This was never supposed to happen. It’s 2015, and I’m standing in the front row of The Crocodile, quite literally looking up at one of my favorite bands of all time, a group that was only supposed to exist within my television set. Yet here they were in the flesh – Polaris, the house band for Nickelodeon’s The Adventures of Pete & Pete, which aired its first episode 25 years ago today. Friends who came with me tell me I’ve never been so animated at a show, singing and bouncing along to sensational pop-rock tunes like “Hey Sandy” and “Waiting For October.” In a moment that still feels surreal, I looked up at the stage, and Muggy – the alter ego of singer-songwriter and former Miracle Legion frontman Mark Mulcahy – glances down and wordlessly hands me his guitar so he can walk across the stage and belt out a fiery harmonica solo.
That moment instantly transported me back to the TV show from which Polaris emerged, in an episode called “Hard Day’s Pete.” In this episode of The Adventures of Pete & Pete, the younger of the Petes (Little Pete) discovers Polaris jamming in a neighbor’s garage. Little Pete had previously been indifferent to music, even scoffing at song requests while running his pirate radio station WART. But then came Polaris, wrapped in scarves and thermals, blasting through the electrifying buzz of “Summerbaby.” There’s a look Muggy gives Little Pete near the song’s end, a cool, slow nod of approval.
“As he raced toward school, a strange new feeling raced through him,” Big Pete narrates in the following scene of The Adventures of Pete & Pete. “It wasn’t supposed to happen. He wasn’t supposed to care. But as the feeling blasted through his heart, he knew nothing could ever be the same. He had a favorite song. A song he could call his own.”
The Unique Charm of The Adventures of Pete & Pete
There’s a unique combination of elements that make The Adventures of Pete & Pete so charming, beloved, and ingeniously crafted. The show was structured like childhood mythology – suburban folklore that feels like it could be retold and expanded upon by neighborhood kids for generations. Even with characters like Artie, The Strongest Man in the World, the pajama-clad hero, the show never loses its grounding in reality. Though, Artie does perform mind-boggling feats such as slightly lifting a house and having a Kryptonite-like reaction to the Ohio Players’ “Love Rollercoaster.” The titular Pete Wrigley brothers become our avatars for navigating the surreal aspects of life in their hometown of Wellsville, from payphones that ring incessantly in the summer heat to attempts at time travel by outracing Daylight Savings Time. Episodes like “Hard Day’s Pete” truly encapsulate the magic of The Adventures of Pete & Pete, reimagining everyday experiences with an imaginative, childlike wonder. Even the simple act of discovering your favorite song is elevated to a monumental, life-changing event.
The Quest for “Summerbaby” and Musical Discovery
“Hard Day’s Pete,” from The Adventures of Pete & Pete, offers more than just Little Pete’s introduction to music. After hearing Polaris in the garage, he’s consumed by the desire to hear the song again. He doesn’t know the song’s name or even the band’s name. He forms his own band, hoping to learn the song from memory and broadcast it on WART. He even enlists his mom to use her metal head plate to scan radio waves worldwide in search of the elusive tune. The song feels perpetually out of reach, leading him to near despair before inspiration strikes at the episode’s climax, reuniting him with his beloved “Summerbaby.” This relentless pursuit of music felt remarkably prophetic in retrospect, especially considering it involved the very band that Little Pete became obsessed with from The Adventures of Pete & Pete.
For a significant period, I questioned if Pete & Pete was merely a figment of my imagination. I had apparently watched The Adventures of Pete & Pete as a young child during its original run, but the images and scenes in my memory were hazy and disjointed. As a child lacking articulate expression, it was challenging to describe the show to anyone, asking about “two kids who have the same name and they have a superhero friend and it’s like real life but different.” The clearest image I could recall was Polaris performing in the Wrigley’s front yard during the opening credits of The Adventures of Pete & Pete – particularly a moment with Mulcahy standing atop the bass drum, his curly hair windswept. Years later, in middle school, I rediscovered the show in syndication, and it felt like an epiphany. The town of Wellsville felt deeply familiar, as if it was imprinted in my subconscious. Discovering that The Adventures of Pete & Pete wasn’t just a dream was incredibly reassuring.
TV as Company and the Dawn of a Musical Journey
Long before we entered this so-called “Golden Era of Television,” I spent an embarrassing amount of time glued to the glowing screen. As I’ve grown older, I’ve realized I might have indulged in an excessive amount of TV. I can recall obscure, short-lived cable series and daytime talk shows more vividly than childhood escapades with neighborhood friends. In fact, I had no neighborhood friends; family issues kept me apart from cousins, and it wasn’t until high school that I began to socialize with friends outside of school. Quintessential “indoor kid” stuff. But I never perceived it as sad. TV (and later, the Internet) provided companionship, and TV Guides offered something to anticipate. I was always adept at keeping myself occupied and out of trouble, but Pete & Pete would spark a new passion within me.
