Pretty & Nice: Massive U

The Boston Phoenix released the first installment of “Homework,” a monthly series of free mp3 downloads in which bands are assigned to write original songs under somewhat unreasonable guidelines & deadlines.

For the inaugural edition, the Phoenix tapped hometown prog-pop heroes Pretty & Nice, who are currently recording the follow-up to their Hardly Art/Sub Pop debut Get Young.

Massive U by Pretty & Nice

Not bad huh? As you saw in the video, to coincide with the fall return of Boston’s voluminous student population, the band had to record one song given the following instructions by Phoenix music editor Michael Brodeur:

* contains the phrase ‘welcome back’
* includes, somewhere/somehow, a reference to the guitar accents at the beginning of the Welcome Back Kotter theme—but nothing else Kotter-related
* insults the Green Line at some point
* includes the names of 10 local colleges (used however you wish: “Tufts” can refer to clumps of hair, “Emerson” can refer to Ralph Waldo, “B.U.” can be the first syllables of the word “be-yoo-tiful,” etc.)
* is rad

The lyrics are a bit hard to understand, but I'm digging it! (Actually, if anyone can get their hands on the lyrics I'd love to see them!) Next month the band will be Hallelujah the Hills.