Cap’n Jazz - Burritos, Inspiration Point, Fork Balloon Sports, Cards in the Spokes, Automatic Biographies, Kites, Kung Fu, Trophies, Banana Peels We've Slipped On and Egg Shells We've Tippy Toed Over

        Out of the quiet suburban lawns of Chicago, childhood friends played together in a band. They were made up of brothers Tim and Mike Kinsella on vocals and drums respectively, Sam Zurick on bass, and Victor Villarreal and Davey von Bohlen both on guitar as well. Forming in 1989 and breaking up in 1995, the band only ever released one album and a handful of EPs and singles. Despite their seemingly short lived and miniscule output, the band is highly regarded as a pillar in the emo genre. A figure so colossal it overhauled an entire genre, breaking it down to its components only to reassemble it into something completely new. A style nearly unheard of, and one that would sweep the world of music throughout the ‘90s and 2000s, leaving influence in every corner.

Cap’n Jazz formed in the quiet suburb of Buffalo Grove, about 30 miles north of Chicago. Like many great punk bands, the members had little to no musical experience before deciding to make music. The first incarnation of the band featured only the Kinsella brothers and Victor Villarreal. Mike Kinsella was only 12 at the time and had never played drums before. In spite of their lacking skills, the band continued on as a side project for the three of them. It wasn’t until Sam Zurick joined in 1992 when the group decided to take themselves seriously. Before Zurick came into the picture the trio wrote songs about ordinary topics like homework. Songs with very little lyrical substance. In Mike Kinsella’s words: “just mundane stuff”. 

Burritos, Inspiration Point, Fork Balloon Sports, Cards in the Spokes, Automatic Biographies, Kites, Kung Fu, Trophies, Banana Peels We've Slipped On and Egg Shells We've Tippy Toed Over, or simply Shmap'n Shmazz if you’d like to save the breath, was the culmination of the band’s career. It somehow accomplishes the seemingly impossible task of creating an emotional and melodic hardcore punk sound. In years prior a number of bands had managed to make emotional hardcore (or “emocore” for short) music, such as emo pioneers Rites of Spring and Embrace out of Washington D.C. and Indian Summer from California. Very few before have managed to alchemize the emo style with traditional pop sounding melodies. The album still has its fair share of gain-heavy riffs and general anger at the world, that was a mainstay of the genre and continues to be to this day. 

The album was recorded during the final week of 1994 and released in the summer of 1995. The artwork for the cover depicts a crudely painted red wagon with the name of the band slapped overtop in a font that belongs on a toy box. Inside the CD you’ll find diagrams of a ferris wheel and children playing board games. Cap’n Jazz has always kept both their regional origins and sense of premature fun close to heart, and they aren’t afraid to show it off. In a world of aggressive and macho punk rockers, it’s refreshing to see a band show a more innocent side. 

The band wastes no time in getting you to the action. A slow fade in on rapid fire drums bubbling below punky overdriven power chords with a diametrically opposite clean tone guitar playing melody over top. Slowly Mike Kinsella reveals himself to the listener. A loud howl is his introduction. The guitars part to make way for his nearly cracking voice, exploding with passion. The opener “Little League” is arguably the closest the band got to genuine punk. Even with this in mind the similarities are a stretch at most. The differences between Cap’n Jazz and the rest of their punk brethren become more and more apparent as the album continues. Fingerpicked acoustic guitars on “Bluegrassish”; the meandering twinkly guitars leading the track “The Sands’ve Turned Purple” which inevitably explode into a frenzy during the verse; “Precious”, perhaps the most withdrawn track on the album, consists entirely of reserved chord strumming with an occasional short but sweet riff. The band drifted so far from the punk origins of emo the world had known before. The rage funneled into the emocore scene was now lowly and inward, with a novel sound to match it. Rain fell across the fretboard, no longer fury.

To talk about Cap’n Jazz and not mention the lyrics would be a great disservice. The band bought incredible wordplay and surreal imagery to the table in a time where it wasn’t common to see earnest lyrics from punk bands. It's hard to understand Mike through his passionate shouting. Even during live shows, Mike could seemingly never out of energy to shout. His tenor voice is always at the forefront, never slowing or dwindling. On first listen you probably won’t pick up on the exact words, maybe bits of phrases here and there and the start and ends of verses. Even with lyrics in front of you it's a challenge to decipher his opaque lyrics. Despite his young age, Mike Kinsella has mastered the art of cryptic lyricism and wordplay. “Canine ate seven sick five year olds” from "In the Clear", “I know traps ease / I know no trapeze” from "Flashpoint: Catheter", and “Grapevine twine and loose news noose” on "¡Que Suerte!" are a few examples of the excellent word play and internal rhymes displayed throughout the album. All provide little to no substance through a story telling perspective, but that wasn’t the point. The point was to have fun.

Before Cap'n Jazz emo was associated with punk: aggressive, loud, and manic. After Cap'n Jazz emo became overwhelmingly associated with indie: twinkly, melancholic, and introspective. The band had proved themselves focal in the larger emo scene, and despite breaking up soon after the release of their debut, influence and notoriety was soon to follow. Members of the band would go on to form behemoths such as American Football and the Promise Ring. Nearly every self respecting emo band after the formation of these bands will claim to be fans of these bands. Over two decades later, Shmap’n Shmazz still garners attention and praise from new and veteran fans of emo. Nothing beats teenage angst in the end.