“I been in the right place, but it must have been the wrong time.” —Dr. John

Boy, if that doesn’t sum up the self-titled debut/swan song of Bounce the Ocean, I don’t know what does. Picture it: Washington, 1991. Hawk Bjorn and John Utter are surrounded by the burgeoning world of grunge, but choosing to follow their muse rather than the trends of the day, they produce an album of glossy, harmony-laden pop music that would’ve sounded more at home on the radio in 1981. They still managed to score a decent-sized radio hit, though, thanks to the album’s opening track, “Throw It All Away,” and another song — “Wasting My Time” — earned them at least a little bit of airplay, though it admittedly did so without ever actually charting.

You’d like to think that it was a testament to the quality of their work (because, wow, those harmonies are fucking incredible), but really, when was the last time quality had anything to do with a song becoming a hit?

In truth, the band had been working their way up through the ranks for a while, first getting some exposure by getting their music placed in the Patrick Dempsey flick Some Girls (1988), then by getting signed to Private Music, a label that had previously been known solely for its new-age artists (Yanni, Suzanne Ciani) but in ‘91 was getting ink in the music trades for securing Ringo Starr for their roster. It was probably the Private Music connection that did the most for their profile, but a high profile can only do so much when the music you’re making isn’t anything remotely like what “the kids” are listening to. In fact, looking back, it’s somewhat ironic that the band’s big-nosed labelmate was actually playing more to current musical trends than the members of Bounce the Ocean were, since Starr’s album featured a cover of the Posies’ “Golden Blunders” and had Andy Sturmer and Roger Manning from Jellyfish providing harmonies.

But, really, who’s complaining?

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Instincts run hot and cold, depending on who is relying on them. Some artists go against the grain and it works out fantastically for them. Some make last-minute choices that, while not haunting them forever, certainly don’t help them a hell of a lot. Ben Folds runs somewhere in the middle.

His biggest successes came early on as the namesake of the Ben Folds Five trio. That first eponymous disc was eminently buzz-worthy, whipping indie kids into a frenzy much as we’ve seen with Clap Your Hands Say Yeah, Arctic Monkeys and, more recently, Vampire Weekend. The second disc, Whatever And Ever Amen, made a strong case for the resurgence of piano pop, and indeed we hadn’t heard something so pretty (and at the same time vitriolic) since Joe Jackson’s punk period. It didn’t hurt that “Brick” suddenly became an unexpected hit. After one more studio disc and a b-sides/live cuts compilation, though, the three in the Five were reduced to one. (more…)