It took several days and numerous attempts to decipher the rapidly scrolling credits at the end of Pete & Pete before I finally found the information I was seeking: “Opening Theme Song and Original Music: Polaris.” I repeated the name, Polaris, to myself, frantically searching for a piece of paper to write it down, fearing it would vanish from my mind. As my fascination with The Adventures of Pete & Pete grew, so did my obsession with its soundtrack. I was particularly desperate to find a copy of the opening theme, “Hey Sandy.” Discovering the band’s name fleetingly appearing in the end credits felt like it would resolve my quest, but it actually marked the beginning of a sprawling journey of music discovery – the first of many musical rabbit holes I’d delve into for the rest of my life. When I typed “Polaris” into the search engine on my grandparents’ bulky Gateway PC (likely Google, but possibly Dogpile or Ask Jeeves), I didn’t find the answers I was looking for. Instead, I was met with results about the North Star and snowmobiles.
Navigating the Early Internet for Indie Rock Gems
It’s amusing to reflect on those initial attempts to extract information from the still-nascent Internet. Experimenting with odd keyword combinations, just to get pointed in the right direction, is something I still do frequently. Hunting down Polaris proved to be a more significant undertaking than I had imagined. Given the catchiness and accessibility of their songwriting, I had naively assumed hordes of fans were raving about the Pete & Pete band. Instead, the limited information I could unearth led me down a path of niche message boards and fan sites, each sharing fragmented pieces of information. Even the lyrics to “Hey Sandy” were (and still are) subject to debate. Until then, my musical experiences were limited to mainstream artists. My mom’s cassette and CD collection ranged from Prince’s Purple Rain to Aerosmith’s Pump, artists I had seen endlessly praised on MTV and VH1 binges. I was venturing into uncharted territory.
Eventually, I discovered that Polaris had released an album appropriately titled Music From The Adventures of Pete & Pete. Back then, online purchasing was met with skepticism and wasn’t easily convincing to my parents. For years, whenever I visited a record store or even the electronics section of a department store, I would ask the clerk if they carried the album. They never did, often giving me puzzled looks for asking. I yearned for it as I spent time on Mulcahy message boards and replayed the two Polaris mp3s I managed to find on Kazaa. Finally, one Christmas, my mother gifted me the CD, my holy grail. I played the CD on repeat in my room for hours, grinning with pure joy as I finally heard the full versions of songs I had only known as snippets from The Adventures of Pete & Pete.
Beyond Polaris: The Rich Musical Landscape of Wellsville
Polaris was not the sole musical highlight of Pete & Pete. As I discovered through internet searches, The Adventures of Pete & Pete showcased a wealth of underground artists. The Magnetic Fields, Apples in Stereo, Luscious Jackson, Drop Nineteens, Syd Straw (who also played math teacher Ms. Fingerwood on the show), The 6ths, and many more provided the soundtrack to my childhood without my conscious awareness. This is without even mentioning the famous artists who made cameos on the show such as Iggy Pop and R.E.M.’s Michael Stipe. The music in Pete & Pete reminds me of another 90s icon, Nirvana’s Kurt Cobain. Cobain was known for name-dropping his favorite artists, which would, in turn, bring those bands a surge of fans and sometimes even major label record deals. His taste became a roadmap for young listeners into a whole new world of music. Pete & Pete achieved something similar, albeit on a smaller scale. For a long time, I thought I might be the only one who deeply cared about the music from this show. I even had the AOL Instant Messenger handle “lastpolarisfan.” But when Polaris reunited in 2014 for Pete and Pete fan conventions and eventually their own tour, I found a community of people who had grown up worshipping the same songs I did. Being at The Crocodile in 2015, singing “Ivy Boy” with a crowd of strangers, felt like a dream realized.
“Farewell, My Little Viking” and the Show’s Emotional Depth
For the most part, Pete & Pete primarily used instrumental segments of songs featured on the show. However, there’s a poignant exception at the end of the dramatic two-part arc “Farewell, My Little Viking.” The dynamics in The Adventures of Pete & Pete often revolved around the childlike innocence and imaginative antics of Little Pete juxtaposed with the angsty drama of Big Pete navigating high school. While Little Pete wasn’t immune to his own “growing up” moments, this theme is most explicitly addressed in “Farewell, My Little Viking.”
Storylines rarely extended beyond a single episode in The Adventures of Pete & Pete, but Artie’s departure from the main cast warranted an exception. Little Pete’s personal superhero is exiled from Wellsville after the International Adult Conspiracy (a mix of the Legion of Doom and the PTA) grows weary of Artie’s antics and influence on their children, with Little Pete’s dad, Don, reluctantly leading the charge. Already distraught, Little Pete also faces a new bully named Papercut, who torments kids with Rock-Paper-Scissors matches – invariably, he always throws paper. After a series of characteristically oddball events, the arc concludes with Little Pete confronting Papercut head-on, inspiring his peers to do the same, while Artie watches from afar. Afterward, Artie and Little Pete reunite, only for Artie to tell him he needs to move on and help another child. Little Pete doesn’t need him anymore; he’s strong enough on his own.
