Sundays a great way to start the weekend
Few bands are so aptly named as the Sundays. The 9-year-old British foursome's sunny tunes, dominated by the pixielike pipes of vocalist Harriet Wheeler, are the perfect soundtrack for a weekend morning spent sipping coffee, pouring over the paper and in general fortifying oneself for another tense workweek.
The band is back with more required Sunday listening in the form of "Static & Silence," its third release and the first in five years. Why the extended hiatus? Well, for one thing, the Sunday's resident lovebirds, Wheeler and guitarist David Gavurin, have been busy being parents. The couple's daughter, Billie, was born in 1995. For another, the group had grown weary by the end of its last tour, for the 1992 album "Blind."
"We had just done too much," says Gavurin, 34. "We felt a little bit like we were in danger of conning people by not getting up there and doing our best." The Sundays ended up canceling the last few dates of the tour, including an appearance in Atlanta.
The "Blind" tour was the culmination of a long period of hard work and sometimes overwhelming publicity. Shortly after its formation in 1988, the quartet (bassist Paul Brindley and drummer Patrick Hannan are the other members) was being touted in the British rock press as the next big thing. "Even before we had a single out, we were on the cover of music magazines," says Gavurin. "There was quite a lot of pressure on our shoulders."
The Sundays responded to the pressure with the brilliant 1990 debut "Reading Writing and Arithmetic," which yielded such radio hits as "Can't Be Sure" and "Here's Where The Story Ends." "I don't think [the hype] affected our writing because I don't think we ever believed it," says Gavurin.
Still, the first and second albums were recorded under intense conditions, in marathon sessions that sometimes lasted into the next day. For "Static & Silence," the band pulled back a bit. "We had a kid running around," Gavurin explains. "We couldn't go all night anymore."
Gavurin and Wheeler's daughter has also added a new dimension to the Sunday's current tour, which comes to a close with tonight's show at the Variety Playhouse. "We have her with us and we also have a nanny," says Gavurin. "But we didn't want to become absent parents. The only way we could do this is to have some time with her." To that end, the band's label, DGC, has given it a lighter interview load.
For the record, Gavurin says Billie was not named after Billie Holiday. "It's just a name we liked. But she can use it later. When she's teased in school for having a boy's name, she'll be able to pull the name of this great jazz singer out of her hat."
With a name like Billie and pop stars for parents, surely the kid must have some musical talents. "She does seem like she can hold a tune, but we'll see," says Gavurin. "Of course, you're talking to someone who's incredibly biased. I think she's a genius."