This Boston, Massachusetts, USA-based band is now chiefly remembered for giving birth to the talents of singer-songwriter and bass player Aimee Mann (b. 8 September 1960, Richmond, Virginia, USA). Formed in 1983, the band enjoyed a US Top 10 hit single, ‘Voices Carry’ two years later, with the memorable promotional video becoming an early staple of the MTV channel. Despite their early success, the band failed to follow-up on the commercial promise of their debut, though a rueful Mann places the blame for this squarely on the shoulders of record company intransigence and politicking.
The band was formed around Mann, who had previously played with the Young Snakes, Michael Hausman (drums), Robert Holmes (guitar) and Joey Pesce (keyboards). Their debut album, titled after the hit single, was produced by Mike Thorne and announced Mann’s compositional skills and lyrical assurance. There remained those, however, not convinced by the strength of her vocal delivery. Welcome Home replaced Thorne with Rhett Davies as producer, and saw the band progressing from the new wave gloss of their debut to a more rounded pop rock sound. Despite containing tracks of the calibre of ‘Coming Up Close’, ‘On Sunday’ and ‘No One Is Watching You Now’, the album was a commercial stiff.
Only Mann and Hausman remained from the original line-up by the time of 1988’s Everything’s Different Now, with keyboardist Michale Montes drafted into the band to help record the album. The album utilised a Jules Shear (Mann’s paramour) song as its title track. Expressing his happiness at falling for Mann, and sung by the subject of his affections, it offered an interesting insight into their relationship when compared to the same album’s ‘(Believed You Were) Lucky’, at which stage Mann had dumped Shear but still used his music to bear her own lyric about their parting. ‘The Other End (Of The Telescope)’, meanwhile, was co-written and sung with Elvis Costello. The album’s best track, the poignant ‘J For Jules’, was Mann’s alone. However, the writing was on the wall for ’Til Tuesday, with Epic Records threatening to block any future release and not promoting the records in a satisfactory manner. The band broke up in 1988 allowing Mann to pursue a solo career, taking Hausman as her manager.
