It was the spring of 2013. Jo and Naomi McPherson were playing out of mini amps. I had a MIDI keyboard plugged into my computer speakers. There was a kaleidoscope-style tapestry tacked on the wall and a pack of Marlboro 27’s on the coffee table.
Naomi and I were in love, and I think in some way, starting the band was me contending with my jealousy of their talent as a musician. I was less threatened by them if I was part of their project.
They both were. The bastards.
Years later, we went to see a therapist in Mid-Wilshire as a band. I expressed in a moment of frustration that I was bringing a lot to the table—that I knew I was writing good songs. The implication: I was carrying the band.
“I don’t like that therapist,” I quipped as the three of us rode the elevator down together.
Luckily, Jo and Naomi also took issue with our therapist’s point of view. Maybe we felt no one could understand us like we did each other.
We don’t love each other because we are perfect, or even good. We love each other because we are part of the same team. Because we belong to one another.
Still, these tender feelings can’t gloss over the gory bits of starting a band. Here’s a few things you can expect if you want to go down the path of being a musician: joint pains from sleeping in vans, playing corporate gigs for people eating shrimp cocktails who couldn’t give a damn about your music, electrically shocking yourself while trying to fix an amp, having to perform through various illnesses (both physical and mental), dirty green rooms, moldy showers, sleep deprivation, malnourishment, the list goes on and on.
For instance, Brian Jones and Scott Heiner, our first bassist and drummer, will tell you that a highlight of our first tour was a chaotic performance at Pet-A-Palooza, a dog adoption festival in Las Vegas. Our label told us it was “very important” for us to do an acoustic set at Pet-A-Palooza. That is, if we wanted the support of the radio station that was putting on the fest.
We got through the set without a canine mutiny, but we were humiliated.
Here, I feel it necessary to state that the road towards band-dom is even more treacherous now than it was when we started a decade ago. When we started touring, we were signed to a major label deal with RCA that provided us with tour support so that we could effectively lose money on small headline tours while we were building our repertoire and performance skills.
We’re proud to be part of a long line of bands with disastrous early gigs. Hugo Lindgren cites an early gig of the Cure where Robert Smith “was mortified at first by his own voice” and “sang the words to ‘Suffragette City’ while the band played ‘Foxy Lady.’” It’s normal to suck at first and get better over time, but these kinds of growth opportunities are increasingly rare for bands. And when they do occur, they are more likely to be extended to solo artists.
This is what happens when a music industry becomes hyper-individualized and hyper-commodified. Making music on your own with a computer is cheaper and easier than navigating relationships with bandmates and paying other musicians for their time. It’s optimal to market yourself as a solo artist because you can more easily define yourself, and you don’t have to navigate other people’s boundaries and opinions. But in trying to make music under these market pressures, we are losing the most powerful part of art: its ability to connect us to each other.
In this way, bands are inherently anarchical. They die when one person tries to become their tyrant.
Bands require a lot of you—your time, your youth, your health, the very best of you. But in my experience, it’s worth it. My band has taught me how to truly be in relationship with others; how to listen, consider, and negotiate boundaries; and how to stay in love with something.
Just please, not back to Pet-A-alooza.
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