Back in the 1980s, Cleveland’s alternative music scene was flourishing with a flood of distinctive new wave/pop bands who wrote and performed their own music — Lucky Pierre, the Exotic Birds, the Adults, System 56. Cleveland musician Jinni Fontana was part of that scene singing, playing keyboards and percussion and writing songs with the Rubburheads.
Like many musicians of that time, she felt her next step was to head to Los Angeles, where she recorded and released her debut album The Game of Love. Yet she looked back home for its release on Cleveland-based Banana Records, headed by local musician Jim Butterfield of Butterfield 8. It turned out to be the labels best-selling record.
Now she’s back, and Banana Records is back, with a seven-song EP titled Oh, Cleveland! In the interim she lived out west including Reno, Nevada, where she lived in 2018 when she decided to come back home to Cleveland. From 2019 to 2023, she performed with Cleveland glam rockers Vanity Crash under the name Virginia Plain Crash before deciding to focus on her own music. But the genesis of Oh, Cleveland! was actually back in Reno where she connected with Stutz Bearcat, bassist for Cleveland bands the Generators and the Armstrong-Bearcat Band, and together they laid down the tracks that eventually became the new EP, with its accessible pop tunes about growing up in Cleveland.
“It was a bout with homesickness that fueled my writing,” Jinni says. “I was lucky to have some very interesting experiences living in different places, but I never forgot my roots in Cleveland. I’ve always felt that Cleveland had a sound, a feel, and a rich history of music that’s unique. My true love is writing songs that bubble up the subconscious mind and meld with the real world. And many songs tend to be inspired by my life in Cleveland.”
Oh, Cleveland! is available on most streaming services. You can also pre-order a physical CD here.