Patience Pays Off For the Fastbacks
by Gina Arnold - From The SF Chronicle.
The Fastbacks are one of Seattle's oldest punk rock bands, and also one of its most critically acclaimed. Rock writer Greil Marcus has called the group "the best punk rock band in America."
But for years, the band's biggest claim to fame has been that its first drummer, Duff McKagan, went on to help form Guns N' Roses. Its sugary punk sound is all but unknown except in its hometown. And even there, the band usually headlines at small clubs in front of 100 or 200 people.
That all changed this week. On Wednesday and yesterday the group opened for Pearl Jam at the 13,000-seat Delta Center in Salt Lake City (home of the Utah Jazz), and tomorrow it will do the same in front of 35,000 people at San Jose's Spartan Stadium. The show is sold out.
It's all quite a change for the two-woman, two-man outfit.
"It'll be fun," says guitarist Kurt Bloch. "I've never played an arena rock show before. But I saw enough bands in the '70s to know how it's done. I can be like Ted Nugent or Jimmy Page, or Rick Nielsen... It's be fun to get to pretend I'm a rock star."
Vedder a Fan
The big gig is thanks to Pearl Jam leader Eddie Vedder, a longtime fan. Last December Vedder invited the Fastbacks to play in his three-hour radio broadcast, "Face Pollution," which reached 2 million listeners. That led to the shows tomorrow and in Salt Lake City.
The shows have caused some scheduling problems: Fastbacks drummer Mike Musburger moonlights as drummer for the band Love Battery. To fulfill the Pearl Jam dates, Musburger is flying from Salt Lake City to Minneapolis, then to San Jose, then on to Toronto.
And Bloch- who is also a member of the Young Fresh Fellows, on hiatus while guitarist Scott McCaughey tours with R.E.M.- is in the middle of producing a record by Seattle's Gas Huffer, which will go on hold for a week. "But who could pass this up?" he says.
Until now, the biggest gig of the Fastbacks' career was opening for Public Image at Seattle's Paramount Theater in 1983. Public Image, recalls Bloch, "seemed oblivious to the fact that there were actually people in the opening bands."
'Lending Us Equipment'
By contrast, Pearl Jam is "bending over backwards to make it easy for us to do this, letting us put our equipment on their semis, and lending us equipment," Bloch says.
At the moment, the Fastbacks are over the moon with anticipation. No doubt that will end when they face down 35,000 rabid Pearl Jam fans. "Mark Arm from Mudhoney told us that when they opened for Pearl Jam in Indonesia the audience yelled, "Ed-die, Ed-die" throughout their set," Fastbacks bassist Kim Warnick says nervously.
Guitarist Lulu Gargiulo says, "There's going to be ten or twenty thousand people who just want us to get off the stage, but that's OK. Someone out there might like us. Anyway, even at club gigs the most common comment we get is, 'Hey, you guys are pretty good! Do you have any albums out?' And it's always kind of embarrassing to say, 'Uh, yeah- six or seven...' "
One advantage the Fastbacks have over other bands that have opened for Pearl Jam is perspective. Because of their ages- Gargiulo and Bloch are 35; Warnick is 36- they have no expectations about the results of these gigs. They know that their chances at stardom are not riding on their performance and that keeps them fairly relaxed.
"When I first was in the Fastbacks 15 years ago I just wanted to be famous so bad, and it got me nowhere," says Gargiulo.
"Being in a band was all about wanting to be popular and wanting to be cool. But obviously we've surpassed that because we're not popular and we'll never be cool. It's so much nicer to have no expectations and just enjoy things like this while they're happening."
