Hopkins had even said at the time that he’d be “perfectly happy if I were never involved in any way with a major label again.”
#Gin blossoms furcadia dreams professional#
The story of his ousting is sad and complicated, but the consensus seemed to be that he disliked the professional side of the music business, was too drunk to play his solos during tracking, and generally succumbed to his own demons amidst the related pressures that came with delivering a record to a major label. When Hopkins' body was found in his apartment, he had $498 in his pocket-all the money to his name. He had told friends he was born unhappy, and he tried to commit suicide six times in the ten years leading up to December 4, 1993-just a few months after his songs “Hey Jealousy” shot up the charts, soon followed by “Found Out About You.” He was 32.Įven though Hopkins wrote or co-wrote half of NME’s 12 tracks, and it would eventually sell over 4 million copies, the label essentially forced him out of his financial stake in the band.
He also suffered from depression, alcoholism, and possibly bipolar disorder, which probably wouldn’t have been known at the time. Tall, literate, charismatic, and by all accounts a stellar guitarist and songwriter, Doug Hopkins was born to be a rock star. Honestly I don’t think I even watched their performance, I was still so into Nirvana at the time, and I remember thinking the Gin Blossoms were kinda lightweight. I recall seeing the band on Saturday Night Live years ago, when Phil Hartman was host. It took me a second, but I quickly realized the song I was hearing was by the Gin Blossoms.Īs I drove away from the gas station I made a mental note to re-listen to a few of their hits from their heyday-a testament to how tastes change as you get older. That’s what happened at that moment, when a great song caught my ear, even though the clerk was still peppering me with small talk about my destination, where we were coming from and such. The way my brain works, if I hear music I like, it tends to override whatever other sounds are happening around me, even if the song is playing at a low volume. The middle-aged clerk was super-chatty and clearly quite lonely, with his radio playing in the background.
Once inside, I grabbed my stuff and put it on the counter. The sun was shining but patches of dirty snow blanketed the hills surrounding the parking lot. Not too long ago, I pulled up to a desolate gas station/convenience store somewhere outside Tahoe to get some drinks and snacks for my family on our way back to San Francisco.
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