"A Bag of Poop"
The first time we saw the Young Fresh Fellows, at the UW’s HUB Ballroom in 1989, frontman Scott McCaughey had that cryptic “poop” phrase scrawled on the face of his acoustic guitar. Near the end of the joyously ramshackle set, he smashed the instrument onstage and flung its tangled scraps over drummer Tad Hutchinson’s head.
This fairly well sums up the Fellows’ brand of goofball garage-pop. Since 1982, McCaughey and co. have combined the raw Northwest sound of the Sonics, the wry musical craftsmanship of the Kinks and the drunken stage antics of the Replacements, covering everyone from the New Christy Minstrels to the Damned. They’ve released eight full-length albums, an EP or two, a whole heap of singles and compilation tracks, and were themselves canonized with a 2004 tribute album.
Their rocking 1984 debut, The Fabulous Sounds of the Pacific Northwest, took its title, cover art, and some spoken-word samples from a 7” disc released in the ‘60s by the then-local phone company, Pacific Northwest Bell. Even better was their 1985 follow-up, Topsy Turvy, which got reviewed in Rolling Stone. No, that don’t sound like much, but it was a pretty big deal back in the day, perhaps the first national nod to Seattle’s post-Heart music scene.
The Fellows have since become a Seattle rock institution, and McCaughey one of Seattle’s most prolific rock dudes. His extensive non-YFF work includes a solo album, a record-review column in the defunct Seattle music monthly The Rocket, clerking at Cellophane Square, producing friends’ records, playing keyboards for REM, and since 1993, leading another great band, the Minus 5. All along he’s maintained his same trademark appearance -- shaggy hair, sunglasses, and high-top Chuck Taylors.
McCaughey rejoins his fellow Fellows on New Year’s Eve Eve -- Friday night -- at the Tractor. Opening are Seattlest favorites Girl Trouble, and also Llama, led by another Seattle rock mainstay, Rusty Willoughby. It starts at 9.
