Antenna

Although the Blake Babies disbanded at the start of 1991 precisely when they appeared ready to break through in the alternative scene after Nevermind, the split involved neither personality clashes nor creative disputes. John Strohm and Freda Love simply chose to return home. The pair had left Indiana for Boston to study at the Berklee School of Music, only to form the Blake Babies alongside singer/bassist Juliana Hatfield in 1987. Across four albums Strohm matured enough as a songwriter to front his own project, so after he and Love resettled in Bloomington, IN, the guitarist and drummer recruited local musicians Jacob Smith on bass and Vess Ruhtenberg on second guitar to launch Antenna. Strohm had evidently accumulated a substantial backlog of material during the Blake Babies’ later years, enabling the band to record and release its debut album Sway less than a year after the earlier group ended. A direct continuation of Blake Babies tracks such as “Girl in a Box,” the songs on Sway pair dark lyrics with bright, melodic jangle pop, their sound expanded by Ruhtenberg’s rhythm guitar beyond anything the previous trio had achieved. The country inflection heard on a few numbers would grow more pronounced in Strohm’s solo work after Antenna. Ruhtenberg exited shortly after the first album, and Love unexpectedly followed in early 1992. Patrick Spurgeon assumed the drum chair, and the revised trio issued the EP Sleep, pairing two of Sway’s strongest cuts—“Sleep” and “All I Need”—with a rough demo of Smith’s “Wall Paper” and a noisy, punk treatment of Wire’s minimalist classic “Outdoor Miner.” With second-guitar assistance from Strohm’s friend Ed Ackerman (who received Strohm’s contributions on several Polara albums), the trio tracked the standout Hideout in 1993. The twin-guitar exchanges between Strohm and Ackerman recall both Television and My Bloody Valentine, while the tracks—all Strohm/Smith co-compositions—drive forward with fresh verve and confidence. Antenna nevertheless concluded at that moment, issuing the 1993 (For Now) EP as its farewell; the three new songs, especially the storming title track, rank among the band’s strongest work. Once the group dissolved, Smith and Love married, had a son, and formed the countryish pop band the Mysteries of Life with Vulgar Boatmen keyboardist Dale Lawrence. Strohm quickly assembled the even darker and noisier short-lived group Velo-Deluxe before beginning an alt-country solo career in the mid-’90s.