Finding a Good Replacement : With His Band Bash & Pop, Tommy Stinson Tones Down Defiance and Aims for Longevity

“Shiftless When Idle” was among the first of many songs in which the Replacements defiantly declared themselves to be reprobates and screw-ups, and proud of it.

Actually, the band from Minneapolis was hardly shiftless or idle in its pursuit of rock ‘n’ roll success: The Replacements toured and recorded throughout the 1980s, enough to make their mark as one of the decade’s great rock bands. Nevertheless, that defiant screw-up attitude seemed to be in the quartet’s genetic makeup. If these ragged, sometimes drunken Dead End kids had confounded convention and won the commercial sweepstakes in spite of themselves, it would have been a Hollywood ending. But when they finally broke up in 1991, the Replacements hadn’t expanded their following beyond a sizable cult.

Tommy Stinson wasn’t merely in the Replacements. He grew up in the band, enlisting as its bassist at the age of 12 and staying on as main man Paul Westerberg’s sidekick until the finish. Now 26 and the leader of his own band, Bash & Pop, Stinson says he can’t afford to be shiftless any more.

“I don’t look at our attitude as being good. We kind of shot off our left foot,” Stinson said of the Replacements’ aversion to appearing too steady, too professional and too eager to climb the ladder. “To a large extent, I’m still the same way. But I don’t believe in being so loud about it like I was before. It makes you look kind of stupid, not the kind of person I want to look like at 26. I’ve got other ways to be defiant.”

But flip on Bash & Pop’s album, “Friday Night Is Killing Me,” and there’s Stinson on the lead-off track, “Never Aim to Please,” yowling a declaration of somewhat anguished pride in being shiftless and idle: “I shoot at nothing, gaining nothing is all I do.”

“I often fall into that mode of ‘I don’t give a (expletive),’ ” Stinson said during a recent phone interview. “But I do aspire to do this for a long time, to write songs and sing.” In other words, he is shooting at something, at least most of the time.

These days, Stinson is shooting to establish a more cohesive live sound for Bash & Pop, having recently revamped the lineup for a tour that begins with shows Monday at Bogart’s and Tuesday at the Coach House.

He also is aiming to end a lifetime of shiftlessness in the automotive sense. He recently moved from Minneapolis to Hollywood, and it has dawned on Stinson that to thrive in his new surroundings, he will have to buy a car and learn how to drive.

“I’m going to go for something low-buck, because I anticipate a few fenders hitting things,” said the skinny rocker, who wears his hair in a spiky rooster ‘do that’s about halfway between Rod Stewart and Johnny Rotten. Back in Minnesota, Stinson was able to get around on his hometown’s mass transit (immortalized in the Replacements song, “Kiss Me on the Bus”) or on a bicycle. “Paul (Westerberg) and I do not drive. He started to learn when he was in school, but I think he hit someone on a bike” and gave up.

“It’s my big adventure,” Stinson said of his decision to leave Minneapolis about a month ago and move into his girlfriend’s apartment in Hollywood. “I don’t feel much connection to the last 10 years now that I’m here. I feel I’ve walked away from it quite far.”

The pain of parting, separation and having to move on resounds through the more reflective songs that crop up on Bash & Pop’s album, along with a large helping of rough and crunchy rave-ups in the old Stones/Faces tradition. Stinson has had his share of significant partings over the past few years, including the breakup of the Replacements and his separation from his wife and their 3-year-old daughter.

“A lot of it is real personal, but other things have to do with me relating to other people going through the same (expletive) I went through,” he said of the lyrics on the new album. “Most of it isn’t so literal, as far as (his own experience is) concerned. I’d rather write about someone else complaining. . . . I certainly know enough people” like that.

Stinson says he has remained in fairly steady contact with Westerberg, who wrote and sang the Replacements’ songs and recently emerged with his own first post-Replacements album. He also readily cites the critically esteemed Westerberg as a mentor.

“He’s very influential. When you hang with someone for so many years, you pick up a lot of things. He’s told me things about songwriting I’ve picked up. He’s turned me on to a lot of influences. I told him once I wanted to get a Mel Bay guitar book to learn some different chords (to use in songwriting). He said, ‘Don’t bother. You can make up chords on your own that are more fun than the book.’ I never got the book.”

