13 Year old Seattle band races Des Moines
From The Wail.
Oh, the irony of rock culture. The most current version of the path to "alternative" success consists of spending seemingly endless toil, touring 300 days a year, sleeping on floors, eating Ramen noodles and wearing second-hand sweaters until you've earned your indie credibility, which enables you to build a fan base so you can sign with a major label and make "a meelion dollars."
Not so with Fastbacks, who have seen a lot of bands sprout up as acorns under their feet and grow into mighty recording industry oaks in their 13 years together. All the while, they have continued to make great music, tour sporadically, and hold down "real" jobs. This is one Seattle band that has separated itself from the grunge goldrush.
"It's kinda good, actually, in some ways," says vocalist/bassist Kim Warnick of fastbacks' relative anonymity.
"We make little records on labels that no one's heard of," adds guitarist and songwriter Kurt Bloch.
Warnick and Bloch are loading all their band's equipment (by themselves) into the van so they can go to the next show, which is...
"Where are we playing the next show?" Bloch asks.
"Columbus," Warnick states with certainty.
"No, Cleveland, then Columbus," corrects diminutive guitarist/vocalist Lulu Gugliano (sic).
While they are arguing over just exactly where they will be playing next (Gugliano (sic) was right), a kid walks up to Bloch and asks how much a T-shirt costs.
The price is $10, but the kid needs to save some of his money for gas on the way home. Bloch sells him the shirt for five bucks. One he is gone, Gugliano (sic) begins chastising Bloch.
"You can't give out any more shirts. Remember what happened last time?"
Bloch smiles sheepishly, explaining that he gave away so many shirts at the early dates on the last tour that there weren't enough left for the end of the tour. I wanted to buy Fastbacks newest album, Zucker, but Bloch tells me I can't do that either.
"We have away $150 worth of CDs last time, so we don't bring them along anymore. Write to Kim at Sub Pop if you want one. She works there"
Yes, Fastbacks' singer also works at the record label. In fact, it turns out that each band member has side projects. Gugliano (sic) is a videographer. She runs camera for movies, TV commercials, things like that. Bloch records albums for other bands. Like?
"I just finished doing a five-song EP for Mudhoney," Bloch says, "I also play in another band called Young Fresh Fellows."
All of this tends to leave one with the impression that Fastbacks aren't the conventional rock star success story. It's the right impression. Not only did Bloch not know how many records Fastbacks have sold, he didn't even know how many records they've released.
"We're pretty bad at business," he said. "I hope our records do well, but I don't wanna know. Sub Pop probably owes us some money. We've done a lot of 7-inch singles. Singles are kind of the business card of the 90s, and in fact it's probably cheaper to produce a single now than it was 10 years ago. I don't know how well they sell, and I don't care, as long as we get to keep making them, and putting cool covers on them."
Fastbacks make their tour plans in much the same manner. Disdaining structure and Odyssean journeys, they instead tour when they feel like it.
"We just don't think it's worth being miserable," Bloch said. "If we're getting sick of each other, or one of us has to do something, or if we just don't want to go, we don't go. Like this time, we've never been to the Midwest, so we just decided to take a couple weeks and go."
Hairy Mary's is in the second of six dates on the tour. Owner Jeff Wright said that Mudhoney recommended the club to Fastbacks after playing there in Nov. of 1992. Unfortunately, the show didn't go as smoothly as one would hope.
Sharing the bill with the Fastbacks were D.R.I. Fastbacks were to headline the show, so the imbeciles dutifully set up their drum kit. Then they decided they wanted to headline the show.
Which would have been fine, except they refused to tear the drum kit back down. This forced the members of Fastbacks to find whatever nook or cranny they could on the already small stage. Warnick was understandably non-plussed.
Warnick had a few derogatory remarks about the band, comparing them to Blue Oyster Cult, and clarified that, no, Fastbacks were not on tour with D.R.I.
They certainly didn't let the setback affect their performance. Fastbacks' show was full of all the energy, catchy hooks and fuzzy guitars you would expect from the elder statesmen of Washington state.
