Arcata seems to be spawning at this time of the year. New bands are emerging every week. Well one of the latest births is a trio by the name of "The Craze."

Michelle: Do you just want to do a personal intro for each of you and your missing drummer?
Danny: I'll do Joe's first. He's a drum major at HSU. Far as we know he's from Petaluma. He plays all kinds of good stuff.
Damian: He's on the rugby team as well.
Danny: I'm Danny, and I'm a student at HSU as well. I play bass in the band.
Damian: I'm Damian, and I'm from New Mexico. I just moved here last summer. I play guitar, sing, and write most of the songs. Danny does some singing too.
Michelle: I only heard of "The Craze" just recently when you called me up to drop off that demo tape. What's kind of the band's history?
Damian: When I moved up here I tried to start a band right when I got here in August. I hooked up with Danny pretty quickly. But, it took us a long time to find a drummer. We went through a number of guitar players too because for awhile we had a second guitar player. We never played any shows with them though. By the time we actually found the members we have now, it was about two months ago.
Danny: Damian and I have been playing for about six months.
Damian: Yeah. We've only had three shows so far as far as with the three of us. We've played the Manila Community Center, Crown Pub and the Kate Buchanan Room.
Michelle: You guys seem to have the right motivation, is there any place that's at the top of your list of places to play?
Danny: The Vista probably. We'd like to play the Jacoby Storehouse as well because its one of the few venues in Arcata. I want to play the Plaza Grill because its hard to get into a venue in Arcata where there's drinking. It seems that people have a little more fun at the shows where there's beer. You seem to get more of a turn out as well. I mean no one wants to drive out to Manila.
(waitress comes over for coffee)
Damian: One thing I have to say though is that this area sucks for drummers. There seems to be an extreme scarcity of drummers.
Michelle: It's true.
Danny: We were pretty lucky to find such a skilled drummer such as ours. Joe can pretty much play anything we ask him too, twice over. We're a trio which is cool. I like that idea. It means a lot less gear to carry around and a lot less bickering at each other. There's only two other people to bitch at.
Michelle: Ok, so where's one place that we could typically find each of you guys?
Danny: I'm always at work. Sacred Grounds, the coffee shop.
Damian:I guess I frequent Muddy Waters a lot because I live up the street from there. Other than that, I can be seen playing the guitar on the street by the bars a lot. Earning beer.
Danny: I'm sure you could find our drummer either on the rugby field or far above planet earth.
Michelle: Have you met Guitar Dan(musician who frequents the plaza a lot)?
Damian: Yeah, he gets pretty mad at me for being down there. I think he feels I'm invading his territory or something.
Michelle: I like Guitar Dan, he shows up at a lot of the Plaza Grill shows. One time he performed there actually. Ok, so what was kind of the thing that got each of you started in music?
Danny: I picked up bass first because my older brother played guitar. He taught me everything I know. So I just started up playing with him and my dad. That was in Shasta County, so there was really no one else to play with. Then I came up here and started playing with other people. My roots expanded.
Damian: I pretty much have always been looking for different avenues to express myself. I went through a pretty big phase in high school where I wanted to do visual arts like painting and stuff. Graphics and things. I did that for a long time. I started playing guitar when I was in ninth grade or so. I kept playing guitar, but I never took it really seriously until I got to college. I never had any formal training in terms of music at all. I took one music theory class but it didn't really click with me becuase it was all directed towards piano. I had this teacher who was this crazy Russian woman who didn't speak any English. She was an amazing musician but I didn't really get much from the class because I could barely understand us. She would get really frustrated with us and kinda freak out. For a long time, I also wanted to write. I did a lot of short stories and started working on a novel. But, that I could never stick with. I never had the patience for it. I think that's why I went with music because it was more immediately rewarding. When you perform its instant payback. If you submit a story somewhere and get it published, you never ever see your readers' faces as they read it. You never see their reaction. When in playing music, you see that right away.
Michelle: I totally see that with the magazine though. The other night I was at some show, and I was watching various people pick up the mag and start laughing over something and then bring it over to their friend. I almost wanted to see what exactly they were reading.
Danny: That's what I was looking for earlier, the feedback from the music. In my high school it was really discouraging to play guitar and bass and what not. I thought it was going to get me a girlfriend, but instead they just laughed at me.
Michelle: (laughs) The whole, "I'm in a band" line?
Danny: Not even that, just "I am a person that plays guitar" and they just kind of laughed and kicked me to the goal post.
Michelle: (laughs) So what has the reception been like at your shows?
Danny: We've had an incredible turn out at our shows but that can be good or bad because we flyer like mad and tell all of our friends. Even just people I've seen once or twice, I'll tell them,"Please come to our shows, for the love of god please come to our shows." At the last show, people came up to me and said that they were totally into our band and that they've never heard anything like us in Arcata before. I don't know if that's true or not. But I appreciate it.
Damian: I think I've been really happy with the turn out we've had so far, not even really the turn out in terms of numbers, but in the response we've had. It's definitely a vote of confidence for us. Last Tuesday our show at the Manila Community Center, it was our third show and I think it was our best show. I mean obviously you improve as you do it. I talked to this guy Jakob who works there and he said that we filled that place up more than it had been in a long time. So that was cool. Manila's weird. I'd never been out there before but there's chickens in everybody's lawn and stuff.
