Guster: Three Men and a Band (Throwback Thursday)
The Empire Hotel is located on the lower edge of New York City’s Upper West Side, a few blocks west of Central Park and in the shadow of Lincoln Center. It also plays a prominent role in the pop culture television phenomenon Gossip Girl and the show’s fingerprints are all over the Empire’s lobby bar – from a list of specialty cocktails to a full house of ritzy guests hoping to live out a Gossip Girl experience. It’s the perfect backdrop for an interview with a self-proclaimed “major label pop band” like Guster aiming to capture the Gossip Girl demographic.
Even though two Gossip Girl stars were recently spotted at one of their shows, the members of Guster are oblivious to their surroundings – more concerned with talking about blogger buzz bands than rubbing elbows with any high profile guests. And despite the fact that their first album in more than four years is due in just a few short weeks – 2010’s infectious, radio-ready indie pop opus Easy Wonderful – none of the principal members of Guster are fully in promo mode either.
The band’s muscular, square jawed baritone singer/guitarist Adam Gardner is firing off e-mails on his smart phone about Reverb, an environmental nonprofit he started with his wife in 2004 that helps green concert tours for artists such as Jack Johnson, Maroon 5 and Dave Matthews Band.
Slim, bearded drummer Brian Rosenworcel’s thoughts move elegantly from sarcastic comments about the Empire’s steep drink prices to a local Brooklyn bar he recommends for to the gentrification of Lower Manhattan.
Ever personable frontman/guitarist Ryan Miller is regaling the group with a story about a recent Spoon show that ends with a somewhat sincere proclamation that Guster should end each of its shows with a giant rock star kick move like Brit Daniels.
All three musicians are also more than happy to play a “degrees of separation” game for the music industry that connects the dots between Guster, The String Cheese Incident, Fiery Furnaces and Miller’s current obsession Yo Gabba Gabba! Answer: Mike Luba (the band’s former booking agent).
In fact, from their casual demeanor to their matter of fact eye rolls at the bar’s yuppie clientele, you’d never suspect that the musicians comprise three-fourths of a group that is about to enter its third decade of existence. Guster is a major label alternative rock band that has faced a number of rock’s clichéd hurdles – label problems, loss of a band member and numerous stylistic fads – in the past two years. Instead, they interact like any other group of Brooklyn dads in their late 30s – which makes sense since both Miller and Rosenworcel live in the borough with their wives and young children. (the newest addition to the band, Luke Reynolds, is also based in Brooklyn while Gardner used to live in New York with his family before he relocated to Maine.)
Guster is one of the few original grassroots bands that truly harnessed the power of the Internet in the ‘90s that still tours regularly and records for a major label. The band has managed to deliver four successful major label albums in nearly ten years while maintaining a strong following and – almost as impressive – winning over countless new fans since the group formed in 1991. In that time, the group has shed many personas, including not-quite accurate descriptions as folk troubadour, jamband stalwart, mainstream pop act and quirky indie group. On the eve of its twentieth anniversary, Guster can still pack 2,000-plus rooms in markets across the country.
“Look at all these bands that came out with these promising first records and disappeared into the ether because there’s no momentum anymore,” Miller declares. “You have to earn it every single time. You don’t get a pass to make a third record if you make a great first record and a mediocre second record. You have to earn it every fucking time.”
The original members of Guster first met on a wilderness trip during their freshman orientation at Massachusetts’ Tufts University in 1991 and started playing music together a few weeks later. The group’s early sound was rudimentary – two acoustic guitars and a bongo – but it laid the groundwork for the melodic, independent-minded pop that the band has explored for almost 20 years.
After cutting their teeth on the Boston coffee shop circuit and through free gigs in Harvard Square, the band members self-released their first album, Parachute, in 1995. Following graduation, the trio slowly cultivated a loyal following at clubs like New York’s Wetlands Preserve, thanks to several grassroots tools: a lively tape trading network, numerous interactive fan rituals and humorous stage banter.
