You want to start a band. You go to Craigslist.com. You click the “Community” tab. You click “Musicians.” You read:
“I play guitar, sing and write songs. Blues rock, punk, metal, country.”
“For-fun rock group seeking 2nd guitarist to share rhythm and lead duties. 80s-90s indie rock, garage, punk, alt. Some originals.”
“Looking for like minded musicians interested in something unique under the guise of heavy bass, distortion, experimental sounds. Darkwave/Synthwave/Post-Rock/Alternative.”
“The sound we’re aiming for is one part goth, one part garage rock, one part post-punk, one part shoegaze.”
The first three were posted in the Denver Craigslist “musicians” section within the last week. The last one I posted in October 2022, when Nic and I were searching for a singer and a bassist to form a new band, the band now known as Heck Reckoners.
We weren’t starting from scratch. We had some songs, and a conception of how those songs should sound. But this wasn’t going to be like starting a Beatles tribute band, where you know how everything is “supposed” to sound. This was going to take some feeling out.
“Drummer wanted for recording and gigs. Stuff we’re into: Pixies, Pink Floyd, Mastadon [sic], The Flaming Lips, The Voidz, Ministry, The Doors, CCR, Prong, The Beatles, Frank Black, Black Sabbath, The Strokes, Kiss, Lana Del Rey, Mercury Rev, Spiritualized, The Verve, The Smiths, Nick Drake, Radiohead, etc… All originals only.”
The reason an upstart band’s list of influences sounds like a schizophrenic person naming musicians is because you won’t know your band’s identity until you’ve spent some time with it. Initially, your band will feature a gumbo of influences. Nic brings in Thomas Pridgen’s ADHD fills, Kylee adds Gwen Stephani’s go-girl positivity, Wagner adds a jazzbo’s sense of space and a shredder’s desire to fill it up. Unless you’re led by a dictatorial front person, all of this stuff goes into the pot, and the band becomes what it becomes.
That’s why, I believe, a band’s first album is often its weirdest.
That’s not to say “bad.” Often the songs on a first album are quite excellent because they’re selected from the best ideas that everyone brings to the table. But that in itself can lead you astray, as you may end up taking side roads that as a more mature band you would leave alone – or at least leave off an LP…maybe save them for a B-side.
Listening back to Touch Grass, which was recorded almost a year ago and features some songs that were written two or three years before that, I’m struck by how quiet much of it is. Hell, “SRO” and “Regret” are acoustic songs. Today’s burly, rambunctious, punk rawk iteration of Heck Reckoners that I’ve come to know and love would not abide such folky nonsense.
But at an earlier time, we did. And while I like both of those songs – and am glad to have them on record and in the world – I can’t imagine that we will play them in the future.
And then there’s the matter of tone. “Vampire Heart” is a rockin’ goof about a dracula who accidentally drinks his human girlfriend, but “Time Draws Nigh” is a ballad about two people who realize they’ve spent too long together as a couple. “Thrill Kill Felines” is a fem-dom slasher movie and “Dark Horseman” is a grindhouse revenge fantasy, while “SRO” contemplates suicide and “Winter’s Gone” glimpses at infinity. Should these songs go together? Can you be serious and funny at the same time? (I hope so.)
And then there’s a bit of the whole “we like the Beatles and Radiohead and PJ Harvey and Diana Ross and Fela Kuti and Miles Davis and Mozart and Hildergard of Bingen.” After hearing “Shadow of Rousseau,” the podcaster “Snobby” Bobby asked me if we were “intentionally combining shoegaze, metal and jingle jangle punk?” In a way, I guess that’s exactly what our Craiglist ad said we were trying to do. But I don’t know if we should’ve. (And, to be honest, I didn’t ask Bobby whether he liked it). Maybe a record shouldn’t swing from the drumless folk of “Regret” to the drop D riff-a-palooza of “Safeword” to the bouncy dance of “(Let’s Make This) Cold War (Hot).” Will we ever again record a ten minute song like “Winter’s Gone”?
Perhaps given another year to write and record, HR would’ve assembled a more cohesive set of songs. But in an era that encourages bands to record early (and often), I do not for a second regret waiting to release a more “definitive” Heck Reckoner’s album.
In fact, in my twenty years of making music I’ve never been prouder of a recording. In the past, I feel like I’ve always had to provide excuses for my projects. “It would’ve been good if our bassist knew the notes.” “It would’ve been good if it didn’t sound like a truck dragging a garbage can.” “It would’ve been good if we mixed it with our ears instead of trying to make all the levels look the same.”
“It would’ve been good except our singer was me.” Sorry, Part Time Ghost, et al.
Touch Grass isn’t only the best album Heck Reckoners could make at the time, it’s actually a good album that fans of goth, garage rock, post-punk, and shoegaze would probably appreciate, even if it isn’t, technically, any of those genres. I think we’ve settled on calling ourselves a punk band, but I hope the music will speak for itself.
Comments