While you were in …

I was getting into the Gear Daddies right around the time the blue collar alt-country band was disbanding. My friend Nicole offered to drive a few of us to the Gear Daddies’ final show, an outdoor concert in their home town of Austin, Minn.

I was 15 and this was a no-go for my parents, who seemingly spent my teen years waiting for me to get kidnapped. My friends went without me and of course it was the best day ever.

The next day the Rochester Post Bulletin had photographs from the show: Teenagers covered in mud. Mud-suits, practically, that went with their mud masks and mud dreadlocks. The ground was wet that day and fans had made an organic Slip ‘N Slide, which seems like a perfect way to send out the Gear Daddies.

“It was like a modern-day Woodstock,” I thought, and genuinely believed, looking at the picture. “And I missed it.”

From then on, Austin, Minn., became an intriguing, dare I say romantic, place – at least as seen through the ears of the Gear Daddies.

They painted it as a town where Bruce Springsteen might swing through, meet a hard luck girl and write a song about her. It was a place that smelled like the Hormel plant. And the Austin Pacelli basketball team was incredibly easy on the eyes. Where Rochester was sterile and suburban, Austin was real. Stuff happened there. People made music and drank beer and felt things. Then they coolly took the stage, closed their eyes and sang, heavy on twang coming from a hint of a smirk.

I bought the CD “Can’t Have Nothin’ Nice” the day I turned 19. It was ceremonial. The song “Bored and 19” is on that album. I could relate.

I wouldn’t see the Gear Daddies live until a reunion show at the Minnesota State Fair the summer I turned 30 – but I saw Martin Zellar, the band’s front man, plenty.

There were his Neil Diamond Tribute shows at O’Gara’s in St. Paul. Martin Zellar, eyes squinched closed, dimples everywhere, giving new life to “September Morn.” He played the senior concert the year I graduated from the University of St. Thomas. In the photos my bib overalls are wet with beer, I’m leaned against the stage, trying to appear in the same photo as Zellar, who was behind me with his guitar and hamming it up. My eyes are a little wild with fan adrenaline.

Then there were solo shows at O’Gara’s, and when I moved home I caught him at Aquarius Club or Rookies.

I was in the front row of a show when a kid next to me tottered a bit and began yelling “Zamboni! Play ‘Zamboni’!”

Another fan and I looked at each other, looked at the kid, looked back at each other. Eyes wide. We dove to silence him, hands over the stranger’s mouth.
“He hates that song,” we hissed. “Shut up!”

I don’t love bands the way I used to love bands. I can’t remember when that went away. I don’t collect discs and make mixes and pay attention to what is coming out of my car speakers at stop lights. (Answer: Terry Gross).

In this job I occasionally end up interviewing members of band that meant a lot to me. Bands from when I did collect discs and stick around after the show. Cracker, Toad the Wet Sprocket, Trip Shakespeare. And after the interview I always wish there was a way to beam the information back to 1992 or 1995 or 1999 and tell young me that in 2012 I’ll sit at my desk and talk to Martin Zellar for more than a half hour in a way that is cool and casual. A conversation where he admits that when he played with the Suburbs last summer during the Maritime Festival here in Duluth it was surreal because The Suburbs, whoa. In the early 1980s he used to sneak into their shows!

And I’m like, “I feel ya, brother. Take this conversation, for instance …”

*The above video is from when the Gear Daddies played David Letterman.

Today’s Faces & Names includes a bit about a young pop musician, the daughter of a Duluth native and Telly Savalas of “Kojak” fame.

The darkly funny video features Ariana Savalas coupled with the Perfect Man Eric Dane of “Grey’s Anatomy.”Ariana Savalas is the daughter of Julie formerly-Hovland and her grandparents are Gloria and George Hovland.

This video is probably NSFW (not safe for work), the young Savalas spends plenty of time in lingerie. But maybe you work someplace where that is no big. In that case, watch away.

Trampled By Turtles debuted new music this morning on The Current. If you missed that, you can leisurely point your laptop in the direction of the public radio stations all-music site and get to it when you get to it. “Alone” is posted on The Current’s website, as well as a mini 2-minute “Making of the Album” video that has plenty of Duluth faces in it.  (See above).

There is also a two-minute-ish phone convo with Dave Simonett where he talks about Nirvana and the Rolling Stones and where the music comes from. Also, honesty and staying true to oneself.

Also: on the Current Blog, a transcript of an online chat between the front man and listeners. It’s a lot of “When are you playing (fill in the blank with city)” but there is more stuff, too, if you dig.

The album is scheduled for an April 10 release date, with a show at First Ave. on April 11. No Duluth dates in the tour schedule, but Trampled does have a bit of a break at the end of April until mid-May that looks like a good place to drop a Homegrown Music Festival date.  Simonett did claim Homegrown as one of this three favorite festivals to play during the online chat. So.

