Three Stars: Fever

Could you explain to me a little bit about the roots of Fever?

AC: Me and Justin moved to D.C., I actually moved here a little bit after him, with the intent to start a band.

Where are you from?

AC: North Carolina. So, we moved here didn’t know anybody. Looked for people to start a band with. Met a guy named Karl Southgate, who, is a good buddy of ours.
JR: He’s in The Coats now.
AC: So, the three of us, me, Justin and Karl, started a band. Got going. Went with the name Fever. That went on for awhile, all of 2007, the first part of it. Then we added Chris at the end of the year.
CD: I joined in like September '07 and then in about October '07, we had a sort of, break-up session.
AC: We weren’t headed in the way that we’d planned. We wanted to start a band and we did it and succeeded and we started playing our shows a lot and really got rolling and even exemplified by we were going at it as we were starting to figure things out.
CD: It’s like if you build a big building on a bad foundation. A cracked foundation. Something wasn’t jiving. So they needed to demolish that building. Rebuild the foundation which is where the two-piece came in.
AC: We knew Chris, we were all friends but we didn’t play together very long, it was inside of a month that it was a four piece that it became clear that something was wrong.
CD: It sounded sick.
JR: The fact was that it was weird. It had to do with Karl a lot, Chris was kind of a bystander. He was totally new. We wanted to scale back to a two piece and figure some things out. We did that. And we stuck it out as a two piece for a little while and wrote some songs that we liked and played as Football for awhile.
AC: We decided to ditch the name Fever just because we had broken up the band so we went with that but we were so obviously back to the core of writing songs as the two of us. So we stuck with the name Fever. We only played as Football for two shows. And our first two piece show was a disaster.
JR: We played with No Age and Ponytail.
AC: At our warehouse, it was an awesome show. We had broken the band down to a two piece three days before. So, fast forward. We liked where we were headed but we didn’t like being a two-piece. So, enter Aaron, months and months later, January or February of this year. We’d been doing a lot of writing but hadn’t really found anybody. So we met Aaron through Ryan Wakeman, who is also booking our shows.

Was there a stylistic shift? Because you were talking about breaking down the foundation and building it back up again. Was there a distinct stylistic shift from the way you were writing before?

JR: From two to three I would say that it went from mild awesome to super awesome.
CD: It should be mentioned that Justin who now plays bass was originally playing drums.
JR: For Fever 1.0, 2.0 and 3.0
CD: I played bass during 2.0 and now I play guitar. And I would say having seen them at 2.0, 3.0, 4.0 and current.0 that we got a lot faster, louder and harder in that time.
AB: Maybe a little less swingy.
CD: Straighter and more full. My job is a gap filler.
AC: The thing with our two-piece is that it was all really soul-oriented. We didn’t have enough instruments to be a really instrumental band. So we kind of had a hop to a lot of our stuff. But then we started playing with Aaron and it was like right away with our first few practices we were like, “Oh my god, this is fantastic!” The three of us were all totally on the same page, wrote tons of new stuff, played and it was perfect.
AB: It was really easy. I’d played in bands back in LA and I’ve never been in a band that’s so easy it’s just stuff comes out all the time.
JR: So we got that going even though I was just plucking single notes for the first couple of shows.
CD: Justin learned to play bass like two, three months ago. As a dude who has played bass for a long time, I am forever amazed at Justin Rodermond.
AC: We met Aaron and wanted to jam and were like, “How are we going to do this?” Aaron’s an awesome drummer. Justin, do you want to pick up that thing? Figure out what it does?
CD: They asked me to play in late April. Justin, Alex and I had a meeting and I had a list of demands and one of them was that I have to play bass and that I have to sing. And then I ended up playing guitar and I was scared shitless because I hadn’t played guitar with anybody except myself.
JR: And then he realized that he was amazing at guitar.
AC: Another thing that we talked about, taking Fever in a different direction was wanting to be more of an instrumental, kind of rowdy band which was an easy switch that we made with Aaron. Chris came in wanting to be auxiliary and bring in more sounds. Right now we’re just a four-piece basically with two guitars, bass and drums but we’re going to start adding in keys, noise, all kinds of other stuff. That’s on the horizon.
AB: I feel like we’ve only been playing for like a month maybe and we’re at a point where we know songs, we have songs, but we haven’t even begun to really evolve and be creative together which I’m really excited about.

For not having been together terribly long, you’ve managed to have gotten some pretty choice opening slots and you have a residency at Dahlak. How did that come about?

