Early '90s Month: The Origin

I've talked a bit before about the birth of my passion for music, and last month the inspiration struck me: what better way to kick off the new year than to travel back in time a decade and a half?!? So, every Tuesday and Friday (at least, that's the planned schedule) of this January, I'll be spotlighting one of the CDs from the early 1990s that has since been, and will forever remain, a permanent part of my music collection. As a part of this special series, I'll include a song download with each and every post of "Early '90s Month".

THE ORIGIN
"THE ORIGIN"
(Virgin, 1990)


"Growing Old"


The Origin were a short-lived acoustic pop-rock band based in California. Frontman Michael Andrews' songwriting skills and charmingly unique voice were at the heart of this group's appeal, and their self-titled debut album was a briskly engaging set of spirited, semi-folksy tunes. Sadly, they would only release one more album before disappearing from the music scene in 1993.

Even though the album came out in 1990, I actually didn't discover it until several years later, when I happened upon the cassette version in a dusty budget bin at a local record store. Not expecting much, I plunked down the 50 cents it cost me, and a friend of mine (visiting from out of town) and I popped it into the car's tape deck on a morning drive. Well, we were both instantly captivated, playing it repeatedly during his week-long stay, and we scoured the internet until we each found our own copies on CD.

Unfortunately, lack of promotion by the group's label, Virgin Records, led to poor sales of their two albums, after which they were dropped from the label and subsequently broke up. Since then, Michael Andrews has remained hard at work in the music world: as a part of the acid-jazz band Greyboy Allstars; composing Hollywood scores, most notably for the film "Donnie Darko" and the TV series "Freaks & Geeks"; and most recently releasing a solo album, "Hand On String", in 2006.