Being a long time fan of Spagetti Westerns (namely those involving Clint Eastwood) and being a fan of The Clash and their song 'The Magnificent Seven', Jeremy suggested the name to the band. 'The Magnificent Seven' was a movie with a few sequels and also a television series. Elmer Bernstein (1922-2004) was the original composer of the movie theme and passed away on the 19th of August.
The Magnificent 7 started in June of 2001. Danny had been putting up flyers and posting on the Web for members. The fruits of that search were a 14-year-old guitar player who had never heard ska, a trombone player that used to be in a Christian ska band, and a bunch of people Danny already knew, including vocalist Kent and drummer Jeremy. Jeremy had recently left Special Disaster Team (punk ska band) to pursue a different style of Jamaican influenced music.
After several practices Danny broke up the band. People were showing up sporadically. No one knew the songs, let alone the styles. It was basically three ska fans and a bunch of non-ska musicians. Fast forward about ten months. Danny tried to start a garage band with the guitarist, Barret, and another drummer, Max. By the second practice, Danny had taken up the alto saxophone and it was determined we'd give ska another try. We recruited more members but they never showed up. Max quit but didn't have the balls to tell us before we set up all the gear. Corbin, the supposed trombone player, didn't show again and Danny fired him. The bass player didn't show up. Either Danny fired him or he quit. This was the best thing that ever happened because two weeks later we had a real band. Barret and Danny got Jeremy back on drums and Kent back on vocals. That was enough to start.
The next thing we needed was a bassist. Jeremy said he knew someone. Danny said he knew someone. At the next practice, they both brought their bass players. While Jon was a bona fide bassist, Brad was a multi-instrumentalist. We threw him on keys and he's seemed pretty happy ever since.
Through trying to school the Norman kids on traditional Jamaican music over the Internet, Danny met Thom. He invited him to join and lo and behold, Thom became a fan of stuff other than Mustard Plug and Voodoo Glow Skulls, even though he did miss our 2nd show to see VGS.
Even with Mr. Thom Bone, the horn section was still lacking, so we found a band nerd named Eric. He was already in Third Grade Scuffle, but we thought he'd dig our band too since he got a lot of improv time. Unfortunately we either scared the shit out of him or he thought we were inept for playing out of tune. Either way, he took Danny's CDs and never came back.
As time went on, some of the members noticed that Thom and Barret weren't happy. We realized they were about to quit and decided to talk to them. But by then it was too late. Thom announced that he was leaving the band and that the Mustarg Plug show would be his last. The next day, Barret quit too. We thought we were screwed. We don't know any other ska musicians. But Danny remembered that a band called Oedipus and the Mamas Boys had a good guitarist named Levi. He posted on the local BBSs asking if anyone knew how to find Levi. It worked. Levi met us, liked us, joined us. And we're damned glad to have him. Thanks to Jeremy, we played a 2-week tour with the Toasters and Big D and the Kids Table. The crowds liked us. In fact, our worst audience on the whole tour (except for Baton Rouge, but that's another story) was Oklahoma City. Go figure.
After the first big tour, Jeremy left to focus on taking care of his new baby and had just taken over big responsabilities for The Toasters and Megalith Records. During this time the band tried out a few drummers in the area, but nothing panned out. Brad sat on the drums for awhile, but that left the keyboard empty. A few months later once Jeremy got the hang of raising a kid and running a record label, we all talked and Jeremy came back. Since then we have left the state three more times for micro tours playing with The Toasters again and another mini tour with King Django and The Drastics. Which included a big festival date in Grand Junction, CO (more on this later).
Afterwards, Levi left the band to pursue his bi-lingual activities in foreign countries, while just before that we gained two additional horn players, Grant and David on Sax and Trombone. David left at the beginning of the last tour (here is some more of that, and more still to come).
Since then Jeremy had become friends with Justin Dillavou, the old singer/guitarist of the ska oi! band The Skoidats. He had moved to Oklahoma to go to college and started coming to our shows. After Levi left we were looking for someone to fill in for him while we did a little 6 shows tour. During this time looking for a temp guitarist Justin expressed interest in jamming with us. He came to about 4 practices(?) helped us re-organize a tune we were having issues with, and brought some insight to the band and music scene in general. He then played one show with us and looked to be set to tour, but work and school laid down the law and kept him from touring as well as becoming a full time member....suxxor.
So Danny moves to guitar full time since we now had two horn players, but now that we had to rhythm guitar player, Danny is taking up both stick bass stylee and rhythm. So we go out on this tour which ends up being only 3 shows instead of 6 cause we couldn't get places to respond to trying to get a show booked. Grand Juntion, CO. was the first show, not a lot of people there and we drove almost 16 hours to get there, so we were a little bummed out on stage and to top it all off, David the new Trombone player, mysteriously disappears the next morning. After searching around for almost 2 hours for him, we finally get a hold of him on his cell phone to find out, he has left the band/tour, talk about fucked up (later has arrived). So we are back home, two members gone in two weeks. Back down to solid 6 ;)
A few more local shows and a trip to Denver to open up for Westbound Train, things are going well, but tensions are mounting with different views on musical direction. Practices are getting few and far between, new songs aren't being written. Danny decides to quit the band to leave the state and subsequently start a new band with Brad and Kent, playing instrumental reggae. The band plays one final show with this line up, opening up for Cracker (yes that band Cracker) at their favorite venue, VZDs in OKC.
Afterwards, Jon Jeremy and Grant are left, some time off is taken off, then Jon brings his friend Zach in to play guitar. A few practices are held, some songs are forming, but without keys general cohesiveness, Jeremy calls it a day. Since then, Jeremy starting playing drums with The Starkweather Boys and at New Life Church in Norman. After being kicked out of The Starkweather Boys for reasons beyond him, he meets Kevin Fitzgerald (guitar / vocals) who is just disbanding his rock band and wants to pursue new musical venues. About this time Jay Martin (bass) is introduced to Jeremy and voices interest in joining a band. Them together with long time local rockabilly guitar player, Greg Bogart, the 4 are now gearing up to start the band again, but this time taking it in to a new direction. More 2tone driven with rockabilly surf and pop elements blended in to form a "dance" music band. The hopes that people will start dancing at clubs and bars again, instead of sitting drinking and talking during live performances... [8/24/07]
Members of the past include:
Cheek, Brian : Keys
Dauffenbach, Thom : Trombone, Vocals
Davis, Barret : Guitar
DeWall, Kent : Vocals, Percussion
Dilavou, Justin : Guitar
Felton, Daniel : Guitar
Fielder, Bradly : Keyboard, Vocals
Fowler, Daniel : Trombone, Vocals
Granny's, Max : Drums
Nordahl, David : Trombone, Percussion and Back-up Vocals
Nuckols, Levi : Guitar
Peters, Danny : Guitar, Sax, Melodica
Rhoton, Jonathan : Bass
Schofield, Grant : Sax
Smith, Amber : Trumpet
Waggoner, Nick : Bass, Guitar
Walschap, Eric : Tenor Sax
Williams, Zach "Z-dub" : Guitar
Michael ? : Bass
Laney ? : Keys
Levi "Little" : Trumpet
[Portions of this bio were written and constructed by Danny Peters with later elements by Jeremy Patton]