The band added electric guitars to its musical palette on 1997’s Goldfly and worked with producer Steve Lillywhite (Dave Matthews Band, U2, Phish) to massage its 1999 major label debut for Sire Records, Lost & Gone Forever, into a collection of well-produced, road-ready pop songs like the band’s first hit “Fa Fa.”
Guster put its ardent fans to work, too: through its forward-thinking “Rep Program,” the group allowed them to sell its albums directly to their friends – and in exchange, the band rewarded their efforts with stickers, rep-only CDs and free shows (as well as band-branded secret nicknames). The program served as the training wheels for a
future generation of music industry tastemakers who got an early introduction of how to promote bands (see sidebar).
Though the band never improvised musically, Guster’s organic sound and commitment to making each show a unique experience placed the group squarely on the mid-‘90s H.O.R.D.E.-era jamband circuit. Shows and/or collaborations with Phil Lesh & Friends, Phish’s Page McConnell, moe., Widespread Panic, Galactic and Karl Denson reinforced the connection. In many ways, the group fell through critical cracks because its hybrid of introspective songwriting and high-energy performance was too ahead of its time in an era where indie music was reserved for pasty record store clerks and exploratory jambands dominated the festival circuit.
“It had more to do with the club we grew up playing and that we made our money touring,” Miller says of the misapplied jamband tag. “Bonnaroo helped break down those barriers and, now, I think a lot of people who grew up listening to Phish and Guster check BrooklynVegan every day – I mean, I do.” And in a 2000 Jambands.com interview, Gardner described Guster’s sound as “a taste of pop” for the jamband crowd.
When Guster retreated into the studio to make 2003’s Keep It Together, the musicians threw out the rule book and fleshed out their hallmark instrumentation with bass, keyboards and, most surprisingly, a full drum kit. The band also embraced its current modern rock influences – with the assistance of Yo La Tengo producer Roger Moutenot and Miller’s old friend Ben Kweller – to the point that one of the band’s former publicists encouraged Miller by saying, “[Ryan], you’re finally making albums you’d listen to” without losing the band’s trademark sound. Rosenworcel echoed that sentiment in a 2004 interview by affirming, “I don’t want to be playing ‘Fa Fa’ when I’m 40.”
Guster’s core members also brought in multi-instrumentalist Joe Pisapia to help interpret the band’s new sound onstage. Pisapia – a well-respected producer who has since worked with singer/songwriter Josh Rouse – grew into a fulltime member of the band and helped bring Guster’s sound into the post-jam indie era. (Little known fact: Miller asked future Wilco member Pat Sansone to join the band before Pisapia and he appears on the B-side “Say That to My Face.” )
While Guster’s new sound alienated some of the band’s aging fans, the group’s audience replenished itself in part through prominent placement in movies like Life Is a House and Wedding Crashers as well as the band’s continued focus on college markets. “It’s the kiss of death when your fan base grows old with you,” Miller says while stroking his curly beard on a coach at the Empire. “That’s why playing colleges has been really important to us – just to make sure that we keep putting new life blood into it. Tons of bands have seen their audience get older and stop going to shows.”
The next act of the group’s career culminated with 2006’s Ganging Up on the Sun, a fully-realized pop album more akin to The Shins’ dreamy Garden State crossover hits than the roots-oriented pop characteristic of Guster’s early contemporaries Push Stars, Rusted Root and From Good Homes. “We’re very proud of Ganging Up on the Sun,” Rosenworcel says with a smile. “We produced that record ourselves and tried on a lot of [musical] costumes. Some worked more than others but we proved that we could produce an album ourselves.”
