A new genre quietly emerged in the 1980s and rose to some level of prominence in the 90s. It didn’t have a defining musical style, but rather a defining mood and tempo: dark, sad, and only slightly faster than a tortoise on valium.

The music press eventually dubbed it slowcore.

That term didn’t exist when American Music Club formed in San Francisco in 1982 (and in later days they probably didn’t think of themselves as part of that genre anyway — nobody likes being placed in a box, especially a narrow one). The band’s sound generally centered around folk-rock with elements of country and post-punk, but they slightly expanded their sound palette — and their tempos (a caffeinated tortoise, perhaps) — as time went on.

Their first few albums achieved critical acclaim, particularly for goateed lead singer Mark Eitzel’s lyrics, but their audience remained small. As the “alternative” music scene gained more prominence, even non-grunge bands like American Music Club benefited from the increased attention (since a rising tide lifts all boats) and more passengers climbed aboard to join the club.

Eitzel’s poetic and evocative torch songs about barflys, drinking, and loneliness fit right in with the darker turn music took in the early 90s. American Music Club served as the perfect soundtrack for heartbroken, 20-something, English major types who yearned for a drinking buddy to wallow with (not me, of course — heartbreak, schmeartbreak).

Anyway, here are the godfathers of slowcore with the closing track from their 1991 album, Everclear:

Their next album, 1993’s Mercury, also contains a song title with an apostrophe after the S of a possessive name. How often does that come up? Hardly ever. Weird to see it in two consecutive albums, so let’s have that song, as well: