Though it is true that the days of Led Zeppelin and KISS, hair bands and rock 'n' roll gods are gone, the pop music canon is still full of Rock Stars. Some of this is the artists' doing.
As much as he pretends to be an aww-schucks everyman, let's not forget that Chris Martin has a bodyguard and named his daughter Apple. He wears big sunglasses, hangs out on red carpets, does blow off of shiny mirrored tables in posh urban clubs (maybe), and lives a life that his fans read about in Star magazine.
Still, a lot of the perceived distinction between revered musicians and their less talented, peon-like fans is purely psychological. The lives or Art Brut's Eddie Argos or even Sonic Youth's Thurston Moore aren't particularly glamorous - they hang out with their normal friends, raise their kids, and do the mundane things that normal people do. Nonetheless, if I ever ran into Thurston Moore, I would be speechless. He's a regular guy, sure, but my puny mind can't reconcile this fact with the magnificent music he makes. He may walk his dog and pay his own taxes, but he has a gift, and that makes him different. Unfortunately, there is nothing an artist can do to avoid this kind of reverence.
Unless, however, you're in pop-rock's newest "it" band, The Hold Steady, playing at the Middle East on Monday Oct. 30. In a story that would make Horatio Alger proud, The Hold Steady's is a classic DIY, rags-to-riches saga of a bunch of dudes getting famous by making loud, engaging Rock 'n' Roll.
After the collapse of their band Lifter Puller, singer/songwriter/guitarist Craig Finn and guitarist Tad Kubler moved from Minneapolis to NYC to form The Hold Steady in 2000. It would be four years until the duo, plus Judd Counsell (drums) and Galen Polivka (bass) would issue The Hold Steady's debut, "Almost Killed Me," a drunken romp through the bars, alleys, and house parties of Minnesota defined by Finn's singularly insightful wit.
Grumbling in the least beautiful of singing voices like a bar-rock Tom Waits, Finn crafts elaborate, meticulously detailed stories that are simultaneously hilarious and emotionally riveting. His players are troubled, often struggling with drugs, alcohol and the opposite sex, but his tales never get too heavy. He gives you glimpses into the sordid lives of these people, but makes sure to show that everything is at least mildly under control.
It helps that these tunes about loneliness and disrepair are set to Kubler's celebratory, tongue-in-cheek guitar shredding. Nothing is really ever that bad when they can harmoniously coexist with riffs as manly and catchy as his. The album was a bona fide gem, but when it went widely unheard, the band hit the road where their stratospherically high-energy shows, fueled by Budweiser, Maker's Mark, and the enthusiasm of a small legion of rabid fans, regularly pushed two hours.
A year later, with Bobby Drake replacing Counsell on drums and the addition of mustachioed keyboardist Franz Nicolay, the now-quintet released "Separation Sunday," a rawking, occasionally harrowing, even drunker romp through the lives of people you pass on the street.
Finn outdoes himself, running off tale after witty tale about drug abuse, human interaction, religion, and getting schwasted with your friends in a smooth cadence that was swift but never hurried. His perception of the human condition is so sharp and his literacy so crisp that the listener goes beyond feeling like they know and care about his characters, but that, in some ways, they are the characters, which provides a unique experience.
Once more, Kubler's hooky power chords make this audio character transformation a raucous and vibrant one, and the addition of Nicolay adds a poppy texture to it. Again, The Hold Steady released a vitally classic album, and again, a paltry few heard it, so again, the band hit the road in their truck to play their passionate hearts out to hole-in-the-wall clubs full of smiling cheap-beer drinkers who were virtually always blown away.
Bigger and Better: Vagrant Records and "Boys and Girls in America"
Though "Separation Sunday" was criminally neglected, it did draw the attention of Santa Monica indie label, Vagrant Records, whose most notable signees include Alkaline Trio, Saves the Day and fellow Minnesotan/former Replacements frontman Paul Westerberg (to whom Craig Finn is often compared).
Vagrant picked up The Hold Steady shortly before the band played the AppleJam side stage at Spring Fling, and has since launched a mammoth publicity offensive for "Boys and Girls in America," their third full-length.
Part of the reason The Hold Steady are finally getting the recognition they deserve is due to the fine work of the label.
"They are an incredibly successful indie label, probably the most," Kubler told the Daily. "In terms of handling the growth of the band, [signing for Vagrant] has just been great."