In late 2007, after more than a decade of hard touring, the members of Guster decided to take their first formal break from the road. With the exception of a low profile benefit gig for President Obama at the Music Hall of Williamsburg, the entire band did not perform together from October 2007 until March 2009. During that time, Miller, Gardner and Rosenworcel each welcomed their first children ( “Now’s the time in Guster when we make babies,” Rosenworcel joked on the band’s website in 2008). Miller wrote music for a friend’s indie film while Rosenworcel hung out with young rock bands like Sam Champion (whose debut album he produced). Gardner spent countless hours working with Reverb – he’d walk to the company’s office everyday and promote the non-profit at shows across the country. In 2007, he even testified before Congressmen Edward J. Markey, Chairman of the Select Committee on Energy Independence, on the importance of biodiesel fuel. Meanwhile, Pisapia built a home studio in Nashville, Tenn.
The band members checked in with each other periodically and, after a period of time, sketched out some song ideas. In December of 2008, Guster started pre-production for a new album with noted producer David Kahne in New York. “We have families now, so no one really wanted to take the helm this time around,” admits Rosenworcel, who says the group was hoping for a big pop sound that “isn’t very Relix-y.” But the sessions quickly went south.
“We actually love a big production but the specific David Kahne production just wasn’t germane to what we’re about,” he continues. “His ideas were good – but his over-dubbing isn’t what we were about. He’s not good at working with bands. He would be more ideal working with a solo artist who needed direction.”
Miller interjects: “We didn’t have enough of a rapport – a dialogue – to sort through the process. We ended up having all of his ideas on there, which really killed us.”
Rosenworcel goes one step further with his bluntness: “Kahne’s credits say he worked with The Strokes and Regina Spektor but really they should say he made the worst Strokes album and made Regina sound more processed. He was the man who dropped Wilco – I should have said, ‘We’re out of here’ from the beginning. He could have complemented us well if he had the ability to co-produce this with us and interact with us in ways that just weren’t possible for him and where he is in his life.”
The band aborted the sessions and spent a few months in limbo. To complicate matters, the group also left its longtime label, Warner Bros., and signed with Universal. This period of confusion resulted in somewhat of a State of the Union for the band.
“We were really on our backs about how to proceed and what voices to listen to – it was a real defining moment for Guster 3.0,” Miller says. “Shit was the worst it had ever been so Brian and I went to [Brooklyn bar/venue] The Bell House to talk one night about the basics – like if we even want to make music together anymore. I sat down and said, ‘I just wanna start by saying I wanna keep making music together.’ I think bands have to that gut check periodically.”
The conversation opened up the band’s creative flood gates as Miller started working on a handful of new songs while fleshing out the best material from the Kahne sessions. The group then headed into Pisapia’s studio record what would become 2010’s Easy Wonderful.
“We shut out the record label, we shut out management – we didn’t think about singles and just made a record we could stand behind,” Miller says. “Before, we were too concerned with what other people thought and that’s a dangerous way to make music.”
Gardner adds: “The good news is the bones of the songs were healthy. A lot of it was just pulling away some of the bullshit that was on top.”
Easy Wonderful, the resulting album, is both the group’s most accessible release and a natural progression of the melodies and themes that Guster has explored since the ‘90s. A far cry from the guitar-bongo jams of the band’s early days, the record nods to everything from Ben Folds to Devo, while Miller and Rosenworcel’s lyrics tackle some of the group’s usual themes: relationships, religion and self-realization. The album contains some rawer moments, too: “When I recorded this one vocal part, I said, ‘You guys cool with this? ‘Cause I’m missing a lot of notes in this one,” Miller recounts. “It is a new thing for us – making sure our mistakes are in there, too.” The album also includes high energy banjo romps ( “This Is How It Feels to Have a Broken Heart” ), breezy almost acoustic moments ( “That’s No Way to Get to Heaven” ), adventurous melodic pop ( “On the Ocean” ), electronic experimentations ( “Jesus and Mary” ) and straight-up radio candy “Do You Love Me” ).
