Those irreplaceable Replacements

We won't -- we can't -- forget what the 'Mats gave us.

On the one hand, they put their whole heart and soul — considering what was chemically and emotionally available to each of them on a particular evening (depending on their drug/alcohol intake) — and on the other hand, it was only a bunch of otherwise unemployable guys making seven studio albums and four live albums worth of noise that happened to touch so many of their listeners so deeply, the band was alternately were excited AND embarrassed, aghast and delighted, self-defeated because that’s all they knew and, well, ultimately, they were unforgettable.

Apparently, you don’t sorta like The Replacements. Which, I think, is a testament to a band that did what it wanted when it wanted; and at times, intuitively perhaps, they were tremendously responsive to their dedicated — sometimes, insanely so — fans, writing things that they — and we — felt and at the same time, y’know, whatever happened, happened.

It may not be legal to sorta like The Replacements

A little over a month ago, I wrote a Substack about the great Paul Westerberg, who had turned 65 a few days earlier and, recording-wise, had pretty much been silent for a good while. I said I missed hearing from him and, man, did Replacement Nation respond. As of this morning, Feb. 18, 2025 at 12:35 p.m., that post had 7,076 views, drawn 85 “Loves,” brought me 81 new subscribers (Hi, friends!) and 32 restacks.

Maybe there’s somebody out there in Substackland who knows how to communicate that to our friend Paul. Please do. Somebody ought to tell him this. And from what we know of the guy, he might laugh, light a cigar and tell them to go listen to the DeFranco Family’s greatest (and only) hit “Heartbeat — It’s a Lovebeat” that they covered — believe it or not — and to leave him alone. He’s given us enough. Maybe so.

I’ve been writing about music for a long time; three books about Bob Dylan, concert reviews over a long journalism career (U2, Neil Young, Bruce Springsteen, The Clash, Joe Ely, Jerry Lee Lewis, Bob Dylan and The Band, Rod Stewart, Roxy Music, Tom Petty and yes, The Replacements.) And to me, this unprecedented outpouring, I think, says something about not only what the music meant to all of us but what it still means, now. And we also know, sadly, that it’s not coming back, not like it was.

Kendrick Lamar can have all the Grammy Awards and color-coded Super Bowl halftime shows he wants but to me, that performance was directed at just a fraction of that massive 127.3 million viewer audience and the hell with everybody else (including me.) While I cannot imagine a world where The Replacements would be even mentioned as a possible Super Bowl halftime guest, those of us who love the band could secretly imagine what they might do with that kind of a showcase.

What is it about their music that brings this kind of devotion? It might have been something as pure as this: they wanted to be heard. If you’ve read Bob Mehr’s wonderful “Trouble Boys,” they didn’t exactly have a golden escalator to ride through their lives. Alcoholism, sex abuse, violence, unemployment, never-quite-fitting-in anywhere, they weren’t exactly a match for one another but as I read it, they couldn’t think of anything better to do (or didn’t want to) and at least some of the time, enjoyed the music, the validation, the perks (drugs, women, the occasional royalty check) while they were riding along outside of respectable society and loving the non-9-to-5 life, at least in principle.

So, stranded in a not-particularly inviting warehouse in Roseville, Minnesota in late 1982, throwing together their second full album, wryly called “Hootenanny,” Westerberg delightfully threw off the mantle of second-album expectations by thumbing through the classified ads of the October 13, 1982 issue of “City Pages” for a song idea and by reading the kinky classified ads over an up-tempo somewhat jazzy tune (“Slightly overweight girls need sex… Hey, Ellen, Mark says hi. Tom what else I can I say, I’m glad we’re together, love Kitten…Fantasy Phone Swingers’ hotline.”) He gave us “Lovelines” and a sign that there was no way to know what was coming next.

What was a record producer going to say? Would they listen? And they were off on a careening, shambling recording career, never quite finding Billboard success but they (and when we say ‘They’ we’re really talking about Paul) had their say.

