Evan Dando has many wild tales to tell. The US singer-songwriter and Lemonheads frontman has spent much of his life and career battling drug addiction, something that means there are a lot less of his warm, melodic rock songs out there in the world than there should be, but he has been clean for a few years now and recently completed a UK tour. On a stop off in Stoke a few weeks ago, Dando spoke to Substack music publication The New Cue and revealed the moment that he realised it was time to kick his drug habit for good.
“We were going to do a tour with Squeeze before Covid,” Dando explained. “It didn’t happen, it was either Covid or it was my hellish performance I did where I realised I had to get off drugs. I saw the tapes - I played at this fucking graveyard, the graveyard where all the stars are buried, a really bad idea. I was so bad, because not only was I on coke and dope but I was doing all these edibles. That’s the completely disgusting picture, what I’d become. My teeth were all gone, and I was like, ‘Dude…’ and that’s the one and luckily I’m out since then. I was not there at all. I’d play half a song and start laughing. It’s really sad when you see a picture of yourself when you’re on heroin, it’s really sad, every time. And everyone can tell, even on the phone for a second, if you relapse, it’s like there’s this glazed sugar on your voice, or something satanic.”
Not having his own teeth, he explained, was one of the biggest downsides to his lost years. He said he wished he could tell his 18-year-old self to take better care of his pearly whites. “I wish he knew enough to learn how to floss,” he reflected. “When you smoke, you got to floss, cos those teeth are going. I’ve got caps. They’re not the same, it’s annoying. Your teeth are so much part of your character, it’s really fucking weird to get used to. I wish I had my teeth.”
He’s still here though, and despite it all, he has a lot to feel proud about. Considering what he thought his greatest achievement is, he surprisingly picked out a Mrs. Robinson-related moment – he has a complicated relationship with the song that The Lemonheads became famous for covering. “It’s funny because it’s Mrs. Robinson-related, which I don’t like, but it was in The Wolf Of Wall Street, a great Scorsese movie. I watched it again last night, and they used it as a featured song at the end, and that’s what he does, music and film. That was a big achievement for me.”
Let’s enjoy their take on the Simon & Garfunkel classic one more time below:
