Flashback: Jawbreaker '4/30/96'
Once an elegy, now a snapshot
Good morning!
Today, we’re taking a look at Jawbreaker’s ‘4/30/96’ record
Some bands are better in the studio, and some are better on stage. Jawbreaker is a little bit of both, but seeing them live is something everyone should experience at least once.
I’ve written about the massive impact this band has had on me and how they’ve been a throughline in my life. From late-night drives up/down I-5 to see them in the early 90s, to their reunion show at Riot Fest to celebrate a milestone wedding anniversary.
If listening to Jawbreaker is good, then seeing them is better. With the band splitting up in 1996 and going silent for almost 20 years, the only way to experience a show was through grainy YouTube clips, listening to an old guy like me, or this CD.
In the days before the internet, the way to discover a band was either by word of mouth or through magazines like Flipside. It was in the latter that I first read about the band, right around the time their first full-length record, Unfun, came out. The album features a picture of lead singer Blake Schwarzenbach’s cat, Sammy, who he made sure to mention in the piece.
Similarly, I discovered this CD in a now-defunct record store here in the Midwest. I had no internet, and no access to Flipside—if anyone carried it out here, I sure hadn’t found it. At that point, I’d long been resigned to the band breaking up, and seeing new (to me) material was not something I was expecting.
Here’s to happy accidents.
4/30/96 has tracks from three of the band’s albums: 24 Hour Revenge Therapy, Bivouac, and the long-embattled Dear You. It also features three tracks you won’t find on any album.
Further, it features what the studio records don’t: Schwarzenbach’s often stilted/always funny stage banter. Some don’t care for it. Pitchfork’s Brent DiCrescenzo likened it to…
… a shy ninth- grader’s advanced- placement science project presentation or a disorganized DJ on low bandwidth college radio.
For us, it was one of the reasons to go to the show. We loved it. He might’ve been awkward and dropping jokes that only made sense to him, but so were we. We saw ourselves reflected in that patter.
Less quantifiable but no less important is the energy in/from the crowd. It’s muted here but still palpable. These shows were equal parts concert and catharsis. 4/30/96 doesn’t do the best job of conveying that, but it does enough. Seeing them again some 20+ years after this show was recorded, I can tell you that emotion hasn’t dissipated at all.
At one point, 4/30/96 served as an elegy for a group gone too soon. The band is back together and playing fairly regularly as I type this, so today, it’s a great time capsule representing one chapter of the group’s many lives.
Pitchfork dismissed this as a record “for fans only.” Maybe you had to be there. But I’d push back on that and say it’s a great on-ramp for anyone that wasn’t.
Listen:
Jawbreaker | 4/30/96
Click the record to listen on your platform of choice.
As always, I’d love to hear your thoughts on this record! Memories, hot takes, and glances askance are also welcome.
Thanks for being here,
Kevin—
I feel like we had a lot of that going on in Portland. Straight from Seattle to California or the other way around. I had to go to the King Dome or the Tacoma Dome way to many times to see someone that was skipping Portland.
Ah, this has a raw Presidents of the United States of America vibe to it. Very nineties, indeed. Another nice disovery for me, not sure this ever crossed the Atlantic.
Thanks for sharing, Kevin