17 Pygmies release Last Train

17 Pygmies new 7" Vinyl Single release available now: www.maryattmusic.com or www.myspace.com/17pygmies
17 Pygmies T-Shirts available too.

If you are curious as to the origins of the trak, it is actually a song I began writing in 1989 when the break-up of the post Island Records - second generation 17 Pygmies was shall we say, looming large on the horizon. As a last ditch effort to "save" the band, our A&R person Kim Buie asked me to write a "pop" song that was similar in feel to an older 17 Pygmies trak called "From Theo." "From Theo" was actually the outgrowth of an earlier song I had written called "Brand New Heartbeat," the chorus of which was later ejected for reasons still unknown to me. So, I began writing a piece that was originally called "Kim's Song" which was the working title for what was to become "Last Train." "Kim's Song" was actually a somewhat more upbeat song, but when the band finally collapsed, I re-wrote the song with new lyrics and renaned it "Last Train to Nowhere" (if you can imagine that line being sung in the chorus, you've got the idea). But as time moved on I fell under the spell of Phil Spector and once again re-wrote the song, now dubbed simply "Last Train," but with a somewhat wall-of-sound type string arrangement in the background. Add in a few folky touches, such as an accordion, acoustic guitar and a wistful country-ish vocal into the mix and Voila! Last Train in it's current and NEVER to be re-done final state. And now you know the rest of the story. Kind of a nice way to segue from the old to the new, wouldn't you say? -JDR