The Vaselines

Long before achieving any measure of recognition, the Vaselines stood at risk of remaining little more than an obscure reference point, an outcome averted only because Nirvana frontman Kurt Cobain repeatedly name-checked the Scottish group during press conversations. Although Cobain’s advocacy hastened their elevation to cult status, the quartet’s own trajectory would likely have reached the same destination without external assistance. Equal parts lewd and wide-eyed, abrasive and affectionate, their loose, elemental racket captured the essence of unfiltered, joyous pop songcraft.

Eugene Kelly and Frances McKee launched the band in Edinburgh during 1987 as a pair of singer-guitarists; Kelly’s sibling Charles soon took the drum chair, and James Seenan joined on bass. After aligning with 53rd & 3rd—the fledgling imprint run by Stephen Pastel of the Pastels—the group entered the studio for the first time and emerged with the 1987 single “Son of a Gun.” The follow-up, “Dying for It,” surfaced twelve months afterward and introduced viola player Sophie Pragnell, a clear nod to the Velvet Underground’s influence. When 53rd & 3rd folded, the Vaselines disbanded in the same week their only proper studio album, Dum-Dum, appeared on Rough Trade in 1989. The original lineup did reassemble briefly the next year to support Nirvana in Edinburgh.

Nirvana later recorded versions of “Molly’s Lips” and “Son of a Gun,” both of which appeared on the Incesticide compilation, and delivered “Jesus Doesn’t Want Me for a Sunbeam” during the celebrated MTV Unplugged performance. Fresh attention prompted Sub Pop to issue The Way of the Vaselines in 1992, a collection containing every one of the band’s nineteen officially released tracks. Kelly subsequently fronted Captain America, later rebranded Eugenius, while McKee remained largely out of view until joining Suckle and issuing a solo album in 2006.

Kelly and McKee eventually revived the Vaselines name for concerts throughout 2008 and 2009, among them a modest U.S. tour. They tracked the follow-up full-length Sex with an X and placed it with Sub Pop in 2010. After several years focused on individual endeavors, the duo reconvened to cut their next album, V for Vaselines. Drawing inspiration from the Ramones, the record reunited many of the musicians who had contributed to Sex with an X, including Belle and Sebastian’s Stevie Jackson and Teenage Fanclub’s Francis MacDonald; it surfaced on the band’s own Rosary Music imprint in late 2014.