| Whoever said, "Don't look back" was dead wrong. In their new Drive-Thru Records CD The Rocking Chair Years, the New Jersey-based quartet Day At The Fair takes a long and defiant look back at days of emptiness, nights of drunkenness, love gone south and dreams grown wild. The result is an album of original songs sure to have an impact on the state of the rock ‘n’ roll union.
After the success of the band's debut CD The Prelude, many expected great things from DATF and with the new album they do not disappoint. One change is the addition of bassist Todd Maisano, which allowed Rob Heiner to return to playing guitar. "For the longest time, [lead singer Chris Barker] would record with my guitar," says Heiner, "and when we got the idea to go to a four-piece, Chris said he would do it one condition: he gets to keep playing my guitar."
That was the easy part. Teaming up with producers John Naclario (Brand New, Ataris, Matchbook Romance, Steel Train) and Chris Badami (The Early November, The Starting Line, Midtown), the band stretched itself musically and lyrically far beyond the predictable borders of the sophomore effort.
"The songs came to me over an extended period of time," says Barker, who also writes the songs. "The theme of record is looking back nostalgically on the last few years of my life. We looked at the tracks and wanted them to go backwards in time."
That’s just what they did. The songs are sequenced in a kind of reverse order, with the underlying story line working its way backwards. The CD kicks off with the wistful title track, a song that "explains what the record is," says Barker. "It sums up everything. When we're older we’re gonna be looking back on this."
Next up, "Coda" (a term that refers to a musical finale), a hard-rocking celebration of self-acceptance, something that usually comes only after a few years of hard living. But, as Chris says with a laugh, "We’re through growing up."
"And My Name’s Dignan, So What?," "Who You Gonna Believe, Me or Your Lying Eyes" and the acoustic-flavored "This is Why We Don’t Have Nice Things" are three musical CAT scans of bad relationships ("I can’t sit here listening/To how bad you want to pave the way/To drink yourself like Hemingway"). Comments Barker: "You get stabbed in the back and it hurts, but then you realize the person was never a friend to begin with."
"Eastern Homes and Western Hearts" is about leaving home and finding peace on the open road. The CD also includes two haunting tracks – "Pale in Comparison" and "Lost and Lucky" – about the suicide of a friend, while "Erasing Wilks" captures that impulse to get the hell out of the hometown. "It was about Wilks-Barre (Penn.) where we lived for a while," recalls Chris. "It was nothing but malls, bars and miserable people. But the song is about anyplace people loathe."
The wry and brooding "Darkness Washed Over the Dude" recounts hard times of self-medication with drugs and alcohol, while "Everything I Ever Wanted" is a hopeful, forward-looking rocker. The album ends at the beginning, with "Monday Morning," an optimistic spring-like tune that ties it all together.
To write the songs, Barker had to reconnect with his own past, a task he completed in novel ways. "I'd dig out old pictures, old letters, old e-mails," he says. "My favorite show as a kid was ‘The Wonder Years.’ I watched every episode just to get into the zone."
Being that the band members still live in the Jersey town of Jefferson, where they grew up, it might not have been so hard. Chris and Rob have known each other since high school; Rob and Steve go back to grade school, and all can attest to the sleepy small town vibe of Jefferson. "It’s pretty much like any other town," says Chris. "People complain saying there’s nothing to do, but then you go to other places and realize you might not have it that bad."
The band grew up listening to bands like The Lemonheads, Soul Asylum, Dinosaur Jr., and The Cure, which paved the way to pop punk bands like Sicko, The Dead Milkmen and Zoinks. Later favorites included Miineral, Ben Folds Five, Wilco, Knapsack, Trusty etc.
Adds Rob: "I remember sitting on the dock at Lake Hopatcong playing acoustic guitars with Chris and having these stupid conversations." They couldn’t have been too stupid. Dreaming of recording their own music, the two would cut school to go to New York (about an hour away) and plot their eventual escape.
Chris made it out first. He enjoyed early success with the band Lanemeyer, which joined the Warped Tour and played all over the country. However, there was a catch. "None of us liked each other," laughs Chris, "and when we were about to sign, I moved to California to get my head straight."
That was when Chris and Drive-Thru Records founders Richard Reines and Stefanie Reines first worked together, though not in the way Chris might have liked. “When I was in Lanemeyer, I met Richard and Stefanie,” he recalls. “We became friends after that, and when I moved to California, they asked me if I had any office skills. I lied through my teeth claiming that I did, and was offered a job at Drive-Thru. I pictured a bunch of people hanging out in an office, opening fan mail, listening to music and looking at porno on the internet. I was sadly mistaken when I realized that I actually had to wake up at a certain time, and do a job.”
Turns out Chris eventually became Drive-Thru’s officially designated "second worst employee they ever had," and the Reineses’ reluctantly fired him. That turned out to be a blessing in disguise. "I still wanted to do a band," he recalls, "but everybody was so lazy. I ended up calling Rob and said, ‘If I come home, could we do this?"
The answer was a resounding yes. He returned to Jersey in 2001 where Chris and Rob promptly recorded four new tracks in Rob’s bathroom. That was the beginning of Day At The Fair.
Drummer Steve Weir signed on and they hit the ground touring, playing their first two gigs on the 2002 Warped Tour. A short time later, L.A. indie label Springman Records in L.A signed the trio, leading to their debut CD and a couple of U.S. tours. "We made no money," says Chris, "but we bought a bus for $800, met a lot of cool people and booked our own shows."
Though they drew plenty of positive response, DATF was looking for a better home. "We got our CD to Richard and Stefanie at Drive-Thru," remembers Chris. "I called them every day to get them to listen. Finally, we went to L.A. and said, “‘Let’s go bother Richard and Stefanie.’ Fortunately, they loved the music."
Just as fortunate, DATF quickly evolved into a first rate band, playing incisive songs with the kind of punch and fury that commands attention. For the new album, with its strings, bad-ass twin guitar work and ambitious structure, DATF challenged themselves as never before.
"We knew we didn’t want to make a record of 14 songs that sounded exactly the same," notes Rob. "So all our choruses tie everything together with a catchy feel. Chris isn’t gonna bring a song to the table unless it’s top notch."
Adds Chris: "We don’t try to subject ourselves to genres. Songs come from feelings and come out the way they are. We don’t paint ourselves into a corner."
Actually, with the new album out and a year’s worth of touring ahead of them, there are no corners in sight for Day At The Fair. Just open road and clear skies. Says Rob: "We worked so hard for so long, there’s no part of this we take for granted. But this is definitely the best thing any of us have ever done."
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