Those Wandering Bands Return : Traveling Can Be an Adventure or a Chore, Say Musicians Who Will Perform at Benefit Concert

If a musician wants to be heard, to forge a name that the music world knows, then it becomes necessary to reckon with the road.

For those who have some years beneath their treads, who have to leave spouses and children at home, it can be a hard reckoning--but it is one that they continue to make so long as the dream of being heard remains too dear to give up. For others, young and free from family responsibilities, the road can be a path of unalloyed adventure and enchantment.

For aspiring rockers such as Frank Daly, 22-year-old singer for Big Drill Car, or Chad Forrello, 24-year-old guitarist for National People’s Gang, the road is a still-fresh place of exuberant discovery, where even setbacks, hardships and absurdities can seem like a lark.

For Adrian Remijio, singer and lead guitarist of the Wild Cards, the road sometimes can seem like a sacrifice. It’s hard not to question the traveling life when you are 30, with a wife and a baby at home, and less money coming in than you used to make working a steady job in a warehouse.

For blues bandleader James Harman, the road is part of a musical tradition that he has lived since he was a boy in Alabama. If you play the kind of music Harman does, it means you travel--although in his mid-40s, and with two small boys at home, Harman thinks hard these days about how he can break through to a new level of success that would make his road easier.

What all of these musicians have in common is that today, the road brings them home to Orange County, where they will play in the daylong Orange County Music for the Needy benefit at the Coach House in San Juan Capistrano. The event, in its fifth year, will once again raise money and collect food and gifts to provide a bountiful holiday for poor families. And it will give the much-splintered, too-often-submerged, and always-overshadowed Orange County pop music scene its annual showcase and day of community.

Today is a good day for music fans to go out and get acquainted with what the local pop scene has to offer. For Calendar, it offered an occasion to check in with four of the acts on the benefit bill who have spent a good deal of 1989 away from home. We asked how the road has been treating them.

James Harman Band

For Harman, full-time travel has turned the blues into a small business, where the condition of the touring bus gets as much attention as the music he’s supposed to be writing for his next album.

The singer-harmonica player was in Vancouver last week, waiting to play yet another show on yet another concert swing, when he phoned in the James Harman Band’s annual report.

“We never had one single week off. I looked it up just the other day. It looked like 220 or 230 dates,” Harman said. “It’s wonderful to be working so much. As always, I’m thankful. But I need some time. I wish there was more time.”

Harman said that the question of time--time for home life, time to incubate new music--came up recently when he spent a three-day break in Houston hanging out with ZZ Top’s Billy Gibbons.

“He said, ‘Man, we’ve got to get you to the next level, so when you come home you can relax for a month and write songs.’ I said, ‘You’re right, and right now I have to work all the time.’ It’s a stagnating situation. It’s what kills a lot of people, drives them out of the business or into something more commercial. But I’ve just got something in me. I’ve got a real high threshold.”

Harman, whose band is composed of drummer Stephen Hodges, bassist Jeff Turmes and guitarist Joel Foy, has a dual recording career: in one, his singing and harmonica playing stay anchored in traditional blues. In the other, he puts out blues-rock albums that shoot for the kind of mainstream success achieved by such peers as Robert Cray and the Fabulous Thunderbirds. That’s the path to the “next level.”

Harman said his current level brought a lot of satisfaction in ’89. On one of his two tours of Europe, fans in the front rows at a music festival in Holland started calling out “Sweet Home Alabama James,” in honor of Harman’s Southern roots.

“Realizing that you’ve got recognition out of your country for what you’ve been doing so long, it’s just exciting,” Harman said. Back home, Harman won recognition with three nominations for the W.C. Handy Awards, the blues equivalent of the Grammys. While Harman ended up an also-ran in his categories--best miscellaneous instrumentalist, best contemporary blues album (“Extra Napkins”) and best blues band--he ran in good company with the likes of such winners as Cray, James Cotton and Albert Collins.

There is little letup ahead in 1990. Orange County-based Rivera Records will release a new album of an old Harman Band concert, “Strictly Live in ’85.” Two other albums Harman recorded in 1989 will come out on foreign labels--a Canadian release pairing him with guitarist Amos Garrett, and a French release that captures the Harman Band playing live in New York with fiddler Papa John Creach. Meanwhile, Harman will be working on more commercially oriented songs for a blues-rock album on Rhino Records.

