Listen While You Read! Click Here For a Spotify Playlist I Put Together - Colin

The Pencilstorm office was reeling this week with news of the loss of Adam Schlesinger from Covid-19. Adam played bass and wrote songs for Fountains of Wayne, Tinted Windows and many other great projects. (Click here for WTF interview) I personally teared up numerous times diving deep back into his catalog of amazing tunes. He definitely influenced my band Watershed. We lost a true artist. Below is a Facebook post from Mother May I drummer Robert LeBourdais about his audition trying out for Fountains of Wayne. He was kind enough to let us share it here. Below that are a few of my favorite tunes Adam had a hand in. - Colin

Robert LeBourdais

April 2 at 1:23 AM · 

My Adam Schlesinger story: In 1996 my band had been dropped by our label and we went our separate ways. I was sleeping on friends’ couches on Long Island trying to organize and move back down to the D.C. area when I spotted a classified ad (Village Voice?) by a band with a label deal looking for a drummer influenced by The Replacements and Cheap Trick: a no-brainer for me. For some reason I thought I’d give it a go even though I had already decided to move back south and try to reform my band.

Next thing I know I am on the phone with Adam talking about the music biz, and our favorite bands, etc. I remember thinking what a nice guy but hating the band name they had chosen (Fountains Of Wayne). He sent me a cassette in the mail which looked home-made as their record hadn’t been manufactured yet. I listened to the tape for a few days and went into NYC to tryout. There was one other person there before me (still pretty early in the day) but soon I was in a room about 10’ x 10’ with Adam and Chris Collingwood.

I think they wanted me to learn the first song on the tape (Radiation Vibe) but I thought the stronger songs were later on in the album so they seemed happily surprised when I called out Leave The Biker. It sounded pretty great, as if we had been playing together for a while. We also did Barbara H. and possibly Sick Day. They seemed more excited than when we began despite my douchey appearance. (I had a goatee for exactly 2 weeks in my entire life and it was during this time, dyed black like my hair and it just felt and looked desperately trendy - wallet chain, backward ball cap, etc. They looked like totally unpretentious recent grads.)

I remember at one point I asked them kind of derisively who played the drums on the recordings and Adam quietly said “Me. That bad, huh?” and we had a good laugh. There was also a point where Chris made some kind of jab at me (mother joke I think?) probably to see if I had a sense of humor and I came up with something right back at him and we had another good laugh. They were very laid-back pleasant guys with a dark sense of humor that was slowly coming out.

They asked to play Radiation Vibe so we went through that and called it quits. I remember Adam asking me what my plans were and whether I would be able to tour etc. and me telling him I was moving back to D.C. the next day to resurrect my band. I’m sure he was thinking “what the hell is he wasting our time for?” I don’t remember if we spoke after that but I have a fuzzy memory of another call. Of course the rest is history. I was wondering today while reading some articles about them whether I was the first drummer to play some of those songs with them as a band since it was just the two of them at that point. A couple of years later i went backstage at the 9:30 Club after a show (Ivy, I think) to say hi to Adam and I started out with “You won’t remember this but…” and he immediately smiled and recognized me which made my day. A very humble person despite his enormous talent. I’m so glad I got to play a microscopic role in his story. - Robert LeBourdais

(Click here for a PStorm story about Mother May I )

Adam and his band mate Chris Collingwood wrote some of the craftiest pop lyrics ever. Dig this.

Adam shared my love of Give The People What They Want era Kinks. It’s too bad we never crossed paths to discuss this subject in full.

Don’t sleep on their sad songs. I’ve always loved this heart breaker. I thought I about covering it live on Instagram and then thought better. This is the clip to watch. Adam on keys and Chris singing.

Enough of that sad stuff.
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Back to Conan for a song that most of us can relate to these days.

Bonus clip! Tinted Windows was Adam, the kid from Hanson, that one guy from Smashing Pumpkins and Bun E Carlos. Adam wrote the tunes of course. Great record!

It’s going to be a tough couple of months for everyone. Enjoy all this great music Adam and his partners left behind. - Colin