Jen Bergrum (from left), Princeton, Nick Haug, Gabriel Mayfield, Nicky, Nate St. Germain and Andy Roemhildt star in ‘Avenue Q.’ Photo by Andrew Benusa, courtesy of the Duluth Playhouse.

Instead of a conventional matinee, the production of “Avenue Q” at the Duluth Play Ground is playing a bonus show at 11 p.m. on Saturdays. Don’t expect this to become a trend at the small theater, this is more about targeting the mature audience more likely to attend a late-night theater event than a mid-afternoon theater event, according to Tessa Lenneman, promotions manager at the Playhouse.

(I use the word “mature” loosely, as you are likely to find yourself cackling like a 12-year-old boy when Kate Monster and Princeton round the bases after a night of marinating in Long Island Ice Teas).

Saturday’s late show drew an audience of about 25 20-somethings — and this 30-something and her 30-something date. It was a good alternative for people who like to stare down midnight in public but aren’t in the mood to get dizzy on PBR. Of course, there is also the 7:30 p.m. show for folks who like a traditional start time.

News Tribune reviewer Lawrance Bernabo said of the musical, with music and lyrics by Robert Lopez and Jeff Marx:

It seems somewhat strange to say a show with songs about racism, unemployment and porn is “cute,” but that is the inevitable conclusion …

“Avenue Q,” directed by Priscilla McRoberts, plays at 7:30 p.m. Thur.-Sat., 11 p.m. Sat. through Feb. 11. Tickets are $20.

Artist Stephen Menart’s steel piece “Hard Top” won the People’s Choice Award for the Membership Exhibition Wednesday at the Duluth Art Institute’s Gallery Celebration.

(“Hard Top” won the People’s Choice Award and curator Annie Dugan chats with artist Stephan Menart below. Photos courtesy of the DAI. )

Menart, who has his own blacksmith shop at his home in Biwabik Township, made each part of the turtle separately and special for the show: Forging steel into legs and a tail, using an anvil and hammer to create a shell, the mouth cut with a chisel and all welded together.

The turtle was colored with a bronze patina, which Menart applied with a brush.

Menart has had pieces in the Membership Exhibition for years, favoring animals. His pieces feature walleye, dragonflies, chameleons, sea turtles, a blue heron. He’s showed his work at the Minnesota State Fair and at summer festivals where he sets up his blacksmith shop and creates pieces in front of an audience.

“It was really an honor,” he said of winning the award. “I was really surprised.”

Menart said he spent part of the exhibition hanging out near his piece.

“I kind of like to stand in the shadows and watch how many people are attracted to it,” he said. “It sat in a cluster of two or three pieces and it drew a lot of attention. People were looking at it. One guy picked it up. I’m not sure you’re supposed to do that.”

“Hard Top” didn’t have a price tag at the show, but he said it is — and all of the art he makes — is for sale.

Menart got his start in welding while working at Erie Mining Co. and LTV Steel. He jokes that this was his art school, though he had to learn to deviate from the way he did things on the job.

“I was brought up on straight lines,” he said. “I went to work as a welder and it was all straight lines. I had to allow myself to do curves before I could do artwork. That’s what freed me to do what I do today.”

Menart already has a rough plan for what he’s entering in next year’s Membership Exhibition.

“I’m plotting,” he said. “I would say I’m leaning toward a reptile, and I’m not going to tell you what it is.”

Photo swiped from Facebook.

Local band Cars & Trucks went live on Kickstarter earlier today with the hope of raising $3,000 in a month to fund the techie side of an already-written third album.

One of the keys behind waging a successful Kickstarter campaign is having a hunch that if you ask for it, the donors will come. And, well, less than six hours after posting on the all-or-nothing crowd-sourcing website, the trio is halfway to its goal. That’s some speedy money-making. As of this post, they had hit $1,706 and have 31 days to raise the rest.

(Obligatory Kickstarter background: You have a project. Your friends — and even strangers — seem to like your work. You set up shop on Kickstarter, perhaps create a motivational video, telling fans what you want to do and how much dinero you need to do it. You provide incentives to donors: Maybe a limited edition LP and a download code, a private home concert, or maybe the band’s bass player will shave off his beard and give it to you. Shrug. You decide. If you reach your monetary goal, you get the donations for your project. If you fail to reach your monetary goal, well, this never happened and no one touches the beard).

Here’s a blurb from the band’s project description:

If you have any reservations about buying an album sound unheard, just know that the band thinks the album could easily turn out to be their best one, and that it continues their tradition of making plain old hooky rock tunes. (It’s also looking like it may have tons of crazy space-out guitar solos and elongated songs with multiple sections. Just you wait.)

Warning: The video on Cars & Trucks’ Kickstarter page has a few swears and one photograph of women in swimsuits. Watch in an appropriate setting. If you’re already in an appropriate setting, then enjoy Jody Kujawa wearing .. Members Only?