“Though it’s still a little all over the place, Easy Wonderful is consistent and plays through as an album,” Rosenworcel assesses. “It strikes you as an upbeat pop record – first and foremost – which I’m excited about.”
As the group ramped up for Easy Wonderful’s release, the band received another major blow when Pisapia left Guster to write, record and produce k.d. Lang’s forthcoming album in his new studio. “When I saw Joe’s new studio for the first time, my first thought was, ‘Shit, we are going to lose him,’” Miller admits. “It was the manifestation of his dream. He gave it his all with us for seven years but I knew his heart was never on the road. I knew someone was going to make an offer that he couldn’t turn down to go play Pittsburgh with Guster. He and k.d. hit it off on this spiritual level – they had a five-hour conversation about life and the universe and spirituality before they even wrote a note.”
Before announcing Pisapia’a departure, the group hired multi-instrumentalist Luke Reynolds – formally of the jam pop band Blue Merle – as his replacement. “Joe’s quote was, ‘I still wanna be part of the family, I just don’t wanna live in the house,’” continues Gardner, who is quick to point out that the band recently crashed with Pisapia after a show in Nashville.
“It was very disappointing in the sense that Joe’s a difficult guy to replace,” Rosenworcel adds. “The only silver lining, to me, is that the guy that we all chose – Luke – is a perfect fit.”
Despite its turbulent recording sessions, Easy Wonderful peaked at number 22 on Billboard Top 200 chart and has already spawned the upbeat single “Bad Bad World.” Guster supported the album with month-long tours on both coasts, including the aforementioned sold-out show at New Year’s Beacon Theatre. In conjunction with the album’s release, the band also put out music videos for each of Easy Wonderful’s 12 tracks. In addition to several noted filmmakers, the group also asked fans to contribute to the project. Perhaps the icing on the cake: the group recently recorded an episode of Darryl’s House, a performance-based Internet show that sees artists collaborating with Yacht Rock god Daryl Hall of Hall & Oates fame.
“I am not super worried about the initial reception of Easy Wonderful because it’s a grower,” Miller says confidently. “I think all of our albums are.”
While Guster still has the support of both a major label and a respected management company, in certain ways, the group has gone back to the basics by relying on its close network of friends and supporters who have served as the band’s bedrock since the beginning.
“We started employing our friends to help with different projects or ideas,” Gardner explains. “When it came time make an iPhone app, I knew a guy. Brian knew a guy to help with some video work – we knew a photographer for a shoot…We were able to keep it more in the family and realized that we’ve been doing this a long time and have a lot of talented friends.”
Ironically, the band released Easy Wonderful through the Universal Records affiliate Aware – a former indie label that actually helped distribute the band’s music on a sampler early on before entering into an agreement with Universal in 1997.
Looking ahead, the band members plan to continue touring and recording while spending time with their ever-expanding families. “The mantra is to tour smarter – which is basically less, and more efficiently,” Miller says. “I don’t think we’re as into trying to develop places like Montana as new markets like we once were. It’s so hard to plan for the future – even in a band like ours. The entire industry has changed; you can’t just do this or that and make enough money to quit your day job. You have to earn every single record you make – and I feel like we will earn another – but I guess we’ll have to see how it all plays out.”
“You get to a point where you can’t release an album unless you think it’s your best one,” Rosenworcel says. “For us, it would be heartbreaking – we wouldn’t be able to get behind an album at this point unless all of us thought this is the album. It may take a few batches of songs to get to that point, but it is an important step to keep everyone motivated on tour.” “Sometimes – especially now – I don’t feel like we are a very contemporary band,” Miller concludes. “We’re not gonna get invited to play a Vice [Magazine] party, and we may not even get a review on Pitchfork.com. It’s tough because I like a lot of bands in those worlds but, I also think it’s kind of cooler that we’re outside of that whole thing. We may not sound very 2010 or 2011 but in five years, people can still listen to our albums and they’ll sound like they’re of the moment.”