PROFILE: Tiny Lights
- Al Muzer
Hoboken's Tiny Lights have made a career out of being in the right place at exactly the wrong time.
Despite five record labels, six truly outstanding original albums, one amazing compilation disc, a long-running musical relationship with various members of the Bongos and the dBs, and having had 10,000 Maniacs open for them at one point in their career - Tiny Lights' biggest claim to fame thus far has been as a training ground for cellist-in-demand Jane (Richard Barone/Nirvana unplugged/R.E.M.) Scarpantoni.
Formed in 1983 around the nucleus of guitarist/vocalist John Hamilton and vocalist/violinist/drummer Donna Croughn (who married each other a few years ago) with bassist/trumpet player Dave Dreiwitz and drummer/percussionist/saxophonist Andy Damos sharing the duo's vision and adding a solid rhythmic pulse - Tiny Light's eighth album, The Smaller The Grape The Sweeter The Wine (Bar None), is quite possibly the group's finest collection of music since their 1986 debut, Prayer For The Halcyon Fear.
"I think that when you start getting too nervous about making money with your music," Croughn says with a self-deprecating laugh during her six-month-old son's dinner hour, "is when it can get in the way of you making your music."
"The key to having a successful, happy band, I feel, is to be successful on your own merit. You know, if you try to be something other than what you are, or," she adds, "if you try to sound like whatever's 'hip' or popular at that particular moment, well, I think people generally see right through all that."
"We like to keep things exciting for ourselves as a band by going in as many different musical directions as we can," Croughn says of her group's distinctive sound. "So I really hope that people like the new album. So far, the response has been very positive."
"You know," she offers before pausing to switch the phone to her other ear and pick up her son, "we've toured a lot over the years, so, in each little place we've been, in every town we've ever played, we've made a little 'nest' for ourselves where we can always go to play, meet fans, make friends and sell a few records. But," Croughn says earnestly, "I really think that if other people actually heard this record, if people who weren't already fans gave it a chance, they'd really like it."
"I don't know, I guess the main reason we never really fit into any one 'scene,' " she says of the group's run of frequently brilliant albums that never quite found the mass audience they deserved, "is because we never really had one particular sound. I mean, I guess we do sound like ourselves, we sound like Tiny Lights, but, we've never really fit, or even attempted to fit, for that matter, into any one category," she concludes with a happy chuckle.
Experience The Smaller The Grape The Sweeter The Wine and A Young Person's Guide To Tiny Lights (both on Bar None Records, the latter being the compilation disc) for yourself by visiting a music store near you.