"Boys and Girls in America" has seen the Brooklyn-via-Minnesota/Wisconsin quintet winning acclaim in the pages of Rolling Stone, Spin and just about every other influential music publication in this country. Their album is killing the college radio charts, and, as Finn humbly told the Daily, "There's definitely more people at the shows."
While part of The Hold Steady's rise to prominence has been Vagrant's doing, much more of a factor is that "Boys and Girls in America" is an awesome record. Not only does it feature some of the most spirited, expertly-crafted, booze-soaked bar-rock ever set to plastic, and not only does it find Craig Finn at his most literate and moving, but The Hold Steady genuinely push themselves on their third album.
The album begins with four of the best songs they've ever written. Opening gambit "Stuck Between Stations" is straight-ahead, white-bread rock 'n' roll until it shifts gears on a whimsical solo by Nicolay.
Finn croaks, "We drink and we dry up and now we crumble into dust," barely getting the last syllable out before Kubler's thick, macho chops tell him everything will be okay. It sounds American, but not in the conservative, rah-rah-America kind of way. It is as though they have taken all of the good, romanticized, stereotypical characteristics about the Midwest and made them into music: hard-working, strong, simple and pure.
"Hot Soft Light" is classic Hold Steady, with Finn cracking wise about drinking, drugs and social decay as he sings, "It started recreational/ it ended kinda medical/.../ it started all ice-cream-social nice/ it ended up all white and ecumenical." This song also showcases the emergence of Nicolay as a vital melodic component.
With 2005's "Separation Sunday," his keys were generally used as garnish to Kubler's power chords, but he is featured much more prominently on "Boys and Girls." Kubler said, "I deliberately tried to make more space for Franz. I mean, the guy is an incredibly talented addition and such a great player that we wanted to make space for him to shine on this one." On "Hot Soft Light," Nicolay beefs up the bridges with high-speed rock-inspired keys that harken back to Jerry Lee Lewis.
Good times, good hooks
But as good as these songs are, virtually no song in the entire Hold Steady catalog stacks up to "Chips Ahoy!," the second track on the latest album; probably the band's best, it's a frontrunner for unofficial song of the year. On this tune about a girl who uses her skill at the race track to fund her druggy lifestyle, every band member brings their A-game, with Polivka's twisting bass line echoing Nicolay's glitzy keys. Drake's ever-dependable cymbals and snare fills punctuate Kubler's thick power chords as Finn's tale about trying to love in between gambling and taking drugs steadily evolves.
The refrain, "How am I supposed to know that you're high if you won't let me touch you?/ How am I supposed to know that you're high when you won't even dance," is anthem-like by itself, but the addition of Nicolay and Kubler's backing vocals, a new tactic that abounds on "Boys and Girls," makes it completely irresistible.
This section still isn't the hookiest of the song. That honor goes to the instrumental section in which Kubler's guitar playing is so enormous and arena-worthy that it sounds like its coming out of a double-neck with underwear thrown from the audience dangling on the fret board.
Unfortunately for Kubler, that isn't really the vibe at a Hold Steady show. Looking around, there are more guys double-fisting Bud Light than the type of girls who would cast their undies at a guitar player. But don't mistake that for a bad thing. In fact, there is precious little about The Hold Steady's live show that is at all bad.
The dynamic of the audience is one of camaraderie and fervency more regularly associated with bands like Phish or STS9, whose fans follow the band across the country. The fan base is one that genuinely loves the music, which is refreshing in the scene-loving, folded-arm world of indie rock.
Most concertgoers know most words to most songs and aren't afraid to show it. The band, which drinks as much as its fans do, recycles the crowd's energy on stage, and this (and the booze) accounts for what has to be one of the most engaging performances in indie rock.
Kubler sums it up when he says, "Our shows are definitely a celebration of al things rock 'n' roll, and it's just so much fun for us to do it that it's contagious. Seeing us having such a good time translates to the audience, and vice versa."
Maybe it's cynical; it's hard to believe bands when they talk about how they "do it for the fans" and how "it doesn't mean anything without all you guys." When The Hold Steady say it, however, it's fact. Together, their performance, their ethic, and their music are the creative embodiment of a couple of dudes going to the ballgame together or having a barbecue in the backyard.
Even as they continue to gain the fame they deserve, they are still just a group of bar-rockers drinking the free beer.
"I still drink Bud," says Finn, "You gotta drink the same thing; otherwise, your body treats it differently." Their music aside, in a world where it is nearly impossible not to treat musicians as some form of Rock Stars, you have to love a band that subscribes to this ethos.
