For the first time, No Show Ponies' 2002-2003 original album, The World Will Break Your Heart, is available on all streaming platforms. Recorded at The Green Room recording studio in Harrisburg, PA. and produced, engineered and now remastered by Kathy Kelly (Welsh), the album features singer/songwriter brothers, Jeff and Ben Brown, along with drummer, Jason Jones, and bassist, Jason Shover.
As songwriters, Jeff and I were starting to develop a slightly more adult voice and perspective, which was aided by our transition from West Virginia University to Penn State Harrisburg, where we would cross paths with Jason Jones. As American History and communications/journalism majors respectively, Jeff and I were given access to literature and critical frameworks with which to view, contextualize and analyze the events of the day, which started to bleed into the songs on The World Will Break Your Heart. It was under Clinton that I remember us becoming politically aware, and under W. Bush that we became politically active, which would culminate in songs that eventually became The End of Feel Good Music.
Based on our previous recording experience at The Green Room, 2000's Blueprint, and a demo for the song, "I'll Wait," Bob and Kathy Welsh extended the gracious opportunity to record what would become The World Will Break Your Heart, which would be the first record with Jason Jones, who replaced a departing Jordan Shover in 2001. Jeff had met Jones at Penn State Harrisburg in the fall of 2001 after a mutual classmate introduced Jones as "a really great drummer" during a classroom introductory icebreaker. Jones' prominence is felt right away on the record with the drum fill intro to album opener, "Can't Stop Thinking 'Bout You," which is a song that echoes early Springsteen influence.
"Weak in the Knees," while still somewhat lyrically adolescent, describes the encroaching darkness and paranoia that could be felt in the headlines, which is much amplified today.
I see shadows in the meadows / Old pictures look like ghosts / We used to drink to our health / Now we see who can drink the most
"All I Love" is a comical love letter to the absurd specter of Elvis Presley, in the vein of Warren Zevon's Porcelain Monkey.
Your comic timing left us all crying / Your pin-up pose was thumbing your nose / We found you under the trees with a pocket full of BB's / But you're all I love
"A Debt is a Terrible Thing" would later become a live staple, but exists here in a Paul-Westerberg-style guitar romp.
The title track, "The World Will Break Your Heart '' is notable for its ambition, featuring a strong rhythm from Jones and a U2 meets the Cure guitar and bass interplay. The lyric implies the loss of innocence, which was very much a theme of the record.
I've seen the ships of better men crushed on the shore / I've seen the junkyards filled with ways of life that are no more / No matter where you're going, I will embark / It's only the world that will break your heart
"Before Dark" has Jeff on vocals, Ben on acoustic guitar and Bill Nork on lap steel. This was written at a time when the first of our friends were getting married and having children, while we felt we were moving ever deeper into the metaphorical "Nighttown" of Ulysses--or was it Donkey Island?
All of the mountains are turning to hills / And all of the valleys are starting to fill / But I'm still busy playing, playing in the park / My love, please call me before dark
The verse lyrics of "Lay Your Arms Down" would later be used on The Grownups track and The Savage Poor live staple, “Hand Coming Down.”
God takes care of children, children and drunks / So maybe someday I'll find a place in the sun / Free will or fate, the great debate / I just want to be forgiven for my mistakes
"Never Never Land" is the epitome of the musician-as-Peter-Pan metaphor, with the narrator asking Wendy to help him grow up--knowing full well that while youth may be the realm of immaturity, adulthood is the realm of the broken and unrealized dreams.
"Ms. Last Year" is notable for its strong melody and intricate guitar playing, with a great two-part solo from Jeff.
"I'll Wait" was a song Jeff originally wrote for inclusion on a compilation album benefitting a Harrisburg-based rape prevention coalition. The song, which was about someone offering their support to a partner who was processing and healing from rape, features Jeff's growing lyrical prowess in the lines,"
Astrud (jazz singer Astrud Gilberto) the unaffected / I've listened to her at length / I'll keep all your records safe, while you get your strength / You went back to your mother's house to get everything straight / You said it could take forever, I'll wait
Ultimately, The World Will Break Your Heart is a document of four young men looking down the barrel of adulthood--with its seemingly requisite resignations--with prophetic skepticism, trepidation, and defiance.
Looking back now, it was a ramshackle time. While some songs feel lyrically underdeveloped at this remove, there are good ideas here and solid playing throughout. I remember the playing of every note on this album; I remember BEING every note, and I'm proud to share it with you now.
Special thanks to Kathy Kelly Welsh for seeing this project through during its inception, and for remastering the tracks for streaming. The World Will Break Your Heart would not exist without her time, care, and contributions.