The song appeared on the Lemonheads' fifth, and what was then its most critically acclaimed, full-length record, It's a Shame about Ray. At the time, the band was a trio originally out of Boston - Dando, bass player Juliana Hatfield, and drummer David Ryan - that had attracted a small but passionate following. But "Mrs. Robinson" helped draw a much broader audience to the group. And when that audience found Ray, it had plenty to like. There were hooks: At just 30 minutes long, Ray offered a plethora of brief, catchy songs. There were looks: Tall, shaggy-haired, and handsome, Dando, the son of a former fashion model, was easy magazine-photo-spread material. In 1993, soon after Ray's release, Dando was even named one of the world's "50 dishiest people" by People magazine, an honor (?) that was probably due in no small part to his friendship with Johnny Depp.

But from there, the story took an almost-too-predictable course, one that involved a failure to find another hit, rumored (and confirmed) drug use, and a personal crisis that spelled the end of the Lemonheads in 1998. Dando didn't record under that band name again until 2005. When he did, Ray was there again: That year, he performed a couple of shows in which It's a Shame about Ray was played in its entirety.

The comeback spurred Dando to record new Lemonheads material; on the heels of 2006's The Lemonheads, another new album is expected to come out later this year. And that's inspired this month's reissue of Ray in a collector's edition that includes a 45-minute DVD of videos and live performances and some never-before-heard demo tracks that, like Dando himself, were once lost but now are found.