The Replacements
The Replacements were formed in 1979 in Minneapolis, Minnesota. The original line up of the band consisted of Paul Westerberg on Vocals and guitar, Bob Stinson on guitar, Tommy Stinson on Bass, and Chris Mars on Drums.
The history of the band began in 1978 when Bob Stinson (At this time was nineteen years old) gave his eleven year old broth Tommy a bass. Bob said that at the time he did this to keep his brother off the streets. In this same year Bob met Chris Mars who was a recent high school dropout. Mars was originally thier guitar player before he switched to the drums. Chris, Bob, and Tommy got together and started covering songs together as a trio, with no vocalist. The band named themselves Dogbreath. Around this time Paul Westerberg had a job as a janitor at the Senator’s office and would often hear the band practicing as he would walk pass the Stinson household on his way home from work.
Westerberg became impressed with the band and would regularly listen to the band after work. Mars knew Westerberg and invited him to jam with him.
Paul had no idea that Mars was in the band Dogbreath and became very interested in becoming a member. The band auditioned several vocalist (Westerberg excluded) and eventually found one. Westerberg however really wanted the position and went up to the vocalist one day and told him an elaborate story about how the rest of the band didn’t like him. Soon after this the vocalist quit and Westerberg was awarded vocalist duties. Dogbreath was a band known for drinking and doing various drugs during their rehearsals and for playing songs as more of an afterthought than as the set out point. Westerberg was quite different then his band mates for he was relatively disciplined at these rehearsals. He would always show up in neat clothes and would practice the songs until he felt good about them.
Around this time Dogbreath changed their name to The Impediments and famously played a drunken performance in June 1980 at The Church Hall Gig with then 13 year old Tommy Stinson. The Impediments were then banned from the venue which led the band to rename themselves to The Replacements.
In May 1980, the band recorded a demo tape in Mars’ basement and passed it along to Peter Jesperson who at the time was a manager of a Minneapolis punk record store. Jesperson also founded the label Twin/Tone Records. Westerberg handed him the demo with the hope that it would get some play at the Longhorn, which was a local disc jockeyed venue. But after Jesperson heard the tape he had very different ideas for the band. He was so blown away by it that he called Westereberg the very next day and asked him what he would rather do a single or an album. Jesperson is quoted of saying “I didn’t even get through the first song before I thought my head was going to explode.”
After their second show Jesperson was asked to become the band’s manager and he accepted. The band has often stated that his enthusiasm was the only thing that kept the band going through their several empty club gigs that summer.
The band singed to Twin/Tone and Westerberg began to write new songs for a studio album. He quickly had a whole albums worth of material. The band recorded the album on an eight track home studio called Blackberry Way in Minneapolis. The band unfortunately had no clout at the studio and the time spent in it was intermittent, this led to the album taking six months to record. This was not a big deal for the band because at the time Twin/Tone didn’t have enough money to release the album until August 1981.
The bands first album Sorry Ma, Forgot to Take Out the Trash was released in August 1981, and to positive reviews in local magazines. The band’s first single “I’m in Trouble” is featured on this album.
At a show in Chicago the band debuted the track “Kids Don’t Follow” which Jesperson was convinced sounded like a hit. He approached the other investors at Twin/Tone and was able to get the money to record and release an E.P. This E.P. was titled Stink and was released inn June 1982.
After the release of Stink the band started to distance itself from the punk rock scene. In 1983 The Replacements (also given the nickname The Mats) released their second studio album entitled Hootenanny. This album saw Westerberg’s songwriting ability expanding with tracks like “Willpower” and “Within Your Reach” (he plays every instrument on Within). This album received critical praise and led critic Robert Christgau calling it “The most critically acclaimed independent album of 1983.”
Hootenanny was making the band’s following reach outside of just Minneapolis which led the band to their first U.S. Tour, in 1983. Tommy who was still in high school at the time dropped out so he could join the band on the road. Even with the band opening for R.E.M. at eight shows the tour was a failure which left the band with very low morale.
In late 1983 the band began working on their next studio album. The band was starting to get tired of just playing loud and fast songs so they softened their music and placed more focus on songwriting. This album also showcased Westerberg experimenting with more instruments including the piano, mandolin, and twelve-string guitar. R.E.M.’s Peter Buck is featured playing the mandolin on the lead off track “I Will Dare.” Other noteworthy songs on the album are Westerberg’s piano ballad “Androgynous” and the song “Unsatisfied.” In October 1984 this band released the album entitled Let It Be. This album met with extreme critical praise, with Robert Christgau giving the album an A+ rating. Let It Be was also ranked in Rolling Stone magazine as the 15th best album of the 1980’s.
With this acclaim came major label interest for the band. The band wasn’t doing very well financially, with the sales of Let It Be and profits from concerts going directly to instrument repair, travel costs, and hotels. Twin/Tone at this time knew it was time for a major label to step in. Even with so much attention surrounding the band it was hard for them to get a major label contract for every show that a label representative was present at they would intentionally preform poorly.
Eventually the band signed with a subsidiary record label of Warner Bros. named Sire Records. One of the reasons the band signed with this label was that they admired the head of the label Seymour Stein. Stein had previously managed The Ramones and even got Tommy Ramone to produce their first album for a Sire, Tim.
After the band released Tim they fired guitarist Bob Stinson for being unwilling to play the band’s songs that were “less rocked-out.” Around this time they also fired Jesperson. Bob Stinson preferred the bands loud and fast style that was like their early material and didn’t like the direction the band was heading. The band released their next album 1987’s Pleased To Meet Me as a trio. The band picked up Slim Dunlap to play lead guitar for the bands tour of their album and he was then turned into a full fledged member after the tour was completed.
The band’s next release was their desperate for a hit, stab at mainstream album Don’t Tell a Soul. The album was far less punky and much quieter than their previous albums. The album, although alienating many hardcore fans, had many notable tracks including “Achin’ to Be” and “I’ll Be You.” “I’ll Be You” was the band’s only song to ever top Billboard’s Modern Rock chart. The band caused some controversy at the ABC Rock Awards show when They performed a version of their track “Talent Show” where Paul (in response to the network censoring the line “feeling good from the pills we took”) inserted a line later into the song that went “It’s too late to take pills, here we go.”
In support of Don’t Tell A Soul the band opened for Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers. The tour was disastrous and caused trouble within the band. This led to Westerberg cutting a new album with mostly session musicians. The label however persuaded him to release it as a Replacements album. So in 1990 the album All Shook Down was released to critical praise. Quickly after the album came out Chirs Mars left the band.
The replacements officially broke up on July 4th, 1991 after preforming at a show in Grant park. At the show, slowly during the set members disappeared from the stage until it was completely replaced by roadies.
On June 13, 2006 a Replacements best-of compilation album was released entitled Don’t You Know Who I Think I Was? Chris Mars, Tommy Stinson, and Paul Westerberg got together to record two new tracks for the compilation (“Message To The Boys” and “Pool & Dive).
