Replacements’ Tommy Stinson still rocking with Bash & Pop
By JIM CATALANO | Published September 26, 2017 on ithacajournal.com
Tommy Stinson has some unfinished business in Ithaca.
In May 2016, the ex-Replacements bassist came to the Haunt for an impromptu show — it literally was booked with less than 24 hours’ notice after a gig elsewhere fell through. But about halfway through what was becoming a great show, Stinson lost his voice and had to leave the stage for about 30 minutes. While he rallied for an encore, he wasn’t quite able to recapture the momentum of the first part of show.
Luckily, Stinson is on the road again, and Monday night he’ll bring a new version of his band Bash & Pop to the Haunt. Actually, it’s the same band — guitarist Steve Selvidge, bassist Justin Perkins and drummer Joe Sirois — as he performed with last year (minus the keyboardist), but Stinson decided to bring back the Bash & Pop moniker after releasing a great new album titled “Anything Could Happen” under that name earlier this year.
Not surprisingly, some of the songs sound like long-lost Replacements songs — and indeed, they were intended for a reunion record that never came to fruition. But Stinson doesn’t shy away from the comparisons.
“After growing up in that band, I’d be hard pressed to sound completely different unless I started making disco records,” he said in a phone interview over the weekend. “All of our stuff is gonna end up sounding somewhat like the Replacements.”
After playing bass in the Replacements and then, for 18 years, with Guns N’ Roses, Stinson is enjoying leading his own band. But he likes just about anything to do with playing music.
“It all is fun to me,” he said. “I like being a frontman, I like playing bass, just about all of it. I think my next thing will be trying to play drums with somebody, and give that a shot!”
