Interviews with Coverband Hopefuls
By: Isabel Hardwig, Bad Habits Editor
As we move into the spring semester, you can’t get two feet through the upper floors of Wilder without running into an optimistic cover band. This week, the Grape interviewed some of the cream of the crop.
Smellin’ and the Degenerates
Lead singer Alan Coccyx, drummer/pianist Eleanor Riggs, guitarist Bimp Bomp
Grape: Tell me a little about your source material.
AC: Yeah, for sure. Ellen and the Degenereses was a brief but luminous ska band in the spring of 1997. They put out some real bangers, but unfortunately had to break up two months after they got together, when the real Ellen Degeneres came out as a lesbian. The frontman put out a statement about how they don’t condone “carpet-munching” or “bush-whacking,” and then they donated their whole tour profits to Anita Bryant, just to have.
ER: Their politics don’t really stand up, but their “Horns of Plenty” album kicks ass.
Grape: Yeah, tell me about it. How have you guys been gelling as a group?
BB: Super good. Alan and I have this epic bit where he sucks the guitar pick out of my fingers and swallows it.
AC: We can’t practice it too much, though, they’re hard to pass.
The Murts
Lead singer/tambourinist Paul Dano, upright bassist Paul Rudd, guitarist Paul McCartney
Grape: You guys are a James McMurtry coverband, right?
PR: Yeah, we really fuck up some “Angeline.”
Grape: I couldn’t help but notice that you’re all very famous, and that none of you go to Oberlin.
PD: Yeah, we were all at a red-carpet event and we got to talking. We realized that we shared a mutual love of folk americana singer James McMurtry. Paul Rudd and I don’t have as much band experience as Paul McCartney, but he said that it was really easy. So we thought we’d try our hand at the Oberlin College coverband showcase.
Grape: Aw, that’s so sweet to hear. I wish you all the best!
PM: Thanks! I’m excited, but also nervous. I hope a lot of people are there, but not too many people. And I really hope we get in.
Satan Peeler
Bassist Priscilla Pett, guitarist/singer Rice Rocky, drummer James Block, stomp/clapper Colin Wright
Grape: I spent all day trying to figure out which band you’re spoofing, and I got nothing. Who is it?
JB: Well, we didn’t want to spoil it before the showcase, but since you’re with the Grape . . . it’s Nathan Fielder!
Grape: Oh! Wow. Like, the Nathan For You guy?
PP: Yeah! We couldn’t believe no one had done it yet. I mean, he’s so popular now.
Grape: I didn’t realize that Nathan Fielder did music.
RR: You didn’t?
Grape: No, I was pretty sure it was just TV.
JB: I mean, he does do music. He for sure does music. Right?
RR: I don’t know, we haven’t really looked into the music much. We’ve been perfecting the hairstyle and aggressive neutrality.
PP: Guys, I think we fucked up.
As Yet Unnamed Fleetwood Mac Coverband
Guitarist Ike “Binks” McCullen, bassist Kyle Emeritus, drummer Gibson Gobs.
Grape: Which songs will you be playing? Wait, let me guess– “Landslide,” “The Chain,” and “Dreams.”
KE: Oh, we’re just gonna pick some out of a hat. We couldn’t give less of a shit about the music, to be honest.
Grape: Really? What are you doing it for, then?
IM: We get into these scathing fights because of our irreconcilable artistic differences and flighty temperaments. To tap into the rawness of Fleetwood Mac, we started breaking each other’s hearts before practice each day, and we found that we really enjoyed that seething undercurrent of tension more than we liked anything that Fleetwood Mac has ever written. So we’re mostly in it for that, now.
GG: And the gay sex!
IM: Oh yeah, we have mindblowing gay sex.
Peltin’ and the Dumb Gyrates
Singer Ariana Mosh, trumpet player Ax Cromble, everything else ZZ Trimpet
Grape: So what kind of music do you guys play?
AM: We’re a coverband of Smellin’ and the Degenerates. Which is itself a coverband of Ellen and the Degenereses, of course, but we’ve never listened to the original songs.
Grape: Whoa, that’s cool! What kind of stuff do you play?
AC: Our boy ZZ hides behind a table outside the gear co-op when Smellin’ and the Degenerates are practicing. Our practices are right after, so we try to imitate the songs as near as he can remember.
AM: Which isn’t that near, ‘cause usually he’s also playing the New York Times Spelling Bee when he’s supposed to be listening. So we’re kinda working off vibes alone.
AC: He’s a god with the pangrams. And we’re confident that by the time we’re invited to play Coverband Showcase, we’ll have a solid repertoire of Smellin’ and the Degenerates songs.
Grape: How do the members of Smellin’ and the Degenerates feel about that?
ZT: When I asked, they said “neutral to bad.”
Pond and the Ponderers
Frontman Pond Appaloosa, theremin player Lester Jinx, organist Bonnie Smith
Grape: Who are you guys modeled after?
LJ: We are modeled after the slow ascent of the slug across a bent blade of grass.
BS: We also are modeled after the grass itself, and the sound it makes as it drags against itself.
Grape: That’s cool, very Oberlin! What sorts of songs do you play?
PA: We play the song of the blackbird and the gosling.
BS: The song of the weary animal’s feet upon the ground.
LJ: And especially the song which all rivers share, but none remember.
Grape: Tight. Anything else you want to say to our readers?
BS: Music speaks to vanity. Only the sounds untouched by humans are pure and beautiful.
LJ: The world turns on uncertain axes, briefly stabilized by the sounds of the forest.
PA: We shall be at your Coverband Showcase, Lord be willing, and we shall experience this bliss together. We are also working on a few brief ABBA songs if that is more to your liking.
