Darian Sahanaja and Nick Walusko of Wondermints (who performed admirably as Brian Wilson’s backing band on his recent Pet Sounds tour) met in the early ’80s, and before striking out in their own right they jobbed as arrangers/performers for other artists. In the late ’80s they teamed up with power pop diva Lisa Mychols on Lost Winter’s Dream, a suite of songs updating 1963’s A Christmas Gift For You From Phil Spector. Receiving only a very limited cassette release in 1990, this is the project’s first appearance on CD, and sounds like a blueprint for the style that would later make the band a huge critical, if not commercial, success.
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