High School Bands are as integral to the cultural makeup of America as professional sports or finance. For many Americans, forming or participating in a High School Band — or, in some cases, simply listening to one — marks their first engagement with culture on their own terms. However, as of this moment, no one has undertaken the monumental task of recording the exploits and the output of America’s High School Bands. In fact, few of us consider them at all and, when we do, the exercise is unfortunately often dismissed as simple nostalgia tourism. But their importance is more than nostalgic. Their value transcends narcissism. More than a series of transitional moments in the lives of individual kids, High School Bands tell the story of what it means to be young in the USA.

Alex Shephard and Scott Beauchamp are currently writing the definitive history of High School Bands in America. Every other week we will be publishing excerpts from the first volume of their forthcoming work, tentatively titled Dictionary of Saints: High School Bands in America 1998-2005.

BASEMENT CRAM JAM
Roswell High School, Roswell, Georgia
April 16, 1999

Brian Guinness — Guitar
Derek Pool — Guitar
Alex Harbind — Bass
Chris Treadwell — Drums

Fueled by ditch weed and senioritis, four young musicians met in a crowded basement full of packed boxes and performed one of the best jam sessions in the history of high school rock. After spending between 12 and 15 minutes tuning — accounts vary — the band jumped into a shoddy rendition of “The Weight.” Though the musicians initially seemed uncomfortable with one another, by the second verse they were playing a sly, knowing rendition of the The Band’s most iconic single. Individually, they were 16-year-old virgins with one half of a mustache between them. But together, they were weathered, drunken 57-year-olds, eschewing a cleaner, tighter version, for a loose and rambling take that would occasionally get caught in a groove based on the chorus. One such groove lasted nearly twenty minutes.

After the fourth verse, the song’s conventional structure broke down — mostly due to boredom — and took a psychedelic turn without losing any of its edge. This section can best be described as something akin to the Allman Brothers being covered by Uncle Tupelo. Brian Guinness was in his prime, vocalizing dirty, heady lines on his guitar that he would never be able to replicate. Chris Treadwell’s drumming started off efficient, even minimalist — it wouldn’t be out of place on a record by The Ventures or Dick Dale. Somewhere near the end of “The Weight,” due to either his gelling with the other players, or the weed, or both, he actually expressed himself on his instrument. It was the first time he’d ever played exactly how he felt, rolling melodic fills off of his toms that pulled the other players back together, keeping them from flinging themselves out of orbit. As he packed up his drums after the jam concluded he was physically exhausted but — though he kept it to himself at the time — happy.

It was the last time all four boys would see each other, much less play together. Alex Harbind stopped playing bass during college, becoming involved instead with mainstream Democratic politics. Derek Pool transitioned to folk music, using his arrangement of Neil Young’s “Winterlong” to convince his future wife, Stacey, to spend that first night with him. Pool is currently a mechanical engineer. Chris Treadwell continued to play drums, appearing in a few Atlanta-area bands before developing a substance abuse problem. He is now a born-again Christian and a member of his church band as an auxiliary percussionist, specializing in congas. Brian Guinness moved to New York City after high school, where he became involved in chillwave production. He was killed in a car accident in 2006.

basement cram jam

This flyer, made by Brian Guinness during Mrs. Smithheimer’s 7th period math class, was the catalyst for the now famous basement cram jam.

 

WISH YOU WERE QUEER!
Palo Alto South High School, Palo Alto, California
March 1998–February 2000

Guitar/Vocals — Janice Feldman
Guitar/Vocals — Charlie Horsht
Bass — Jules Kempt (March 1998–July 1999)
Bass — Gordon Horsht (August 1999–February 2000)
Drums — Levi “Fishmonger” Hauptman

“We’re all about subverting norms. We’re about destroying patriarchy,” Janice Feldman, founder of Wish You Were Queer! told her school paper in the fall of 2009. In late 1997, Janice and her best friend, Jules Klempt, took a sudden, earnest interest in their mothers’ campus involvement in second wave feminism. Soon after, they started a bell hooks discussion group but, after a lengthy discussion about how they need to “stop talking and actually do something,” the two began a regular jam session in March of the following year. At that time, playing punk meant something akin to Goldfinger, but WYWQ! harkened back to an earlier period. They sounded raw and they played as if they were trying to sound like The Slits without ever having actually heard their music.

Their first show was at their friend Levi’s poetry readings. “Honestly, I thought they were going to play folk songs or something,” Levi told us. “Two girls, you know. But they dragged in these tiny amps [ed. note: they were 15 watt Crate amplifiers that Janice and Jules acquired from a garage sale] and pretty soon our coffee cups were rattling and they were screaming about all sex being rape and like, aliens coming down to earth and only killing people who can’t menstruate. I loved it, it was really wild. And since I played the drums I asked them if I could play with them some.” Levi went on to not only play with the girls “some,” but to give their music the organization that it severely lacked as a performance art duo. Pretty soon WYWQ! were playing all-ages hardcore shows across Palo Alto.

Charlie Horsht, who knew Janice from before she quit Jazz Band, eventually joined WYWQ! as a second guitarist, allowing Janice to concentrate more on her vocal delivery, which became quite popular among a certain crowd at Palo Alto South. “Janice could do this thing where she would like, make a noise like a cow in heat or something. I can’t describe it, it was really strange. It made everyone really really uncomfortable. But when she did it into a microphone it was like, even worse. Whenever we played shows for people who were, like, not already converted, people would literally throw things at her. It was so upsetting. But, you know, that’s what Janice wanted. That’s what she was trying to do — provoke. So while she did that I would noodle around on some pretty shitty blues scales or just hammer some staccato power chords,” said Horsht years later. The band played a handful of live shows but never recorded a demo.

Jules, a year older than her bandmates, left for UC Santa Cruz in the Fall of 2000, effectively breaking up the band. A few more shows were played using Charlie’ s brother, Gordon Horsht, as a stand-in, but things were never the same. It was the chemistry between Janice and Jules that had given the music its edgy power. Janice and Jules no longer speak, though they both are currently teaching in NYU’s Cultural Studies program.

wish you were queer-1

All images courtesy of noted High School Band archivist Kelly Schmader.


 
 
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