''Nobody's Cool'' is the second studio album by

Lotion Lotion is a low-viscosity topical preparation intended for application to the skin. By contrast, creams and gels have higher viscosity, typically due to lower water content. Lotions are applied to external skin with bare hands, a brush, a clean ...

, released in March 1996.

Thomas Pynchon Thomas Ruggles Pynchon Jr. ( , ; born May 8, 1937) is an American novelist noted for his dense and complex novels. His fiction and non-fiction writings encompass a vast array of subject matter, genres and themes, including history, music, scie ...

writing the album's liner notes drew attention; at the time, after "the press registered a fair amount of amazement" at this development, the ''New York'' magazine quoted Rob Youngberg as having said "We wanted him to do he liner notes so we kept hinting... Then he offered", and reported that "the story, told in ''The New Yorker'' and other places, is that Pynchon followed the band to a gig in Cincinnati, where he revealed himself backstage. And they all became friends." The same article however continued: "Some people wonder whether any of it is true, or just Pynchon pulling everybody's leg again, with the boys in the band in cahoots. 'As I understand it, the real story is that the father of one of the band members is Thomas Pynchon's personal banker', says a music reporter. 'But I can't prove it.'" In 2009, ''

The New Yorker ''The New Yorker'' is an American weekly magazine featuring journalism, commentary, criticism, essays, fiction, satire, cartoons, and poetry. Founded as a weekly in 1925, the magazine is published 47 times annually, with five of these issues ...

''- giving details of the original story including that Pynchon "had approached

he band He or HE may refer to: Language * He (pronoun), an English pronoun * He (kana), the romanization of the Japanese kana へ * He (letter), the fifth letter of many Semitic alphabets * He (Cyrillic), a letter of the Cyrillic script called ''He'' ...

after a concert at a Cincinnati laundromat-cum-rock club; that he didn’t reveal his identity until months later, when he spotted a copy of his short-story collection lying around backstage"- stated this "hoax" story to be "mostly untrue", with the band at that time stating that "they had fed reporters at various outlets an account designed to be 'as Pynchonesque as possible'" and that Rob Youngberg's mother was Pynchon's accountant; having given him an advance copy of the band's album, "he liked it well enough; at any rate, he agreed to write the liner notes".

Track listing

All songs composed by Lotion # "Dear Sir" – 2:37 # "The New Timmy" – 2:19 # "The Sad Part" – 3:21 # "Rock Chick" – 3:44 # "Blind for Now" – 3:11 # "The Enormous Room" – 3:42 # "Sandra" – 3:43 # "Juggernaut" – 2:58 # "Namedropper" – 5:32 # "Dalmacia 007" – 3:41 # "Precious Tiny" – 9:57 # "Switch" – 2:49

Personnel

;Lotion * Bill Ferguson –

bass guitar The bass guitar, electric bass or simply bass (), is the lowest-pitched member of the string family. It is a plucked string instrument similar in appearance and construction to an electric or an acoustic guitar, but with a longer neck and ...

* Jim Ferguson –

guitar The guitar is a fretted musical instrument that typically has six strings. It is usually held flat against the player's body and played by strumming or plucking the strings with the dominant hand, while simultaneously pressing selected strin ...

* Rob Youngberg – drums * Tony Zajkowski –

vocals Singing is the act of creating musical sounds with the voice. A person who sings is called a singer, artist or vocalist (in jazz and/or popular music). Singers perform music (arias, recitatives, songs, etc.) that can be sung with or withou ...

;Additional personnel *

–

liner notes Liner notes (also sleeve notes or album notes) are the writings found on the sleeves of LP record albums and in booklets that come inserted into the compact disc jewel case or the equivalent packaging for cassettes. Origin Liner notes are desc ...

Liner notes
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References

1996 albums Lotion (band) albums SpinART Records albums {{1990s-alt-rock-album-stub