The summer was ending and I knew the last thing I wanted to do was move back home, so I had to do some quick thinking: who do I know that can help me get an apartment in Boston? JA of course. He managed to hook me up with the same rental agency that owned the brownstones on Beacon right down the street from Emerson. [This was well before many of them were bought and given some serious renovation and became overpriced condos, mind you.]. By the end of the month I’d found what would become known as The Shoebox Apartment, one building over from where I’d lived with L just over a year previous.

It was going to be hard and I’d be living from paycheck to paycheck, but I stubbornly refused to give up this easily.

The Pogues, “Tuesday Morning” single, released 1 August 1993. Their latest minus their longtime singer Shane MacGowan, this was a radio favorite on WFNX (on Tuesday mornings, natch). KEXP likes to play this on Tuesdays as well!

The Juliana Hatfield Three, Become What You Are, released 3 August 1993. The ex-Blake Babies singer gives herself a slight band name change for her second solo release and has a huge hit with “My Sister” on alternative radio. This was on heavy rotation on both WFNX and WBCN that summer.

Sheryl Crow, Tuesday Night Music Club, 3 August 1993. Sheryl’s debut knocks it out of the park with an interesting blend of blues, alternative rock and maybe even a bit of country, and manages to pop up not only on MTV and VH1 but also WFNX and WBCN and other indie and commercial stations. “All I Wanna Do” ends up getting played everywhere and you still hear it to this day.

Swervedriver, Mezcal Head, 5 August 1993. Another band whose music I loved but never quite got around to purchasing (I had to be extremely picky considering how frequently broke I was), I was always fascinated by their odd blend of PNW grunge and British shoegaze.

The Breeders, Last Splash, released 8 August 1993. Everyone loved the odd and quirky Pod from 1990 but this one was miles better and more radio friendly. You could not escape “Cannonball” even if you tried. There are several other great tracks on here as well, including the boozy ‘Saints”, the bluesy “Do You Love Me Now” and the very Pixies-like “Divine Hammer”. It is indeed a great record.

Paul McCartney, The Paul McCartney Collection wave two, released 16 August 1993. Sir Paul’s next rollout of catalog rereleases focuses on the late 70s-to-late-80s albums that may or may not have seen him at his best but it did contain several of his most memorable singles of the time.

The Sisters of Mercy, A Slight Case of Overbombing: Greatest Hits Volume One, 23 August 1993. At this point the last Sisters of Mercy release (not including the remasters of their three albums from 2006), it also includes their last single to date, the intense and alluring “Under the Gun” featuring Berlin’s Terri Nunn. This one got a lot of play over the next couple of years during my writing sessions.

Nirvana, “Heart Shaped Box” single, released 23 August 1993. Two years on and the famed grunge trio release a new single that feels not only harder and angrier but more desperate. There were several rumors that Kurt was already feeling the strain at this point, and it truly shows in their music of this era.

Cracker, Kerosene Hat, released 24 August 1993. David Lowery’s follow up to their wonderful self-titled debut may not have seen the same popularity, but it did offer the bluesy “Low” single that was indeed a huge hit on both alternative and rock radio, and still gets played on it to this day. There’s also a fun and goofy hidden track on this one called “Euro Trash Girl” that is also a fan favorite.

Unrest, Perfect Teeth, released 24 August 1993. TeenBeat is an interesting indie label in that it’s full of jangly indie pop bands — some twee, some punky — as a sort of response to other indie labels that release the hardest punk ever. Unrest were also signed by 4AD as part of their move towards a new indie sound. They’re one of those wonderful Bands You’ve Never Heard But Should, and this one’s a perfect place to start.

Stereolab, Transient Random-Noise Bursts with Announcements, released 24 August 1993. The band’s second album and the first with a full band (and the first released in the States) features the single “Jenny Ondioline” which got considerable play on alternative radio. They’re definitely in a field of their own, but they’ve attracted a major fanbase from the beginning.

Eve’s Plum, Envy, released 31 August 1993. A band named after the actor who played Jan Brady, their lead singer was one Colleen Fitzpatrick, who was not only an actor herself (she played Amber Von Tussle in John Waters’ Hairspray) but would also release glossy pop gems in the late 90s as Vitamin C. This first of two albums of their short career are definitely worth checking out for their blissfully perky alt-rock.

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Next up: the Shoebox, the bad habits and terrible decisions, and a sudden change of employment