A story I've told many times is about the magic of my first visit to the (old) 9:30 Club, in 1987. The bill that October 2 was Throwing Muses with openers Hugo Largo. I was a rabid fan of the Muses already, and a pretty fervent fan of Hugo Largo since I'd been playing Drum on cassette all summer. That one was on Relativity Records first, before Brian Eno brought it out in 1988 or so on his Opal imprint. My memory is good and I'm fairly certain I bought it not because Michael Stipe produced it (though that was cool), but because it got written up in (I think) Musician or Option magazines, my go-to's before I started reading the UK music press.
Hugo Largo were all kinds of special. The whole two bass players-one violinist-one vocalist-vibe was appealing, but I likely gravitated to the band because of vocalist Mimi Goese. Already a devotee of Cocteau Twins, in Goese I found an American with a voice as special as that of Liz Fraser. The show that night was fantastic -- exactly the sort of experience one would want in their first club visit. And while my friends likely saw harDCore greats there at 9:30 first, I'm glad the first band I saw was Hugo Largo. After all, they famously once said words to the effect that they were playing punk rock, only really, really softly.
Collected now by the Missing Piece records folks, the music of Hugo Largo will finally be back in print, and in one place. On a new 3-LP or 2-CD set, this really special stuff will soon be gracing ears old and new, winning over minds and hearts and all that. I've heard the set and I will rave about it near the release date of September 13.
But for now, and as many times as I play this music, I'm transported back to 1987, and an era when the adventurous could briefly reach out and captivate in both the simplest and most complicated ways music can possibly do that.
Huge, Large and Electric: Hugo Largo 1984-1991 by Hugo Largo will be out on September 13. You can pre-order here, or pre-ordered via Bandcamp.
[Band photo by Adam Peacock; 9:30 Club flyer scan by me from the Washington City Paper archive]