Here is “Lovelines” - from the City Pages’ classified ads

Rockers, deceptively sophisticated songs of sensitivity, of political in-correctness, the occasional dazzling tune that you would think would be a smash radio hit - “Alex Chilton” but somehow wasn’t so instead, people could listen to “Gypsies, Tramps and Thieves” or “Seasons In The Sun” or some other tripe. It wasn’t right and we knew it.

Alex Chilton himself, the lead singer of The Box Tops, author of the irresistible hit “The Letter,” thought the Westerberg-penned tribute was pretty cool, “made him feel like an outlaw” but it never went anywhere with a mass audience. Their loss.

The Replacements continued on their merry way. Wild-ass tours, a few more terrific all-over-the-place albums, “I Will Dare” with R.E.M.’s guitarist Peter Buck, “I’ll Be You” the closest they ever came to a hit, (#51 on the Billboard charts!) and then the two lost dogs on the cover finale, “All Shook Down” where Westerberg even whispered one of the cuts.

He also carved out one more dazzlingly introspective cut, “Nobody” — (self-image issue?) — about watching an old girlfriend get married to, of course, someone else, but maybe still loving our restless, unrelenting, irascible hero.

There were lots of these songs over their run but coming where it did, their final album, a song that somehow captured, in a way, what it felt like to BE a Replacements’ fan; Seeing an old love move on with her life with someone else, knowing in her heart that it wouldn’t have worked with you, you understanding that, too and wishing her well at the same time your own heart is feeling a pain in the left ventricle. The Goo Goo Dolls and others will top the charts, rake in the dough, but we, Replacement Nation, knew better. We had the goods.

Notice how skillfully, almost effortlessly, Westerberg captures that moment without a wasted word. Your wedding day should be a great day of celebration, of absolute joy. But Westerberg probes deeper.

NOBODY

Heartaches, on your wedding day
Double takes when they look my way

Knees quake, there ain't a shotgun in the place
You like the frosting, you just bought the cake
Your eyes can't fake
Still in love with nobody
And I won't tell nobody

The bridegroom
Drags you 'cross that room
Said I do
But honey you were just a kid
Your eyes said, "I did"
Still in love with nobody
Nobody, nobody
And I won't tell nobody

Take a look
On your wedding night
In your wedding book
See what name I signed
Hey

Love nobody
Nobody, nobody
Then nobody
Nobody, nobody, nobody

Hips shake
To the band for old time's sake
Now you make your getaway
And you're waving to the stage
But on the last page says

Love nobody
Nobody, nobody
And I won't tell nobody
Nobody, nobody
Yeah, you're still in love with nobody
Nobody, nobody
And I used to be nobody
Nobody, nobody
Not anymore
No

If you were Paul Westerberg and you saw that perfect songs like “Nobody” just didn’t make a splash and your solo work, despite some brilliant songs, didn’t really get you anywhere, not like one of the musical giants of the age, no wonder you’d be discouraged, tossing out around-the-bend releases like “49.00” or “Grandpaboy” or “Dry Wood Garage” or whatever else might be out there.

There was a very brief — and well-received — sort of reunion tour/moneymaker (34 shows) but at this point, that might very well be it for them (really just he and Tommy Stinson now.) The final song on “All Shook Down” — which was a downer, was called “The Last.” And maybe it was.

So, give them (and him) this. They made their mark. For those of us who go through life sometimes feeling ignored, or underappreciated or feel like giving the bird to the whole damn world or want to think about how their music excited us, delighted us, and carried us through this life to this point — just as the bands Paul and the lads loved growing up got them through the night — they left us a lot.

And unlike some bands who you dig out of the back of your record rack and two songs in, you’re wondering why you bought it in the first place, these are songs that, at least to me, jump off the turntable or CD player. And whatever discomfort they brought him — he doesn’t seem the happiest soul, does he? — I think he did it for us. He wanted to be heard and God love him, I think he wanted to share.

As he explains on “Things” from his first solo album “14 Songs”: “Things I’d never tell you down the line someday. You’ll be a song I sing. A thing I give away.”

Thanks, Paul Harold Westerberg.

HERE IS “NOBODY” FROM “ALL SHOOK DOWN”