And, of course, the road stretches on. “I can already see three European tours and at least two or three times around the United States and two or three times to Canada,” Harman said. “I guess it’s just nonstop. That’s what you get: It’s the old thing, ‘Be careful what you wish for, you might get it.’ But this is what I do. I’ve been doing it 30 years now. I can’t stop now.”

The Wild Cards

James Harman’s warning about how a musician can stagnate on the road hasn’t been lost on Adrian Remijio. Since 1988, Remijio and the Wild Cards have been touring regularly, trying to separate themselves from the cluttered pack of roots-rock contenders. From the weary but determined tone in his voice as he talks about the Wild Cards’ travels, you can tell that Remijio is already well beyond the stage where the road means glamour. Rigor is more like it for a band that spent about half its time in ’89 trying to generate a following in barrooms across the United States.

“The road is great, but that’s not what I want to do the rest of my life,” said Remijio, who still works part time as a painter and construction worker when the Wild Cards aren’t on tour. “This is what I always wanted to do, but I never wanted to be stagnant. It seems we’re stagnant right now. I want to get to bigger venues, and the only way is to write the (hit) song and get it started. We’re just trying to really concentrate on songs that will get us airplay. We want to head in a direction and just hit it.”

For the Wild Cards, whose lineup also lists singer-guitarist Jesse Reyes, drummer Jesse Sotelo Jr. and Remijio’s half-brother, Albert Farias, on bass, coming up with a radio hit could be a longer shot than it is for most. The band’s music ranges through funk, blues, jump swing and Latin salsa--a combination that makes their lively shows a delight but poses a problem when it comes to fitting into today’s straitjacketing radio formats.

As far as money is concerned, Remijio said, he was in better financial shape back when he was working the warehouse job he quit in order to travel with the Wild Cards shortly before the release of “Cool Never Cold,” their 1988 debut album for Chameleon Records.

“Going by what I used to make, it’s nowhere close,” said Remijio, whose wife works to help support a family that includes a 14-month-old son. “It makes you think sometimes, ‘What am I doing?’ But music’s not all about money. You can’t fool yourself about paying your dues.”

For Remijio, the road still holds payoffs even when the money is thin.

“When the crowd really flips, it’s ‘I’m here for a reason.’ We’re still playing new places and seeing new people. It’s always a challenge to win them over. A lot of times we play and they don’t dance but just watch. You feel you got stiffed, but then they come and ask for your autograph and want to buy albums.”

For now, Remijio reconciles his wariness of the road with the realization that it is the only path to take him where he wants to go.

“I don’t see myself out on the road playing these clubs and bars and being content. It’s very positive, but I want more. If I knew this was as far as I was going to get, I wouldn’t have quit my job. But I know that somewhere down the line, it’s going to happen. It’s discouraging at times, but you’ve got to keep on doing what you do. The only way you’re going to get anywhere is by surviving and keep on hitting it.

“After a two-month tour, if I leave the guitar alone for even one week, I’ve got to play. It feels good, I still have that want. I don’t think I’ll put it down for a long time yet.”

Big Drill Car

For Frank Daly, touring with Big Drill Car means riding around the country day after day without knowing where you’re going to sleep at night. That would be a depressing prospect for most people. But for Daly and his three band mates, it’s the path to adventure. It’s like that when you’re 22 and doing what you enjoy.

The accommodations always end up being taken care of, Daly said, usually through the kindness of strangers.

“It never ceases to amaze me how nice people are,” he said. “Usually, when you play, somebody will offer, ‘You guys can crash out on my floor and take a shower.’ It’s hand to mouth, but it’s really exciting. Everyone in the band is pretty much into it. You feel like Davy Crockett or something. You never know what you’re getting yourself into.”

Along with bassist Bob Thomson, guitarist Mark Arnold and drummer Danny Marcroft, Daly was on tour for about five months in 1989, trying to develop a following for Big Drill Car’s melodic brand of hard-edged, punk-influenced rock. Trips across the country in the spring and fall didn’t turn Big Drill Car into headliners, and the band’s travels yielded losses instead of profits. But it didn’t dim Daly’s enthusiasm for the road. Even a strange happenstance that would make some traveling bands think of giving up turned into a story that he retells with zest.

“The last show of our (fall) tour was supposed to be in St. Louis. We had to get there from northern Wisconsin. But our van broke down in Madison, Wis.”

Big Drill Car found itself facing a lost night and a big repair bill. But a strange thing happened: The owner of the car dealership where they got their van repaired decided that he would put this idled punk band to work.

