News

Circuit Breakers

Continued from page 1

"The few fans the Revolutionary Hydra has, they're rabid fans," says Robbie Skrocki, who's also the Revolutionary Hydra's drummer. "And when somebody becomes a fan, we know about it." With a laugh, he adds, "We can feel that the force shifted somehow across the country, and a force shifted in St. Louis. That's how I met Griffin." Kay wanted to hand out Revolutionary Hydra mix CDs at a March 2002 Death Cab for Cutie/Dismemberment Plan concert, figuring attendees would also like the band. He e-mailed Skrocki for permission. "I said, 'Sure, on one condition: Your mission at that show is to find Chris Walla, hand him a copy of it, and say, 'We miss you at home,' something like that," Skrocki remembers.

Kay did just that. "He showed up and he had made homemade Hydra sampler CDs, with photocopied covers," Walla recalls. "And he'd made like 30 of them. He was just handing them out to people in the parking lot. It was amazing."

Wasoba was also at that show. Back then, he and Norm Kunstel were in the band Saving Boy Wonder. Both knew Aaron Stovall and Ryan Ballew, who were in another group, Children's Audio. When the two bands dissolved later that summer, the four of them formed So Many Dynamos.

The band began playing local shows at now-defunct venues such as Rocket Bar, the Hi-Pointe and Sally T's. Especially memorable was its tenth gig — a near-disastrous opening slot for the Postal Service, the electro-pop outfit of Death Cab's Ben Gibbard. Both of Stovall's keyboards broke — which meant he had to learn bass lines to replace his synth parts on the fly.

When So Many Dynamos embarked on its first tour in June 2003 — a week after Kunstel graduated from high school — Kay tagged along as its merch guy. His relationship with Skrocki helped the band land two gigs, including one at a bowling alley in Bellingham, Washington. "I remember halfway through the first song, my jaw dropped," Skrocki says of that night. "I remember what music was like in the late '80s for me when I was the same age as these kids. They completely transported me back in time a good fifteen years earlier, to me experiencing all this new music for the first time, and being in shock and awe of it all. I fell in love with them instantly."

But Skrocki wasn't the only one instantly entranced. At that time, the Dynamos had just released an EP called Are We Not Drawn Onward to New Era? This recording caught the attention of Chris Walla, who liked Onward enough to express interest in producing When I Explode. Scheduling conflicts prevented that, but they all kept in touch. Meanwhile, the band released Explode in June 2004. Jason Caddell, guitarist of Washington D.C. soul-prog-punks the Dismemberment Plan, mixed the album.

Caddell's presence was both a blessing and a curse for the Dynamos. The association with the Dismemberment Plan gave Explode credibility, with Spin describing the record as "woozy, angular noise punk." But due to similarities in sound between the two bands, the Dynamos were often dismissed as D-Plan clones — a reputation that lingers to this day. "The very first time I heard [the comparison], I was flattered," Kunstel says. "It's not something we really collectively have ever strived for or anything. It definitely got old." (For the record, Dismemberment Plan vocalist Travis Morrison says, "We were never as metal and punk as So Many Dynamos can be, and I don't think they have the secret hippie-Southern-rock and R&B leanings the Plan did.")

Ryan Ballew left the Dynamos two months after Explode came out; Kay replaced him. By 2005 everyone but Stovall was attending Southern Illinois University-Edwardsville. Tired of trying to balance both school and the band, the Dynamos collectively dropped out of college to focus full-time on their music.

When they started touring heavily, the Dynamos discovered that the conventional wisdom about how to grow a fan base (play a strong gig in a city, return there multiple times, and each time more people will show up) wasn't exactly true. "We played a show in Denver, a farewell show for this band we were friends with," Wasoba says. "There were 500 people there. We come back by ourselves a month and a half later, and we play to eight people. That's when I realized, 'Dude, this is not easy for anybody.'"

But So Many Dynamos found a way to distinguish itself from the touring masses: its compulsively listenable 2006 album Flashlights. Reviews were favorable. In fact, Punknews.org called it "one of last year's overlooked gems," while the influential music Web site Pitchfork awarded it an impressive 7.3 (out of 10) rating. Wasoba is pragmatic about such exposure. "Bands get seven-point-blank [ratings] every day," he says. "If people really were affected by the Pitchfork reviews as much as people think they are, then every day, every person would be checking out five bands. And that doesn't happen."

Neither Skrocki nor the band know exact figures, but Flashlights has sold a respectable amount; Wasoba estimates the total at 4,500 copies. According to the Dynamos' radio promotion company, Team Clermont, Flashlights also appeared on the CMJ college-radio charts for five weeks, peaking at No. 106.

In any case, So Many Dynamos isn't concerned about numbers. "When you get the weekly report in your e-mail, it's like, 'Oh, that's kind of cool,'" Stovall says. "But that's about as far as it goes." Still, the writer of the Pitchfork review probably best explains what makes So Many Dynamos' music resonate: "What initially strikes me as impressive about Flashlights is how in control of the chaos the band seems. In addition, there are curveballs galore, where the band turns a song on its ear, breaking into something completely different for seconds at a time."

Says Walla: "The hippie-aura energy around the record — it wants you to like it. The band members love pop records. They love Weezer. And for all the time changes and tricks that they turn, they want to write pop songs. They want to write pop songs that melt your heart." His enthusiastic reaction to the album marked a turning point in his relationship with So Many Dynamos. While Walla was always a supporter, Wasoba says that after Flashlights, he started going out of his way to help them.

• 1
• 2
• 3
• 4
Next Page »