July 1, 1995 – She's lying flat on her tummy on the carpeted floor of a wood-paneled TV room, legs scissoring playfully, elbows propped up, notebooks and legal pads full of scribbling scattered all around. Sports drones from the 20-inch set, but her hands are clapped tight over a Walkman's headphones, guitars blaring audibly. It's the reverie of an American girl, raised on rock's broken promises and suburbia's lame spoils, and Kim Deal has wallowed in it more than most.Like one of her teen fans listening intently to the oblique lyrics on the Breeders' 1993 platinum album, Last Splash, Deal is still trying to figure out what the hell she's trying to say.

February 1, 1995 – Early on, boys learn that to grow up you have to shut down. The message is loud and clear: Repress yourself, don't express yourself, to pervert a Madonna lyric. It's even been said that guys don't remember their dreams because those dreams are usually so lousy with sublimated sexual tension.

July 4, 1994 – One day after flying from New York to Los Angeles to meet the Beastie Boys, I watched helplessly as the three still-hyper goofballs hopped a plane back home to New York, for no good reason, except that, as 28-year-old Michael "Mike D" Diamond quipped, "I like to front, you know, like I'm jet-settin'." Sometimes you've got to grit and grin. Bicoastal interview fiascos aside, it's hard to play Crabby Appleton around the Beasties. They're so sincerely full of it that you actually start to miss their charade when they're not around. And they did seem homesick. "See, it's like we're not really here," says Adam "Ad-Rock" Horovitz, 27, earnestly explaining the group's ur-L.A. dilemma. "It's still up in the air. Of course, I've felt like I was up in the air since, like, 1982. "It's cool sometimes.

March 1, 1994 – A blanket of cigarette smoke spreads across the claustrophobic back room of the Breeders' 12-bunk, 15-person tour bus. The four band members slump in different corners—tired, a touch cranky, long since ready to get home for the holidays. And with little patience for overanalytical questions about the codependent inner child of today's budding rock stars. "Oh, c'mon, get over it!" snaps singer-guitarist-songwriter Kim Deal, 32, ex-bassist and coolest member of the Pixies, when I suggest that alternative rock now serves as a group therapy session for kids who fancy themselves misunderstood (which isn't necessarily a bad thing, just kinda boring).