As the credits roll with a still image of Artie’s constellation sketched in the sky, The Magnetic Fields’ “Why I Cry” begins to play. Like many songs in The Adventures of Pete & Pete, the instrumental version had served as a motif for melancholic moments. The desperate pulse of the drum machine against the chunky acoustic guitar chords and a forlorn lead line are enough to evoke feelings of profound sadness. This time, the show’s creators let the full song play, with Stephin Merritt’s mournful baritone resonating in the background. He sings:
All the summer days
Where we used to play
Walking hand in hand
Castles in the sandSo you said goodnight
But you meant goodbye
Now our love has died
This is why I cry
The lyrics are profoundly apt, given the somber mood at the episode’s end, reflecting on the fading days of youthful innocence and watching a loved one depart. It’s remarkably heavy material to include in a children’s show. One wonders if the showrunners considered that children watching Pete & Pete might seek out the music, or if they even imagined that something like The Magnetic Fields’ existential longing would resonate with young, impressionable minds. Probably not, but who knows? I might not have fully grasped the lyrics to “Why I Cry” during the end credits when I first watched The Adventures of Pete & Pete, but something in the music caught my ear and resonated deeply within me.
Loneliness and the Soundtrack of Childhood
To its immense credit, Pete & Pete never shied away from addressing loneliness. In the episode “King of the Road,” Big Pete gazes out at the endless night highway during a chaotic family road trip. As the harmonica solo from Polaris’ “Everywhere” plays, Big Pete muses:
“I sat in the back, trying to make sense of the great mysteries of the open road. Why is it that you always see one lonely boot on the shoulder of the road? And those green signs, what are they trying to tell us? And finally, the biggest mystery of them all. Why is it that when you miss someone so much that your heart is ready to disintegrate, you always hear the saddest song ever on the radio?”
Had he heard the lyrics, Big Pete might have related to Mulcahy’s sentiments: “I hear a song that you sang/It hits my head like a circus train/I cried out when you were there/You were there because you’re everywhere.”
Childhood can be a lonely experience. As a child, you don’t always recognize that feeling – a sense of separation or isolation from those around you. When I rediscovered The Adventures of Pete & Pete during the emotional turmoil of puberty, it all resonated anew. I found comfort watching both Petes as I navigated an age somewhere between their respective adventures. Indie rock was right in front of me before I even knew what it was. Later in life, seeking out music would become an outlet when nothing else made sense. On lonely nights, I still find myself scrolling through the depths of Google and Last.fm, searching for demos and bootlegs from bands I barely know. Every so often, in these digital explorations, I’m reminded of those initial musical expeditions, searching for the full version of a fleeting melody I heard in the background of Pete & Pete. I’m sure I would have loved plenty of music without this 90s kids’ show, but I doubt I would have loved it in the same way. The reward of finally finding that song after endless searching is euphoric. It forges a deep, intimate bond between you and the music.
The Enduring Magic of Everyday Life in Wellsville
The Adventures of Pete & Pete didn’t have a grand finale. The last episode, “Saturday,” wasn’t conceived as a series conclusion. This is precisely what makes the final moments so profoundly sweet and magical. The episode chronicles an ordinary weekend day in Wellsville. Big Pete struggles to make small talk with his barber (played by J.K. Simmons!), while Little Pete interrogates the barber’s buddy, Big Pete’s “girl-friend” (not a girlfriend) Ellen tries to deliver a pizza on time while dressed in a bunny suit, and the manic bus driver Stu teeters on the brink of sanity at a traffic light that refuses to turn green. In short, nothing unfolds as planned. The gang finds solace in each other, deciding to eat pizza on a snowy afternoon before they see Stu outside, desperately pushing his broken-down school bus up the road. The soaring guitar melody of Drop Nineteens’ “Delaware” swells in the background. Ever the sage, Big Pete narrates, “If you look at it one way, you might think it’s a day we’d want to forget. Look at it another way, and you’ll realize why it’s a day we’ll always remember.”
I can recall countless Saturdays spent listening to music like Drop Nineteens, doing nothing particularly noteworthy. The essence of Wellsville, from The Adventures of Pete & Pete, was finding the profound in everyday life. The ice cream man could be a mythical figure, Slushee brain freezes could have their own lore, and a superhero could be your best friend. With the right music in my ears, my imagination runs wild. I feel like an ordinary person living in an extraordinary world, a sentiment perfectly captured by the enduring magic of The Adventures of Pete & Pete.
