's Don't Tell a Soul.)

Village Gorilla Head isn't the first time Stinson's been the main man at the microphone. After The 'Mats dissolved in 1991, he tried his hand as a bandleader, fronting the groups Bash & Pop and Perfect. (The long-shelved Perfect album, Once, Twice, Three Times a Maybe, is finally due out on Rykodisc on Tuesday.) Members of those combos show up on Village Gorilla Head, as do fellow current Gunners Dizzy Reed and Richard Fortus. But Stinson handled the majority of instrumentation himself. The experience has proven to be rewarding, in ways different from even leading a band. "It's all on me. Before [in Bash & Pop and Perfect], it was on me to a certain extent but not quite like it is now. And, you know, I think I might like it this way."

Stinson says he heard some tracks for the Guns N' Roses album-in-waiting "just before I came out on this tour so that I could get my two cents' worth of opinions. All I can say about that is [there were] five fucking amazing epic pieces that I really loved, and some other pieces that were on their way. And it's gonna be done sooner than later."

As for his days in The Replacements, never the most stable bunch even on the good days, Stinson says his memories are mostly good ones, "unless I get to a club that I remember playing for too long. Then I start remembering things that maybe weren't so pleasant. But for the most part I've got nothing but good memories."

Tommy Stinson plays Mon., Sept. 13, 8 p.m., $12, with Alien Crime Syndicate, The North Star, 27th and Poplar sts., 215-684-0808.

Westerberg High

Paul Westerberg's 2001 double-disc Stereo/Mono was so good, it still hasn't dawned on a lot of rock critics who were all too eager to dig a grave for his reputation after the ill-advised commercial concessions of his '90s solo work. S/M put feeling before function, even as Westerberg's innate sense of craft made sure the album was worth playing more than once. It was, in the best sense, the grown-up version of The Replacements.

And like The 'Mats, S/M isn't the easiest act to follow. The new Folker (Vagrant) is his third release since; it's pretty inconsistent, but better than last year's two efforts, Dead Man Shake and Come Feel Me Tremble. Like all of them, Folker was recorded by his bad self in his basement all alone. It's charming and shambolic, with plenty of great songs ("Looking Up in Heaven," "As Far As I Know," "How Can You Like Him?").

The first thing you'll think when you first hear Folker is, when is he finally going to get a real drummer? But in a way, that's missing the point. Add a single other player and a song like "When Will We Arrive?" risks turning into a power ballad, which to Westerberg spells dishonesty. And, he's made it clear, he's through with dishonest-sounding records.