“He said, ‘Business is kind of slow. I want to throw a party. I’ll get a PA system, and you guys can play in the showroom.’ We played to just the car salesmen. People were coming in to pick up their cars and walking out plugging their ears. Playing “Mag Wheels” (one of the band’s songs) in a car showroom with a picture of Lee Iacocca behind us felt like it never has before. That was definitely the weirdest thing that happened on this tour.”

Big Drill Car’s touring so far has been largely a do-it-yourself affair, without a record label to back the band with promotional push. But the band’s first label release, “Album Type Thing,” has come out (on Cruz Records), so the next time the band tours it will have a company behind it.

“Our tours have gotten progressively better,” said Daly, who works for a lithographer when he isn’t on the road with his band. “This one, we came real close to breaking even. The one before, we came home $4,000 in debt. Hopefully, the next one we can make a little money. Imagine that. It’ll be interesting to see what happens on a tour with a real label behind you. With the first record (the “Small Block” EP, which Big Drill Car put out on its own), you could pretty much count on no one having heard of the record or you.”

Big Drill Car has no problem with the idea that its road to recognition in alternative rock circles could be gradual. “Right now, it helps if we go in support” of a better-known headliner, such as label-mates All, Daly said. “And it’ll probably be that way for the next tour and the tour after that. No matter what, there’s no better thing you can do for your band than playing in front of people.”

National People’s Gang

As he spoke last week about National People’s Gang, Chad Forrello had just returned to Corona del Mar after four months on the road (a “four-month binge,” as he put it) and a night without sleep. He still managed to sound unflaggingly upbeat.

“We’ve become a better band,” the guitarist said. “The more you do it, you just start tapping into this very primordial energy. It just exudes when you start playing. It’s fun--that’s the key element. I could go out next week for another month.”

For NPG, which has released two albums for Dr. Dream records, touring is a bit more upscale than it is for the carpet crashers in Big Drill Car. The four-man band travels by motor home. “It’s very domesticated,” Forrello said. “We cook and clean and do laundry. It’s just that your house moves and has an engine in it.”

Among the strangest sights that NPG encountered on its odyssey were the billowing stage smoke and flashing lasers that accompanied the astonished band as it went on stage for the biggest show of its tour--a slot opening for the Village People (of all people) at an outdoor show for about 5,000 fans on a college campus in Hamilton, Ontario. All that flashy stage gimmickry was absurd for an alternative rock band that doesn’t go in for arena-rock conventions.

“It was hysterical,” said Chad Jasmine, NPG’s vocalist. “We have a live recording of it, and a lot of the time, I’m laughing rather than singing.”

The most satisfying moments of the tour came when the band, with bassist Deyo Glines and drummer Anthony Arvizu, saw evidence that heavy touring since 1988 has begun to build a following for NPG.

“In Lincoln, Neb., they were yelling out for songs we haven’t even recorded,” Forrello said, guessing that fans must have made bootleg tapes at a previous performance in the town, where NPG’s new “Orange” album has received extensive college radio play.

“The important thing is that it gets better and better each time you come back,” Forrello said. “As far as the money goes, eventually it’ll be more important. For now, you can walk away from the experience with nothing, and it really doesn’t matter.”

According to Jasmine, 26, the most lucrative music-making of the tour took place not on stage, but on the streets of Toronto, where he and Forrello earned $160 one day with their acoustic busking.

To Forrello, the only drawback to touring for four months straight was that NPG wasn’t able to pursue its goal of winning

recognition in Los Angeles to go with its existing base of support in Orange County and Long Beach. But if more Orange County rock bands were to go out and make a national name for themselves by touring, he said, that L.A. connection might not be quite so vital.

“There are so many bands that are complacent,” Forrello said. “It’s time to start whacking people over the head: ‘Wake up! Orange County has a lot of great music.’ The only way is to get out there and take over. I hate saying ‘South of L.A.’ when people ask us where we’re from. I want to be able to say ‘Orange County’ and be able to have people associate it with good music instead of Disneyland.”

The Orange County Music for the Needy benefit runs from noon to about midnight today at the Coach House, 33157 Camino Capistrano, San Juan Capistrano. The schedule calls for the James Harman Band to play at 3:45 p.m., National People’s Gang at 5:15, the Wild Cards at 6:45, and Big Drill Car at 9:45. The donation is $7, or an equivalent value in canned foods or unwrapped new toys. Information: (714) 496-8930.