Time: 8 p.m. Saturday.
Place: Carnegie Library Music Hall, Munhall.
Tickets: $30 in advance; $32 at the door.
Information: www.ticketmaster.com.
MUNHALL — They’re done lamenting their name.
Today, the four members of Toad the Wet Sprocket believe their band name is perfectly useful.
“We did not think that name would last originally, and for awhile it was a regrettable decision, but now it looks like one of the most forward-thinking ideas ever,” said Dean Dinning, bassist, keyboardist and backing vocalist for Toad the Wet Sprocket, the ’90s alt-rock hitmakers who launch their tour Saturday at Carnegie Library Music Hall in Munhall.
“That name gets us more free publicity,” Dinning said, recalling a visit to Yahoo.com where he discovered Toad the Wet Sprocket’s photo, even though the band hadn’t done anything new.
“At least once a year, some magazine or Web site does a list of the worst band names in history and we’re normally No. 1,” Dinning said. “Although last year we were No. 2 behind Hoobastank, which was kind of upsetting, but I guess you’ve got to make way for the new guard.”
Names don’t matter much — Billy Shakespeare said that — though art is timeless, as evidenced in Toad the Wet Sprocket’s catchy canon that yielded three Top-40 hits and a fourth Hot Mainstream radio smash.
If you listened to rock radio in the ’90s you remember the bittersweet ballad “Walk on the Ocean,” the revved up “Fall Down,” the soaring chorus of “All I Want” and the simplistic and jaunty “Good Intentions.”
Singer Glen Phillips penned “Walk on the Ocean” after vacationing on a pristine island near Seattle then returning home to southern California.
“That’s why you’ll hear those lines like, ‘We spotted the ocean/At the end of the trail,’ and ‘Back at the homestead, where the air makes you choke/People don’t know you, trust is a joke,’” Dinning said, swiftly singing the first and last verses from that 1991 hit.
Dinning and guitarist Todd Nichols were in college when they co-wrote “Fall Down”.
“We were really into Neil Young at the time, which is why that song sounds like ‘Ohio,’” Dinning said, referring to a Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young protest song.
Dinning was delighted when “Fall Down” turned up prominently in an episode of ABC’s “My So-Called Life.” Recalled Dinning: “there was no cooler show at the time.”
Dinning, Nichols, Phillips and drummer Randy Guss formed Toad the Wet Sprocket in 1986 while at San Marcos High School near Santa Barbara. They plucked their band’s name from a punchline used in a skit by Monty Python’s Flying Circus.
And while the original four bandmates are still together, they weren’t asked to play at their class’ 20-year reunion.
“I don’t think we were in the budget,” Dinning said.
On tour, Toad the Wet Sprocket has added a fifth member, Johnny Hawthorne, who plays lap steel, mandolin and guitar.
“He’s adding a really great color to our live sets,” Dinning said.
Toad the Wet Sprocket picked Pittsburgh for its tour opener “because we’ve really had good experiences in Pittsburgh,” Dinning said. “Pennsylvania and Ohio were always good states for Toad even before we got big.”
In 1994, they played for a sold-out crowd of about 24,000 at Star Lake Amphitheatre in Burgettstown. It helped having Rusted Root as the support act, right after that Pittsburgh band had exploded onto the scene. Toad the Wet Sprocket graciously let the hometown heroes take the stage last that night.
“We were glad to have them on tour with us,” Dinning said.
Saturday’s show will be opened by Stephen Kellogg and the Sixers of Massachusetts.
