Ass Ponys

(Translated from my original Italian text by ChatGPT and Piero Scaruffi)

The Ass Ponys hailed from Ohio (from a town near Cincinnati). Their first album, Mr Superlove (Okra, 1990), once and for all defined their style: airy, majestic ballads with realist (indeed naturalist) lyrics, as if taken from the songwriting manual of their friends and mentors the Afghan Whigs, but with a genuine rural edge. The backbone of the group consists of singer Chuck Cleaver, whose vibrato falsetto descends from that of David Thomas of Pere Ubu, and guitarist John Erhardt, whose hysterical country arpeggios counterbalance the intense emotional charge of songs such as the title track, Eleven, and Fingers Fall, steeped in Dylan, Young, and all those who have crossed the vast prairies of solitary spirit.
Even the most heartfelt memories spring from their roots, from a sonic backdrop that is that of their homeland: the rough country of Hey Swifty, Bible House, and Ride Ramona, albeit distorted and almost degraded by a bizarre instrumental imagination. For one airy chorus like Thank You For The Roses or a joke like Peanut Butter, which mimics 1950s novelty songs, there are ten funeral marches ready to bury any trace of a smile on the face of the average provincial kid.

Grim (Safe House, 1993) is a more mature collection of rustic tales worthy of the best Southern writers. Provincial life and its everyday dramas flow through the heartfelt laments of Azalea, No Dope No Cigarettes, Disappointed, and Ballpeen (which borrows a bit of Procol Harum�s Whiter Shade Of Pale). Slightly more sentimental shades appear in the Tex-Mex serenade of I Love Bob and especially in the funereal waltz of Julia Patrana. The work is massive (sixteen songs lasting over an hour) and does not shy away from variations on the theme, from the languid country-rock of It�s Not Happening to the hypnotic psychedelic round dance of Her Father Was A Sailor, but the theme remains the same: a set of highly evocative metaphors expressed with a very limited grammar, finding in the particular the reasons for the universal.
On the more energetic side there are only the comic quadrille of Not Since Superman Died, the ragged rave-up of Dirty Backseat Car Thing, and above all the boogie of High Heaven (though it reworks the theme of INXS�s Devil Inside). But in each of these pieces the true protagonist is the quantity of harmonic irregularities.
Compared to the previous album, whose core was split between country eccentricity and subdued elegies, Grim tends to standardize the style with an aseptic rigor which, paradoxically, drains the instrumental parts of emotion in order to amplify the emotional charge of the lyrics. Cleaver does not in fact identify with his characters; he simply tells their stories with a certain detachment, like storytellers of past centuries. He merely reads imaginary manuscripts. The album is nevertheless a gallery of characters and stories in which the sense of angst of Generation X is distilled.

Electric Rock Music (A&M, 1994) brought the Ass Ponys to a wider audience, mainly thanks to the catchy chorus of that slightly drunken country & western piece Little Bastard. Still excelling in their form of eccentric ballad (Lake Brenda, Earth To Grandma), the Ponys do not venture too far afield, except for the tormented melodrama of Grim and the psychotic quadrille of Banlon Shirt. The martial stride of Neil Young�s Harvest in Place Out There and the aching Dylan-like yearning of Peanut �93 pay homage to their masters.

With their fourth album, The Known Universe (A&M, 1996), the Ass Ponys settled comfortably onto the pedestal of classic rock balladeers. The focus is on singer Chuck Cleaver, perhaps overrated as a poet, but certainly capable of commanding the stage with mastery. The new guitarist Bill Alletzhauser displays a cornucopia of styles, from Pete Buck-like vibrato to understated country chatter, and contributes to the success of the show. Only two moments of serenity (the brisk folk-rock of Under Cedars And Stars, driven by jingle-jangle guitar counterpoint and a central quadrille, and the loud choral anthem It�s Summer Here) appear under an oppressive layer of pessimistic pathos, which stretches from the trembling opening notes of Shoe Money to the anguished, martial scream of And She Drowned, reaching peaks of delirium in the funereal, epic waltz of Dead Fly The Birds and the falsetto spiritual of God Tells Me. The group�s skill is evident in impossible pieces such as Redway, which survive only through touches of class (high falsetto, frantic strumming, organ distortion). They may never make a masterpiece, but at the same time they will never write a bad song.