Danny: That could be cool though. That place is spooky though. Swingsets swinging and no one's on them.
Michelle: So from your three shows, have you established any pre-show rituals.
Danny: Getting beer, practice and we're there. It's been a real rush. Before a show, I'm a real wreck. It's like, "Oh, are we going to do this right?"
Damian: It's been pretty stressful. Not to put our drummer down, but he usually has rugby practice after school and so far we haven't played any weekend shows because of that too.
Michelle: Do you think there is an equation to be successful as a band?
Danny: Yeah, well not an equation so much as a strategy. You got to put on the social engineering. You've got to smile and work hard and tell people about yourself. Look them in the eye. Speak from the diaphragm.
Damian: I don't think there's an equation. For me, I think I'm moody enough where I'll be totally different on any given day. Some days I won't want to talk to anybody. For me, I don't think there's an equation. Just do what your heart tells you and try to promote yourself in a good way.
Danny: I think one thing for sure is that you've gotta be confident about your music. During our Denny's show, we weren't sure of what price to charge when they were asking us how much we wanted to get paid. This and that. We're confident enough that we're good enough to play any venue around here. We're totally willing and able to do that.
Michelle: What do you think is the main thing about the band that attracts audiences to you?
Danny: I just think its really good music. We attract a younger crowd. Most of my friends aren't 21 yet. They haven't gone to see most of the other bands around here like Foster Kids or Crimewave, so it seems like they're moving up in the music world.
Damian: For me its hard to say because I'm pretty wrapped up into the music myself. In terms of I'm writing most of the lyrics and the music and then we're adapting it from there. For me I throw it out there and hope people like it. I don't necessarily know what about they may like, because it's pretty personal. It's not like I'm bleeding my heart out on the stage...
Michelle: But, you're still putting yourself out on a limb. So do you guys have any phobias of something that might go wrong at a show?
Danny: If we did, it's already happened. Actually at our last show, one of my batteries for my cordless guitar thingy ran out. I think that's why it sounded like shit. That was one of my big phobias, and its past me now. We're learning to roll with the punches pretty well.
Damian: Yeah, we've had everything go wrong already.
Danny: He breaks twenty strings a day. He's all "Lenny Savage" on his guitar.
Damian: I've already forgotten lyrics in the middle of a song. We've pretty much had everything that could go wrong go wrong but still even when breaking a string, we've done a really good job of recovering from that.
Danny: At least we don't have any drug problems.
Damian: Well...not too many drug problems. (laughter)
Michelle: Yeah, I was just talking about that with Blackball, the other band I interviewed. They were talking of how its gotten in the way of a lot of their friend's futures.
Danny: I think we've never played a show sober.
Michelle: Well, I think there's a happy medium.
Danny: Everytime I get on stage even if I have had a couple beers before, by the time I get on stage, it's already gone by the time I see the crowd.
Damian: Just sobered up by it. Drugs...(laughs) I don't know if I want to go down that road right now... There's so much to say about that and so much not to say...
Michelle: Is there a certain goal that you have for the band?
Danny: CD, maybe.
Damian: Yeah, we talked about going into a studio and trying to get something recorded.
Danny:Not so much for marketing but as too have something later down the road so we can look back and say, "I was
in a band, and it was pretty good."
Damian: I've pretty much played in bands before in high school and what not. I played in a lot of shitty bands and pretty much bands that just sucked. But, we had a lot of fun doing it. This is the first band that I've been capable enough and willing to express my own voice through music. In the past, I was good enough to play rhythm guitar and do really simple shit and yell punk labels. But now for me I kind of see it as progress in my own musical career. I see it as a good thing whether or not this band itself has lofty goals or not. I think its a good thing for all of us.
Danny: This is my first band, so I'm pretty naive about it all. But, it's as fun as hell though.
Michelle: Do you think there's any kind of glue that holds the band together.
Danny: Yeah, we're all really good friends. That's pretty much the biggest glue that I know of. We like the same music.
(At this point, I comment on how Danny is going overboad on sugar and cream.)
Danny: It's a nervous habit.
Damian: You have to remember that he works at a coffee shop.
Michelle: Yeah, I was just about to ask if there's anything that kind of your staple in this world?
Damian: Coffee, beer and cigarettes. It's bad. It's a horrible diet.
Michelle: Is there anything that you want to leave with Humboldt County?
Danny: I wanted to say that if you can get people together to form a band, you're probably most likely going to get a show around here? So I wouldn't be discouraged on how good you are or not. As long as you're playing coherent songs.
It's pretty easy to just get out there and do it.
Damian: I think Humboldt County in general smokes too much pot and makes people pretty boring. I don't think pot is bad at all. I don't even really want to go off about pot anymore. I think the weather sucks. I think it ought to dry up.
Michelle: Kind of get some seasons in there.
Damian: Yeah, get a couple seasons instead of just four of Autumn. It gets old.
Danny: There's some good ass coffee in Humboldt County.
Damian: Yeah, I don't mean to bitch. I shouldn't go too far. (laughter)

Contact: Damian: 707.826.0763
Danny: 707.826.1099