Marcy Playground – Sherry Fraser —Powerpop Friday

This song was released right after Sex and Candy. The song was not a hit but did get some airplay at the time. I liked it just as well as their hit.

The band was named after the Marcy Open grade school in Minneapolis, which is the school John Wozniak attended. He chose the name because many of his songs were inspired by his childhood. Marcy Playground emerged in the late 1990s. Influences include David Bowie, Paul Simon, Neil Young, Van Morrison, Jimi Hendrix, Syd Barrett of Pink Floyd, Nirvana, Wham! and the Beatles.

Sherry Fraser, the namesake of the song, is the founder of the band Two Ton Boa. Lead singer/writer/guitarist John Wozniak said: “Sherry was my first girlfriend. When I was 15, she was 16. She was my first true love. And still a very close friend. She did all the artwork for our latest record, Leaving Wonderland. She’s a really terrific visual artist and also a great musician. She has a band called Two Ton Boa, which is really cool. I always tap Sherry for her ideas and her creativity, and I have for years. But she’s since married somebody else and we haven’t been together since 1993 or something. So it’s been a long time, almost 17 years. Well, I guess for that age it was a long time. I met her in ’87, and we stopped dating in ’93. We remain friends and made music together. We wrote a bunch of stuff. She sings on the very first record that I ever did, which was the Zog Bogbean – from the Marcy Playground. And we wrote some songs together.”

From Songfacts

The last single from Marcy Playground’s debut album, this is song is about a real person. In our interview with Marcy Playground lead singer/songwriter John Wozniak, he explained: 

There are some Alice in Wonderland references in the lyrics, a theme that would recur in Marcy Playground’s 2009 album Leaving Wonderland. Wozniak told us: “Sherry and I started experimenting with LSD when we first got together. I was 15 and she was 16 and we were tripping on acid a lot. And Through the Looking Glass was always both of our favorite book. And so it’s part of it, I suppose. But the way I write songs is with a lot of imagery, and not necessarily a lot of direct meaning. It’s all multi-layered feelings, like ‘disco lemonade’ (from “Sex and Candy”) doesn’t mean anything. There’s no such thing. (laughs) It’s a feeling.”

Sherry Fraser

Oh I saw stars falling all 
Around her head 
Red gold and blue 
Sherry Fraser where are you 
‘Cause I saw stars falling 
All around your head 
When we were young 
Sherry Fraser where have you gone 
We’re all wondering 
When will you come back 
And play some day. 
Sherry yeah 
The mad hatter he waits for Alice 
To come to tea again 
He waits forever for his old lover 
And always wonderin’ 
Will I see stars falling all around your head 
When you return 
Sherry Fraser what have you learned 
And we’re all wondering 
When will you come back 
And play some day 
And please do come back 
And play some day 
Please do come back 
And play some day 
Sherry yeah

 

https://www.wikiwand.com/en/Marcy_Playground