Lump

This song follows the story of a woman named (or nicknamed) Lump who lives in a boggy marsh. She's not too bright, but has managed to attract a mate ("Lump slipped on a kiss and tumbled into love"). Presidents frontman Chris Ballew came up with the lyric. "It was just a visual, an image I had in my head," he told Songfacts. "When I thought of 'she's lump, she's lump,' I wondered, 'What could that be?' and I just wanted to paint a very surreal picture. It's a little bit 'Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds.'" Growing up with Sgt. Pepper's being such a massive part of the landscape of my imagination, I think it was sort of my 'Lucy In The Sky,' you know, 'Lumpy In The River.' I just saw this scene, this weird jungle with this woman in a housecoat, an overweight, 50-something woman with her hair in curlers smoking a cigarette, sitting in the river and dumbfounding the piranhas who normally would eat her, but they can't make heads or tails of her. Everyone would always say, 'What is 'Lump' about?' I'm like, 'Just listen to the lyrics. That's what it's about.' It's literally about this vision, a fancy flight of imagination."

"Lump" was the first single from The Presidents Of The United States Of America, which had the good fortune of forming in Seattle in the early '90s when the music scene there was red hot. In 1994, they released an independent album and were building a following. The record labels came calling, and they chose Columbia, which issued their debut album in 1995. In America, "Lump" wasn't sold as a single but was pushed to radio and MTV, a strategy that encouraged album sales. The song is a bit of a novelty, but unlike, say, Green Jelly ("Three Little Pigs"), their quirky hit was not their last. Presidents also landed with "Kitty" and "Peaches." The album ended up selling over 3 million copies. Their next album was less successful but still sold 500,000. By 1998, the band was burned out and called it quits, but viewers of The Drew Carey Show could hear their cover of "Cleveland Rocks" every week as the theme song. The band re-grouped from time to time, and in 2016 announced they were stepping down. Lead singer Chris Ballew emerged as "Caspar Babypants," a maker of music for kids and families. Caspar tracks like "Run Baby Run" and "Stompy The Bear" have streaming counts in the millions.

A cello player named Lori Goldston (who played on Nirvana's MTV Unplugged special) had a hand in the development of "Lump." She was Chris Ballew's neighbor, and when Chris hit on the idea for the song, she let him borrow her 4-track recorder so he could work up the demo.