by: Jeff Spevak

The signs welcoming visitors to Jamestown, N.Y., in the rolling hills of southwestern New York state - it's very nearly Pennsylvania - are the authoritative badges of the aging service clubs of America: Optimist Club, Lions Club, Rotary Club, the Federated Garden Clubs of New York State. And there's a nice, big tribute to Jamestown as the birthplace of Roger Tory Peterson, America's pre-eminent bird spotter.

Perhaps wisely, the City Council has declined to erect a sign declaring, "Welcome to Jamestown, N.Y., Birthplace of 10,000 Maniacs."

It might scare off the tourists.

But it was here the Maniacs were born, out of a band called "Still Life" and its 17-year-old lead singer, Natalie Merchant. Beginning with their 1982 album Human Conflict Number Five, the Maniacs' gentle but confident folk-rock sound and dark, socially provocative lyrics won the band a following that was intense, nearly cultish and not particularly profitable.

Then came In My Tribe, the band's amazing 1987 album. In what must have seemed like overnight to them after years of plodding, fringe success, 10,000 Maniacs became stars.

And the biggest star of all was Merchant: dark, gypsylike and alien, whirling around onstage, falling into herself like a black hole and equally as distant.

Natalie Merchant left the band last August - a move toward a solo career that the band had seen evolving for a long, long time.

For now, the band isn't using the Maniacs' name, while it negotiates with Merchant and its label, Elektra. If the new lineup works and if all the paperwork is cleaned up, perhaps as early as September there will be a 10,000 Maniacs again - spiritually and legally.

"10,000 Maniacs never broke up," says the band's bearlike keyboardist, Dennis Drew. "Natalie left. Barring a few legal questions, we are 10,000 Maniacs. I can show you the royalty checks to prove it."

For their return, the Maniacs have taken a page from Darwin: If Merchant's departure was evolution, then her replacement was natural selection: the Buffalo duo of John and Mary John Lombardo and Mary Ramsey - whose own music history is bound closely to the Maniacs'.

For now, they'll be billed as "John and Mary, Rob, Dennis, Steve and Jerry."

The Maniacs have rebounded with astounding speed - perhaps because the four remaining members long expected Merchant to leave. The materials for rebuilding the Maniacs were always close at hand.

"We had inquiries from labels," says Drew. "They said, 'We'll help you find a new singer, we'll work something out. We'll fly people up to Jamestown, we'll pay for your demos.'-" But the band decided to wait. "We realized you don't just plug in singers," Drew says. "That was just an unnatural act."

And that's how it happened this spring, as naturally as bulbs pushing their way out of the ground. In the last six weeks, the four remaining Maniacs and two newcomers have been rebuilding around one or two very old Maniacs songs, a half-dozen John and Mary numbers and 13 completely new ones.

"Thirteen tunes," says Drew. "I hesitate to call them songs. A lot of the lyrics will be extemporaneously mumbled."

But these Maniacs are a different band than the one that wrote In My Tribe, and not merely because of Merchant's absence.

"It's a very different thing now," says Drew. "I think it's a little more about music, a little calmer. With Natalie, there was a cult of personality growing around here. There were not many solos. The songs were the same every night. It was very much a Natalie show."

In an effort to defuse the New Natalie thing, Ramsey politely declines to talk about her role with the band.

As Merchant did, Ramsey will write most of the words and do most of the singing. Like Merchant, she's tiny and 30-ish (though she looks about half that age), with an introspective singing style. For today's rehearsal, her clothes have the same dark, bomehian look as Merchant's.

But the band members insist Ramsey is with them on her own merits, and not as a Merchant clone.

"If you get a woman up there," says Drew, "and they're singing in somewhat of the same register, to the untrained ear they may sound the same."

Lombardo says they're not even close: "I don't see many similarities. Mary is a soprano, and Natalie is a very clear alto. Mary sings in a very precise way, Natalie has a very impressionistic style."

If the new Maniacs emerge as anything different from what the band once was, it may be thematically.

"There's a little bit of a fun element to these songs," says Drew. "Before, the subject matter was so heavy most of the time. We went through a period when we had to refrain from smiling onstage.

"When Natalie was singing about somebody being abused or an alcoholic, you feel stupid enjoying yourself up there. Saving the world from pollution and child abuse are important issues, but you have to balance that with a celebration of people getting together. You have to have a little toe-tapping and dancing."