"Wed be sitting at our local bar coming up with really awful song titles just to see if we could make each other laugh," explains Adam

Schlesinger, who with his old friend and drinking partner Chris Collingwood forms the core of Fountains of Wayne. "The challenge then was to go home and make them into actual songs."

The spontaneous writing and recording of the Fountains self-titled debut came about during the holiday season last year while Schlesinger was on break from his regular band, Ivy. Everyone was out of town except for me and Chris," he continues. "We hadnt really played together in a long time, but we got really inspired writing these songs. Before we knew it, we had a huge batch of them and decided to go in and record them while they were all still really fresh."

While songs like "Ive Got A Flair" and "You Curse At Girls" reflect both the duos dry wit and their appreciation of classic radio popthe result of which sounds not unlike a young, punky Evan Dando playing with the Banglesit was the projects spontaneity that proved to be the magic ingredient.

"Theres definitely something to be said for recording a song before you know it too well," insists Schlesinger. "The longer youre forced to listen to the same stupid 2- or 3- minute song, the more stale it gets. The trick is to get the whole thing finished and recorded before you have a chance to get bored of it."

"Most of these songs were early takes," reveals Collingwood. "Barbara H. Was only played one time, and thats what ended up on the record."

"Yeah, we definitely tried not to be too perfectionist about it," adds Schlesinger. "If you listen closely to the songs, youll hear all kinds of squirrely moments."

In the end, however, both the songwriting and the playing stands up to repeated sunny afternoon drives, regardless of the fact that it all started out as a laugh.

"Another part of the joke with this project was that we were going into the studio and trying to rock when, actually, we dont really rock very much at all," laughs Schlesinger. "That was a little joke to ourselves."

"Yeah," Collingwood concludes. "Well just have to wait and see if anyone gets it."