Note: If you are a person who likes to support local projects, it is easy to search Kickstarter for things happening in your neighborhood. Other local projects currently posted include two guys who want to bike around the Great Lakes and make a documentary about it and two guys who want to kayak around Lake Superior and make a film about it.

The staff at Glensheen recently re-unearthed in the attic of the mansion film footage of the Congdon family trips and time spent at home. These videos have been digitized, and some of them are posted on the historic estate’s YouTube channel.

“It’s been amazing to see,” said Lori Melton, Glensheen’s director of marketing. “We’re such fanatics about anything related to the history of Glensheen. To actually see the trips we’ve read about or the family members interacting with each other has been incredible.”

The site has three videos, including footage from a trip to Egypt, a trip to France and a trip to Tucson.

Congdon history buffs like former tour manager Amy Degerstrom have viewed the footage and tried to date it according to period fashions, journal entries by family members and the style of film used to shoot the footage.

Degerstrom said in an analysis that the Paris footage is likely from the 1910s, early 1920s. The films from Brest, France, show hats with ribbons that indicate a special holiday or Sunday services were held that day.

Josiah Grover, a film student who was on staff at the mansion, wrote that the footage from France was filmed by someone experienced and knowledgeable about films, as the person has a steady hand and is able to understand the intricacies of a hand-crank camera. It could be a copy that Chester requested from someone traveling with the family, or it could be by someone in the family.

Footage from Tucson is from the early 1940s and the description information says that Helen Congdon lived in Tucson and that Elisabeth would go there to paint with David Erickson.

Melton said there are two more videos that could be added to the site. One would require permission from the family, the other would need editing.

Today’s mail brings the new CD by the local space lounge band Tangier 57, “It is People” complete with a link to the band’s first video for the album.

In this video for “There is a World” you will see Darin Bergsven (AKA Thurston) struggling with a mustard packet in the food court. You will also see him travel out of the food court in a flying plastic cup of nacho cheese. Heads explode into cheesy debris, etc. The collective creativity of this band is enough that I’m surprised they aren’t all sitting on Mars drinking Mai Tais as we speak.

You can catch Tangier 57 live at the Duluth Art Institute’s Gallery Celebration. They play from 6:30 p.m.-7:30 p.m. Wednesday at the Depot. Free and open to the public.

This video is a fantastic way to spend less than 3 minutes of your day.

It is no secret that Duluth digs its geeks. Geek Prom, the every-other-yearly event in which attendees dress in their finest taped glasses and Star Wars formal wear, was invented here. And Nerd Nite, held monthly-ish at Teatro Zuccone, draws a crowd of regulars just dying to learn more about superheroes and monster movies.

Nerd Nite magazine, a way of connecting Nerd Nite fans from around the world, debuted recently and includes an article by local Nerd Nite emcee Crystal Pelkey (who reads aloud from “The Notebook” when the audience gets restless) has an article in it “A Nerd Nite Boss’s Guide to Duluth Minnesota.” In it she bills the city as a one with more nerds per capita than any other city.

The two-page spread includes nine nerdy facts about the city, including the “Three quadrillion gallons of freshwater,” manuscript gazing at The Karpeles Manuscript Library Museum, winter surfing and something called “freighter porn.”

The issue also includes a look at jumpsuit fashions, art forgeries and a guide to finding the perfect romance novel. (Play your cards right and you could land on “Sharon Kendrick’s “The Playboy Sheikh’s Virgin Stable-Girl.”)

Pelkey and fellow host Jeremy Nilson are also featured in the Nerd Love section, a sort of singles column with 11 eligible nerds from around the country. (“I’ve won hug awards,” says Pelkey. “My nerd cred includes being interviewed by the Minneapolis evening news for camping in line for four days to get tickets to “Star Wars: Episode 1″ says Nilson).

The magazine is published in Brooklyn by Joshua Wolfe.

Bridger Zadina on Thursday’s episode of ABC’s “Grey’s Anatomy.”

Bridger Zadina was back on prime time TV on Thursday night as the victim of a car accident on the ABC medical drama “Grey’s Anatomy.” The young actor, locally grown-turned-Los Angeles resident, is first seen bumped up and horizontal on a deserted road. His family is part of a car accident involving an ambulance, a baby that needs an organ transplant, and a bad storm. Zadina’s character, Michael, makes it to the ER, thanks to the multitasking abilities of doctors Meredith Grey and Alex Karev. His character’s mom, dad and grandma don’t fare as well. Although the sister who gets it in the eyeball with a hefty shard of glass will probably live to tell the tale.

Zadina has had a few of these gigs, including “Law & Order: SVU,” “CSI: NY” and “Criminal Minds.” He also had a major role in the indie flick “Terri,” a cast that included John C. Reilly. In it, Zadina played an outcast misfit who compulsively yanks hair out of his head. “Terri” played at Zinema 2 in the latter half of 2011 and Zadina attended the opening and did a Q&A.

The full episodes of “Grey’s Anatomy” can be seen on abc.com.

*Photo taken from screen grab from ABC TV.