Stinson wrote songs during his years as a Replacement but he says he felt overshadowed by Westerberg. The oldest song on Bash & Pop’s album is “First Steps,” a nakedly emotional solo-acoustic piece that Stinson brought in when the Replacements were working on their 1989 album, “Don’t Tell a Soul.”

“We demoed it when we did ‘Don’t Tell a Soul,’ but I couldn’t sing it. I didn’t have the nerve,” Stinson recalled.

So what gave him the nerve to step out as singer-songwriter in a band of his own?

“ ‘Cause I’m not next to Paul, probably,” he answered. “I don’t have the feeling of competition or needing to be as good. (In the Replacements), I didn’t feel I could be up to snuff to even his worst songs.”

Stinson also makes no bones about being under the influence of the raunchy early ‘70s sound of the Rolling Stones and the Faces--a sound that several young bands have nicked in the ‘90s, especially the hot-selling Black Crowes.

“I’m not doing it and saying I invented it. I play from the sleeve, just doing what I like. If it sounds retro, I would be the first to admit it. Everyone steals from their influences.”

“I certainly won’t be sporting scarves on my mike stand anytime soon, or sporting flares,” he added, in a disdainful reference to the extremely Jagger-like stage style of Black Crowes singer Chris Robinson.

Stinson started Bash & Pop with three other musicians from Minneapolis. But only the drummer, Steve Foley, who also played with the Replacements on their last tour, remains from the lineup on “Friday Night Is Killing Me.”

Stinson, who has switched from the bass he played in the Replacements to rhythm guitar, said he wasn’t pleased with the band’s sound during its first tour a few months ago. “It just wasn’t real cohesive. The bass player wasn’t on the ball, the guitar player was sterile. I needed a more thumpin’ bass player and a guitar that could add something.” The new additions are Janis Tanaka, a bassist from San Francisco, and guitarist Max Butler, also from the Bay Area. Jeff Trott, who has played with Wire Train, was going to be the new guitarist, Stinson said, “but Tears for Fears offered him a lot more money” to go on tour. Trott recommended Butler as his replacement, so to speak.

Tanaka and Butler both play in other bands, and Stinson said it hasn’t been resolved yet whether they will continue to play in Bash & Pop beyond the upcoming tour. With the band’s album’s having failed to stir much sales action since its release in February, and no new video or single in the offing, Stinson said he isn’t that hopeful of boosting the record’s commercial prospects.

But “whether (the tour) revives the record doesn’t matter,” he said. “I just want to go out and have fun. I have material in my head (for another album) that’s trying to find its way to my fingers.”

Stinson said he was drawn to Los Angeles not only by his girlfriend but by the city’s music scene--the possibility of meeting good new musicians, recording in better studios, and perhaps finding a compatible songwriting partner. As he says, it’s a “big adventure” for someone whose life centered on one rock band ever since his junior high school days.

“I have no great interests other than music and love,” said Stinson, who dropped out of school during the 10th grade to go on tour with the Replacements. “I certainly need a hobby. I can’t gamble at pool anymore. I’m a Gambler’s Anonymous type now. I used to bet and got close to getting in trouble with it. I played cards, too, but I haven’t had money to play a good game of poker lately.”

He says he doesn’t regret having missed out on any semblance of a normal adolescence. That road, he says, probably would have left him truly shiftless and idle.

“I don’t feel like I missed anything. The way I went probably kept me on a good path, even though there were drugs and alcohol. I had something I could learn and do the rest of my life. If I’d gone to school, I’d probably have been a thief and not learned to do anything.”

* Bash & Pop, Eve’s Plum and the Leonards play Monday at Bogart’s in the Marina Pacifica Mall, 6288 E. Pacific Coast Highway, Long Beach. Show time: 9:30 p.m. $10. (310) 594-8975. Bash & Pop, the Trouble Dolls and Pilgrim Soul play Tuesday at the Coach House, 33157 Camino Capistrano, San Juan Capistrano. Show time: 8 p.m. $10. (714) 496-8930.