JR: Danny started having shows here and we came and we packed the place out and he said, “Come back. Why don’t you come all the time.” And we said, “How about we do a six show residency,” and he said, “Okay.”
AB: It’s been a novel opportunity but it’s exciting in that we know so many bands and we’re excited about so many bands in D.C. I think we all feel like there’s a really breaking new music scene in D.C. that is not often enough promoted or noticed. People think “Oh, where’s the music in D.C.” and I feel like we know so many quality bands, quality people who are really creative. We practice with them. Or we just go to their shows. So it’s exciting for us that we can curate the next couple months of shows here.
AC: It’s a brand new thing since we moved here. When we moved here, we didn’t feel a scene at all. Now there’s so many awesome new bands that we’re like, it would be no problem if we got this to book it out with friends of ours and other bands that are all good.
JR: And a lot of the bands were there but we didn’t know about them.
AC: And this location becomes very good because everyone knows Velvet Lounge, DC9 and all that where bands like us play. Playing up here, it’s a whole different crowd.
AB: We want to create more music venues.
CD: Dahlak’s had shows for awhile but no one really knew about them. And they have open mics here every Thursday , but it I think it took the right storms, the right fronts moving in to create a lot of lightning and thunder.

Nice imagery, there. Chris, you were one of the organizers behind the Mt. Pleasant Benefit, do you feel that there’s a sort of responsibility you hold personally, or as a group to help create additional venues?

AC: That was our goal when we moved here. Gold Leaf was a huge thing in that regard. That was our goal when that started, when we didn’t know anybody we were like, “We want to have shows here.”
CD: To clarify, Gold Leaf is the studio where we practice in Chinatown, used to be a trans-am studio and there used to be big culture club parties there. We don’t do those anymore, it’s now a dedicated practice space and also recording studio. Now U.S. Royalty and The Coats practice there. Part of the reason I moved to D.C. was because I was so into the mid-90s Revolution Summer stuff. But, I’ve always been interested in free shows, in benefit shows, alternative spaces and have tried to involve myself as much as possible with that sort of thing. So the concert thing for me was a personal success as well as a financial and community success. So, I hope that it happens more and more and I hope that this Dahlak thing works out because it’s such a positive thing. People like free. People like summer.

Who are some of the other D.C. bands that you really like and enjoy playing with?

CD: True Womanhood, Pree, The Coats, US Royalty, Kalem of the East
AB: Ra Ra Rasputin, Lode Runner
JR: We wanted to get them involved but it’s going to be Bop Beetle, a Lode Runner spin off band. Black & White Jacksons are playing. The City Veins.

Can you tell me who some of your influences are?

AC: We’re all really different.
JR: ELO
AC: The Kinks
CD: Les Savy Fav
JR: The Beatles
AC: T. Rex
CD: Townes Van Zandt
AB: Brian Eno
JR: The Jam
CD: Wild Ficitions
AB: I can’t even think of anybody. I like No Age right now.
CD: I love The Dodos.
JR: Grandaddy
AB: Modest Mouse
CD: Aaron and I are coming from a much different place than Alex and Justin. That interplay works real well because I’ve been in bands for a long time. Aaron was in a bunch of bands and these guys got into it very late in the game and that purity that Alex and Justin bring to the table works well with my tainted sensibility.
AB: So much of my life has been researching music and listening to so many different kinds of music, all genres and anything you name. Every single practice I can name at least three bands that these guys have never heard of and that’s the most awesome thing about the band is that it’s so reflective in our songwriting. It’s very refreshing. It sounds retro. There’s a lot of stuff going on that hasn’t been soiled or been tainted by having an idea of what music has progressed and who’s cool and who’s not. It’s a great dynamic, too.

Which one of the national touring acts that you’ve opened for has been your favorite to play with?

AB: I liked De Novo Dahl. I’m really excited about the Mae Shi. (note, this interview was done before The Mae Shi show).
CD: I’d have been really into Pela.

What’s been your favorite venue to play? Which ones would you like to play?

AC: My next goal is a show at Backstage at the Black Cat.
CD: I’ve played it, it’s okay!
JR: We play Velvet Lounge a lot.
CD: Velvet Lounge, I know it well. I want to play a big one. I want to play Black Cat Mainstage.
JR: I would prefer Black Cat Mainstage to 9:30 Club
CD: I am not excited about 9:30 Club. I think it’s too cavernous and I’ve seen bands that I really loved, like The Walkmen, that I’ve seen a bunch of times. I love them and I’ve seen them in small places and I saw them at the 9:30 Club and I was so upset. I was disappointed because it just swallows bands whole. Maybe not the Decemberists or somebody who thrives off of that huge setting.
AC: I saw Kings of Leon at the 9:30 Club and I thought it was awesome.
CD: Well they’re basically an arena rock band. But we’d basically be swallowed up, I think. Black Cat Mainstage is a lot more organic of a venue. Their sound is a lot warmer. It’s a lot more intimate. I think we’d kill it; blow it up. Also, I want to resurrect the Voters Drive idea. I’ve been thinking a lot about that we want to put on a voter drive, get new voters registered, get like a La Casa type feel, get a ton of bands to register a lot of people to vote. So, look out for that around October.