Prior to college, my meager music collection consisted of a smattering of Christian rock and pop albums, with a few notable exceptions such as The Proclaimers and Wilson Phillips. In college, my musical horizons were opened up when I first heard the sounds of the Indigo Girls' album Swamp Ophelia wafting from one of my hallmates' room in the dorm. From that point on, I was hooked on the Indigo Girls and explored the music of anyone related to them — their influences, those they performed with, and those whose fans overlap.
In the late '90s, Zach De la Roche of Rage Against the Machine and small band of dedicated activists created the Spitfire Tour to provide a space for musicians, actors, and activists to speak out on global affairs. The Indigo Girls were predictably involved with this, and so was drummer Kate Schellenbach. At the time, Schellenbach was a member of the now defunct Luscious Jackson, so I found a copy Fever In Fever Out and gave it a listen.
Within the first few beats of "Naked Eye," I was hooked. For quite some time after that, all I could listen to was Luscious Jackson, and I made it a point to collect the rest of their albums. In doing a bit of research for this article, I discovered that "Naked Eye" was one of their top 40 hits, but I never heard them on the radio, so my relationship to their music had not been influenced by popular opinion. It was an instinctual attraction.
About seven years ago, the band broke up and went their separate ways. Officially calling it a hiatus, there was still some hope that they would eventually reunite. In the mean time, they've moved on to other projects, and recently the band co-founder Gabby Glaser released one such project — her solo album, Gimme Splash.
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1 - Connie Phillips
Congrats! This article has been forwarded to the Advance.net websites and Boston.com.