------------------------------ Date: Wed, 13 Aug 1997 12:17:45 -0400 From: Zarqa Javed Subject: Informative AND 4AD-related! Wednesday, August 6, 1997 Throwing Muses Call It Quits It shouldn't come as a shock, but Kristin Hersh is formally announcing the demise of her band, Throwing Muses. What's surprising is that the reasons behind the split are neither artistic nor personal. "We couldn't afford to go on, and it broke our hearts," says the thirty-year-old Hersh, who, along with her half-sister Tanya Donnelly, co-founded the Muses in 1980. She later went on to form the band Belly and is now a solo artist. "It not only wasn't paying the rent; it was costing us money," says Hersh. "If we win the lottery, we'll play again. But I'm not sure I see that happening." Hersh says calling it quits was painful. "I was so grief-stricken," she says. "I'd be brushing my teeth and start sobbing." Her reaction is understandable. After all, Throwing Muses is one of rock's touchstone bands, a group that preceded--and influenced--not only the new women's rock movement but also the modern-rock scene that surged to popularity during the early nineties. Hersh and her husband have started a small band of their own, called Casa Rita, but right now she's gearing up for the early 1998 release of Strange Angels, her second solo album and follow-up to 1994's Hips and Makers. But where Hips was quiet, acoustic, and contemplative, Hersh says she approached Strange Angels more like a Muses album, though it's still acoustic in nature. "I think that it's more solid," says Hersh, who has three children, aged eleven, five, and six months. "The material is more like Throwing Muses material and less minor key, melancholy. It's all acoustic again, but there's a lot more strength."